SPENDING WITH SAVING
SIR,—When facetiousness divorces fairness "we are not amused." Mr. T. C. Macaulay jokes copiously over the state- ment by another person which I passed on to your readers ; but he ignores my own brief contribution to the debate, namely, that Saving and considerate Spending are comple- mentary rather than contradictory.
Herr Hitler's words " We must export or die " are even more true of our own small island than of his Greater Reich. But Exports and Imports are fundamentally Barter. The business men who so ardently hope that a wide Anglo-Spanish trade agreement will be signed next month know that Spain cannot buy largely of our products if we do not take her oranges, wines, nuts and olives, as well as her ores. Too many people fondly imagine that foreigners possess coffee-pots or stockings full of good currency with which to pay for British goods.
Kindly allow me to correct an obvious slip in my first letter. Mr. Robertson Scott's " two-fifths " of the drink bill for revanue purposes would be Ltoopoo,000, not £150,000,000. But, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer has told us that he expects L95,000,ocon from the beer duty alone, it is clear that Lioo,000,000 from all alcoholic beverages together is an under- estimate of the non-teetotallers' contribution to the Treasury.
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