The German Imperial Estimates, which were published in the Times
on Wednesday, show that the finances of Germany are in a far from satisfactory condition. Receipts and expen- diture are balanced at a little over 2123,000,000, which indi- cates an increase in expenditure of two millions over the past year. So far as concerns the extraordinary expenditure for next year, there is a deficit of over four millions in the amount available to meet it, and the Federated States are unable to meet the whole of this and the other deficits out of "assessed contributions," a special levy in addition to what such States receive from the Imperial taxes assigned to them. Loan credits are therefore to be raised by the Imperial Chancellor to the amount of eleven millions to cover the extraordinary expenses of the Imperial Departments, the Army and the Navy, and certain deficits carried over from last year. "It is a fact," says the Memorandum which accompanies the Estimates, "that the Empire, unless its revenue should be increased, cannot provide for its growing financial necessities, and recourse must be had once more to the loan credit, un- desirable as this expedient may be from the point of view of sound finance." The gravity of the position may be realised when we remember that indirect taxation is already strained to its utmost capacity, and that any attempt to find relief from that quarter would probably so decrease consumption as still further to diminish the receipts of the Exchequer.
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