2. Regulated Wages. The fact that the problem of German wages was worked out at leisure in exact correlation to productions whose types were exhaustively studied in the calm of peace-time certainly allowed the Germans to obtain war-materials at a lower net cost than was possible for the Allies.
3. The Prevention of Waste. The absence of experimentation and the simple extension to war-work of highly efficient industrial methods tested in peace-time, naturally allowed the Germans to avoid in all spheres those immense losses of material of every nature whose bad effects and heavy cost were incurred by the Allies. This state of affairs in France caused losses which were as expensive as they were inevitable. One may imagine the conditions existing in Russia, where control is far more difficult of exercise than in France.
4. Cheap Labor. The Germans have forcibly enlisted the labor of about two million prisoners of war. Moreover, the official French report of April 12, 1917, concerning acts committed by the Germans in violation of international law, asserts that in the occupied territories deportation of workers has been a general measure. It has ‘applied to the entire able-bodied population of both sexes, from the ages of sixteen to sixty, excepting women with young children.’
Now, the Germans requisition labor from among 7,500,000 Belgians, 3,000,000 French, 4,500,000 Serbians, 5,000,000 Roumanians, 22,000,000 Poles, Ruthenians, and Lithuanians—a total of 42,000,000 slaves.
Let us see what sort of remuneration is made. Take the case of a young girl of Lille, twenty years old, who was forced to work for six months, harvesting and threshing wheat and digging potatoes from six in the morning to twilight, receiving all the while the vilest food. For her six months of work she was given 9 francs, 45 centimes. The Germans, therefore, have at their disposal a vast reservoir of labor for which they pay next to nothing; moreover, the small amounts they do pay remain in Pan-Germany.
The Allies, on the contrary, pay high wages to their workers, and, when they run short, must needs pour out good gold in bringing reinforcements from Asia, Africa, and America. This means that a considerable part of the wages paid these foreign workmen will leave France or England for all time.
5. Free Coal and Iron Ore. In addition to their own mines, the Germans have seized important coal and iron mines in France, Belgium, and Poland. A vast proportion of their ore and coal therefore costs them nothing. Naturally, then, a German shell made with French iron and Belgian coal costs far less than a French shell made with American steel and English coal. As a result, the net price of a greater part of German munitions is much lower than that paid by the Allies.
6. Economical Transportation. By reason of the grouping of the Central Powers,—a result of the conquest of the Danube front by the Teutons,—Germany profits by a geographical situation which is infinitely more advantageous than that of the Allies, as regards not only the speed, but also the cheapness, of war-transportation. It is evident that it costs far less to send a shell from the Krupp factory to any one of the Pan-German fronts than to send an American shell to France, a Japanese shell to the Polish front, a French shell to Roumania via Archangel, or an English shell to the army operating in Mesopotamia. By the same token, the cost of transporting a soldier of Pan-Germany to any of the battle-fronts is infinitely lighter than that of transporting Allied soldiers from Australia or America.
We should note that each one of these six factors which we have just enumerated reacts profoundly on the sum-total of general war-expenses, and that, taken together, they involve a formidable sum. It can therefore truthfully be said that Germany carries on the war much more economically than the Allies. Figures are so far lacking which will give the true proportions, but we shall certainly remain well within the realities of the case if we conclude that, as a result of the six factors mentioned above, France must spend one hundred and fifty million francs for war material to every hundred million spent by Germany. When, therefore, France spends thirty billions, Germany evidently spends not more than twenty billions. And what is true of France applies even more accurately to some of the other Allied nations.
This is a fact of the greatest general importance in coming to a true understanding of the financial situation created by the war—a fact which takes on its full significance when we realize that Germany is not only carrying on the war cheaply, but that she has been enabled, by means of this war, to win very important advantages.