The politics are almost entirely personal, and the parties have little discipline; the leaders are full of vague ideas of progress and the megalomania common in the politicians of a new country, and this lack of experience and capability appears very clearly in the finance. Congress is not really competent to consider the budget, and it is usually hurried through in a most unceremonious manner, and the vast increase of expenditure alarms the thoughtful men of the Republic. A recent work[65] on the general financial conditions says: "The increase of national expenditure is a constant, we might almost say fatal, fact, which reproduces itself year by year in the Argentine administration."
It is true that a young country ought not to be criticised on the same principles as ancient, long-established States. It is necessary for the former rapidly to develop its resources and lay foundations upon which future generations may build, and such a process entails great public expense. But there is a conviction that economy and good administration are urgently needed, and that the future is being unduly mortgaged. Resentment at the growth of public burdens is very keen, and political strikes are becoming common. The temptation to squander public funds is almost irresistible, and as elsewhere, economy is unpopular and has utterly inadequate safeguards.
There is reason to fear that little actual improvement is likely in the near future, for the whole system is on an unsound basis—the view that political power is not an honourable privilege but a perquisite. The general national attitude towards this subject is worse in many countries than in Argentina, but an eminent French economist[66] points out the capital vice of South American politics: "Leurs hommes les plus énergiques, au lieu de chercher la richesse dans l'exploitation des agents naturels, l'ont cherché dans l'exploitation du pouvoir. Ils n'ont pas pour force motrice la concurrence économique, mais la concurrence politique. Ils considérent que le moyen le plus prompt et le plus facile de s'enricher est d'être les maîtres du gouvernment."
There is some analogy between the position of Argentina and the United States. In both countries business careers have offered such attractions that the best and strongest men have devoted themselves to the amassing of wealth, and politics have fallen into inferior hands. This is better than the case in many States where those who desire wealth look first of all to a political career, but the United States has of late realised that politics is a pursuit which demands high intelligence and character, and thus the national welfare has been appreciably advanced. In Argentina the race for wealth has been too absorbing to allow devotion of the best energies to politics, but as time goes on professions will become more sharply distinguished and a leisured and, it may be hoped, public-spirited class will grow up, and Argentina may gain a reputation not only for stability but also for good administration.
CHAPTER XI
CONDITION OF THE PEOPLE—WAGES AND COST OF LIVING—IMMIGRATION
The Condition of the People question, as Carlyle says, is the most pressing of all. But it is a question almost impossible to answer, and few inquiries are more futile than the attempt to ascertain the comparative well-being of different countries. Two inquirers with equal knowledge of a country will collect statistics and compile elaborate volumes, and one will come to the conclusion that the people are extremely well off and the other that they are in extreme destitution. They will then apply themselves to another country with the same contradictory results. Carlyle complains: "Hitherto, after many tables and statements, one is still left mainly to what he can ascertain by his own eyes, looking at the concrete phenomenon for himself. There is no other method; and yet it is a most imperfect method. Each man expands his own hand-breadth of observation to the limits of the general whole; more or less, each man must take what he himself has seen and ascertained for a sample of all that is seeable and ascertainable. Hence discrepancies, controversies, widespread, long-continued; which there is at present no means or hope of satisfactorily ending." Wages, price of food, rents, and the other weapons of the statistician are of very little use in attacking the problem. The Hindu peasant may be too poor to buy meat, but if he is non-carnivorous, the deprivation is no hardship, and he may enjoy much greater material well-being than many who eat meat daily. But knowledge of the elementary facts about the life of a people seems to have little effect in elucidating the question, for, as just remarked, people with long experience come to diametrically opposite conclusions. Those who have lived all their lives in England or Ireland disagree toto cælo in their opinions as to the well-being of the working classes. Many observers, of course, believing that facts are silent until they are interpreted by theory, use their facts for the sole purpose of making their theory speak, but, as a matter of fact, entirely disinterested persons differ quite as profoundly. One is tempted to believe that in the Condition of the People question there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so. Probably no one could get an idea of the condition of the poor approaching in any degree to accuracy without living long among them in exactly their way, and even then his conclusions would be warped in every way by reference to his own standards and by the fact that the circumstances, which to him were temporal, were to his associates everlasting. Further, his imperfect knowledge would apply only to one people and so would be useless for the purposes of comparison.
It is not likely, therefore, that a visitor will be able to impart much information upon the subject, but the opinions of the experienced and the testimony of statistics form a rough guide, and these may be given.
In Buenos Aires, of course, wages are higher than elsewhere and the cost of living is also high. The following table shows the rate of wages in some important trades in that city:—