Lenin: 1916/ni-zeta: LLOYD GEORGE ON £4,000,000,000 (original) (raw)
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
NOTEBOOK “ζ”
(“ZETA”)
LLOYD GEORGE ON £4,000,000,000
Lloyd George in the House of Commons. Tuesday, May 4, 1915 (The Daily Telegraph, May 5.)
...“What is the income of this country? The income of this country in times of peace is £2,400,000,000.
| “Now it is probably higher. Why? We are spendinghundreds of millions of borrowed money here.Most of it is spent in this country. Men are workingtime and overtime, their wages are higher; profitsin certain trades are higher, certainly considerablyhigher; and the result is that the income of thiscountry at the present moment is probably higherthan in times of peace. Some are probably makinghuge profits—(hear, hear)—and others have raisedtheir income far beyond their ordinary standard. | N.B. N.B. |
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| “I have no doubt that it would be perfectly justwhen we come to consider, if we can have to do it,what taxes you have to raise or what contributionyou have to levy in order to enable you to getthrough a war lasting two or three years—it wouldbe perfectly legitimate to resort to those who havemade exceptional incomes out of the war (cheers)....What are the ordinary savings of this country intimes of peace? The ordinary savings are about£300-400 (millions) per annum. The income is higher,and I do not think it is too much to say thatin every country in Europe the standard of livingis considerably lower—I am not sure to what extent. |
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| N.B. |
| “But the savings of this country during theperiod of the war when the income is higher oughtto be double.” |
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| N.B. |
And another passage from the same speech:
| “We are an enormously rich coun-try—certainly the richest in Europe.I am not sure that we are not the richest country in the world, in pro-portion to population. We have£4,000,000,000 invested in foreignand _colonial securitiesof the best_”!!...“We have got _to financethe purchases of most ofour Allies_”.... |
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| £4,000,000,000 |
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