Neue Freie Presse
- Warning against a mistake in state finance.
- Behold America!
- Rise of the French franc and the lira.
The front page of 13 November 1926 led with a column by an unnamed "eminent expert" warning against a fiscal mistake. Its subject was a bill, introduced more than two months earlier by the Ramek government, that would let the Austrian Länder tax alcoholic drinks to cover at most nine million schillings a year in extra costs from the unemployment insurance amendment, and the parties had fought over it for two months. Ann Tizia Leitich wrote from New York under the title "Ecce Amerika!", opening with the scattered cries of warning and indignation about a wave rolling over the "so-called civilized world". A market report described a sharp Friday rise of the French franc, with Paris quoted at 17.30 in Zurich and the pound down to 145½ on the French markets.
Translation
Warning against a mistake in state finance.
By an eminent expert.
It is more than two months since the Ramek government introduced a bill in the National Council by which the federal states were to receive the right to levy duties on alcoholic beverages. The explanatory memorandum to this bill calculated that the additional burdens on the states and municipalities arising from the amendment to the unemployment insurance law, which the states' beverage taxes are meant to cover, would amount to at most nine million schillings a year. For two months now the political parties have fought over the bill, proof of how strong the arguments raised against it were.
Behold America!
By Ann Tizia Leitich, New York.
Here and there, like jets of flame out of a dull, massive haze, cries of warning shoot up, screams of indignation, sighs of resentful impotence. They complain of the giant wave of intellectual “Verpowerung” that is rolling over the so-called civilized world;
Rise of the French franc and the lira.
In the course of yesterday the French franc recorded a pronounced upward movement, in sharp contrast to the weak tendency on Thursday. In the course of yesterday the Paris rate in Zurich again went as high as 17.30, and the pound fell on the French markets to 145½. On today's
Context
Why the column still speaks of the Ramek government
The column dates the beverage-tax bill to "more than two months" earlier and attributes it to the Ramek government. Rudolf Ramek resigned as chancellor on 20 October 1926, during the crisis around the state-owned Postsparkasse, and Ignaz Seipel succeeded him once more. By the date of this issue the cabinet that had introduced the bill was therefore gone, and the party fight the author describes had outlasted the government that started it. Ramek's term also saw the end of League of Nations supervision of Austrian finances, while the depression continued and unemployment kept rising. In that setting an amendment to unemployment insurance, and the question of who would pay for it, became a live political issue. The ceiling of nine million schillings a year is the government memorandum's estimate as quoted by the paper.
How federal–Land tax sharing framed the beverage-tax dispute
Austria's financial relations between the federation and the Länder rested on the Abgabenteilungsgesetz passed on 3 March 1922, which assured the Länder shares of certain federal taxes. In return the Länder had to give up surcharges on state taxes. The law was amended almost every year, nearly always in Vienna's favour, and from the late 1920s the Christian Social-dominated federation turned such tax-sharing laws into instruments against the Social Democratic municipality of Vienna. The bill discussed in this column worked differently: it would give the Länder their own right to tax alcoholic drinks and make them meet the new unemployment insurance costs from that revenue. Because the division of revenue between Bund and Länder was already politically charged, the two-month party fight the expert reports belongs to that larger contest over who controlled which taxes.
Why the lira was rising in late 1926
The paper's market report describes the French franc jumping on Friday after Thursday's weakness, with the Paris rate reaching 17.30 in Zurich and the pound falling to 145½ on the French markets. For the lira named in the same headline, the independent background is Mussolini's "Quota 90". On 18 August 1926, in a speech at Pesaro, Mussolini announced a revaluation pegging the lira at 92.46 to the pound, to be reached by December 1927; that had been the market rate when he took power in 1922. A lira rising in November 1926 moved in the direction this declared policy demanded. The revaluation was later accompanied by industrial and agricultural wage cuts in 1927 that went beyond the fall in prices and lowered real wages.
Ann Tizia Leitich, the paper's voice from New York
Ann Tizia Leitich emigrated to the United States in 1921 after a mental breakdown and worked as a housemaid in Chicago and New York until the Neue Freie Presse gave her a job. Her articles on Austria and Germany and on American daily life were highly praised in Austria, and she was at the height of her popularity from about 1923 to 1928, the year she moved back to Vienna. "Ecce Amerika!", datelined New York, comes from that peak. Its opening sets out the warnings, indignation and sighs of impotence directed at a wave sweeping the "so-called civilized world". The excerpt ends before Leitich gives her own view, so it shows how she framed the debate rather than which side she took.
Original
Warnung vor einem staatsfinanziellen Fehler.
Es sind mehr als zwei Monate her, daß die Regierung Ramek im Nationalrat einen Gesetzentwurf einbrachte, durch den die Bundesländer das Recht erhalten sollten, auf alkoholische Getränke Abgaben zu legen. In dem Motivenbericht zu diesem Gesetzentwurf war errechnet, daß die Mehrlasten der Länder und Gemeinden aus der Arbeitslosenversicherungsnovelle, zu deren Deckung die Getränkesteuern der Länder dienen sollen, jährlich höchstens neun Millionen Schilling betragen werden. Zwei Monate haben nun die politischen Parteien um die Gesetzesvorlage gekämpft, ein Beweis, wie kräftige Gegengründe sich gegen die Vorlage geltend machten.
Ecce Amerika!
Hie und da schießen wie Stichflammen aus einem dumpfen, massigen Brodem Warnungsrufe empor, Schreie der Empörung, Seufzer grollender Ohnmacht. Sie beklagen sich über die Riesenwoge geistiger Verpowerung, die über die sogenannte zivilisierte Welt rollt;
Steigerung des französischen Francs und der Lira.
Der französische Franc verzeichnete im Laufe des gestrigen Tages eine ausgesprochene Haussebewegung, die im schroffen Gegensatz zu der schwachen Tendenz am Donnerstag stand. Die Devise Paris ging im Laufe des gestrigen Tages in Zürich wieder bis 17. 30, das Pfund senkte sich auf den französischen Plätzen bis 145½. Am heutigen