26 STATE BORROWING. 



PART III.— SINKING FUNDS FOR THE ABSO- 

 LUTE REDEMPTION OF EXISTING AND 

 FUTURE STATE DEBTS. 



Having already demonstrated that the Wealth of the 

 People of the Australian States since the introduction of 

 Loans has increased in a vastly greater ratio than either 

 Population or the present aggregate capital value of the 

 unredeemed State Debts ; and also, that, owing to the 

 consequent increase of population and the growing 

 working profit of State Railways to State Treasury re- 

 venues, the burden of interest for State Debts of 

 £240,149,727 in the year 1906-7 only exceeds by 2d. per 

 head the corresponding interest burden for State Debts 

 in 1870, when the latter only amounted to £28,328,000, 

 it becomes an important matter to examine the ques- 

 tion, now so frequently proposed, as to the absolute 

 redemption of present and future debts by means of 

 yearly appropriation from current States revenue ac- 

 counts towards an absolute Redemption Sinking Fund 

 within a given term of years from the present date as 

 regards debts incurred in past years, and similar provi- 

 sion for freshly incurred debts from the date of their 

 contraction. 



There are many suggestions recently advocated li- 

 very able public men interested in the problems of 

 State Finance for such a purpose. 



But the real question is : How far should the tax- 

 payer of the day burden himself, not only with his own 

 share of burdens of the State for which he in his own 

 time is responsible, but also with burdens incurred by a 

 former generation of taxpayers, with the view obviously 

 of giving a much lighter burden to future generations of 

 taxpayers, who (having the same or a fuller benefit of 

 the same Asset) by the natural increase of numbers, 

 would be financially more able to bear such absolute 

 weight of burden of interest on necessary State Debts 

 than the taxpayers of to-day. 



The suggestions made by many of such advisers, in 

 promoting the idea of creating such Sinking Funds for 

 the Total Redemption of existing and future State 



