BY R. M. JOHNSTON, I.S.O., F.S.S. 27 



Debts, within the limits of periods of, say, 40 to 60 

 years, though eminently prudent and economic from 

 the standpoint of a private individual, may still be open 

 to question or qualification when applied to the 

 economics of a corporate body, such as a Railway, Joint 

 Stock Company or modern Industrial State. 



The policy for determining the extent, form, and 

 duration of Public Loans, contracted for the purpose of 

 investment in any advantageous scheme of remunera- 

 tive or reproductive work or purpose, should differ 

 widely in some important respects, accordingly as it 

 affects the future outlook of the private individual, the 

 corporate body, or the Industrial State, for the follow- 

 ing reasons : — 



The " Life-expectation " of an individual person is 

 limited, and rapidly diminishes at every stage — sav after 

 the age of 20 years. In like manner his natural powers, 

 physical and mental, gradually decline, especially so 

 towards the close of the average individual life. 



The average Breadwinner of the State may be taken 

 as the Shareholder unit of the State, corresponding 

 somewhat to the individual as the Breadwinner of the 

 Family Circle. The average State Breadwinner's life, 

 however, is practically interminable — never grows older 

 with years — and, in the aggregate, whose individuality 

 is ever changing in young prosperous States, the Bread- 

 winners or Taxpayers at the end of a century are 

 likely to possess fully five times the power and revenue- 

 yielding ability possessed by the aggregate Bread- 

 winners or Taxpayers of the same State at the begin- 

 ning of the century, so far as any fixed amount of debt 

 is concerned. Even if the present debt increased in 

 the ratio of population, the latter, from the greater 

 wealth producing asset, kept up to present value by 

 current revenue for renewals and repairs, without any 

 redemption of debts, would still be less burdened per 

 head than the State Taxpayers of to-day. 



The important distinction between the Individual 

 Family Breadwinner and the corresponding unit — the 

 Taxpayer of the State — is perhaps best illustrated by 

 comparing the present capital value of £1 respectively 

 of the annual incomes of the private individual and the 

 State Taxpayer, as in the following abstract : — 



