198 STUDIES, SCIENTIFIC AND SOCIAL chap. 



ately commenced an enormous increase in war expenditure, 

 and a few figures will show how great this increase was. 

 I am speaking of the ten years 1874 to 1883. Austria 

 increased her expenditure from £7,000,000 to £13,500,000; 

 France, from £18,000,000 to £35,500,000, very nearly 

 double ; Germany herself, not so much, because she was 

 in a very fine position before, from £17,000,000 to 

 £20,000,000 ; Italy increased still more, from £9,000,000 a 

 year to £19,000,000 a year; Russia, from £20,000,000 to 

 £30,000,000 a year. The total of these shows that 

 whereas up to 1874 these six great nations spent 

 £96,000,000 a year on their warlike material and expen- 

 diture, in 1883 they spent £150,000,000. Here was an 

 increase of £54,000,000 sterling, all newly added to the 

 taxation of these countries, and, remember, the most 

 utterly unproductive taxation that it is possible to 

 conceive. 



Evil Results of War Expenditure. 



Now it is not generally considered how varied and 

 extensive are the evil results of such expenditure. 

 The losses involved by it may be summarised under 

 three heads. We have, first, the large number of men 

 employed unproductively ; secondly, the increase of 

 taxation ; and, thirdly, the vast destruction and waste in 

 war. 



First, as to the unproductive men. I find that 

 the European armies have increased since 1870 by 

 630,000 men — more than half a million. The present 

 total is more that three and a-half millions of men, 

 and this is what they call a peace establishment. 

 Then it is not generally considered that this number 

 of men by no means represents the number of men * 

 who are taken away altogether from productive work, 

 for in addition to those who do nothing but drill and 

 prepare for the purposes of destruction, you must have 

 another army of men who are employed in supplying 

 these with the materials for destruction ; and I believe, 

 if we could follow out all the war material to its source, 

 and thus arrive at the total number of the men employed 



