OUR INDUSTRIAL AND FINANCIAL FUTURE 477 



The vast readjustment which such a change in values made 

 necessary was accomplished, however, without panic, without 

 great failures, and with few of these disasters which usually 

 are the features of such a period. The way the country met 

 the situation stands to-day as the most striking monument we 

 have yet reared to our increasing wealth and financial strength. 



Ten years ago we had a population of sixty eight millions ; 

 to-day it is eighty two millions, and ten years hence, with this 

 ratio of increase, the population of the United States will be 

 ninety eight millions. We will in the next ten years add to 

 our number a population equal to one half of France. Such 

 growth in numbers matched to our wealth of resources makes 

 the sort of material out of which to shape an entirely new level 

 of statistics marking the country's material progress. 



The total wealth of the United States, according to the 

 best estimates which we have, has risen in ten years from 

 $75,000,000,000 to $106,000,000,000. Ten years more of in- 

 crease will make the wealth of this country $140,000,000,000. 

 When we remember that such a total will compare with the 

 total of $42,000,000,000 in 1880, the accumulation is seen to be 

 at a rate almost incredible. 



Our money stock has increased in ten years from $1,600,- 

 000,000 to more than $2,500,000,000, and every dollar of it is 

 sound and every dollar of it is on a parity with gold. The 

 actual gold stock itself increased in that period $250,000,000. 

 If the money stock increases in the next ten years in the same 

 amounts, we will have $3,400,000,000 of circulation at the end 

 of that period. Incidentally, it is interesting to note that 

 national bank note circulation in the last ten years has risen 

 from $172,000,000 to $411,000,000; and one might stop to won- 

 der, if this rate of increase is to go on, where the government 

 bonds are to come from in the next ten years to provide for a 

 further increase of national bank circulation of $250,000,000 or 

 $300,000,000. Such inquiry points inevitably to the necessity 

 of some change in our national banking laws in the due course 

 of time. 



National bank deposits in ten years have doubled, going 

 up from $1,600,000,000 to $3,300,000,000. State bank de- 



