170 Statistical Botes on fl&ejico. 



TRADE BETWEEN MEXICO AND THE UNITED STATES. 



It is quite difficult to make a correct statement of the trade between 

 Mexico and the United States, because the official data of both govern- 

 ments never used to agree, especially on account of the different cur- 

 rencies prevailing in the two countries. As we have the silver standard, 

 all our public accounts are kept in silver, and that makes our exports 

 appear twice as large in value as they really are, when stated in the 

 money of the United States, while we give our imports in the value of the 

 country from whence they come, that is their gold value. That fact, 

 which has often been overlooked, has caused the prevailing idea that 

 there is a very large balance of trade in favor of Mexico, because 

 the exports of United States commodities in Mexico amount to a given 

 figure a year, the imports to this country of Mexican commodities 

 amount to over double that figure ; but it must be borne in mind that 

 the former is in silver while the latter is in gold. For instance, accord- 

 ing to the Mexican Bureau of Statistics the imports into Mexico of 

 merchandise from the United States in the fiscal year ended June 30, 

 1896, amounted to $20,145,763, while the exports of metals and com- 

 modities from Mexico to the United States during the same year 

 amounted to $79,651,695, the proportion being almost four to one ; but 

 if the imports are doubled as they ought to be, because the Mexican 

 currency is silver, they amount to $40,291,526, and if the exports of 

 Mexico into the United States, calculated also in silver, are reduced to 

 gold, they will amount to one half or $39,825,847.50. 



In corroboration of this statement I will mention the fact that ac- 

 cording to the data of the Statistical Bureau of the United States 

 Treasury Department, the exports to Mexico of commodities and pre- 

 cious metals from the United States during the last fiscal year, end- 

 ing June 30, 1897, amounted to $23,535,213 while the imports into the 

 United States of commodities and precious metals amounted to $30,- 

 714,366. Since March 1893, however, the Statistical Bureau of the 

 United States Treasury Department, has reduced to gold the silver 

 value of the Mexican metals and commodities imported in this coun- 

 try, and its data come now nearer to the mark, as in the year 1896 it 

 gives the total exports of merchandise from this country into Mexico 

 as $19,450,256, while the total imports of merchandise from Mexico 

 into this country are $17,456,177. 



The figures of our exports appear very large in the Mexican re- 

 turns, because our merchandise is sold in gold markets, and their gold 

 price is reduced to silver, and increased in the same proportion in 

 which silver depreciates. It is not therefore the amount of merchan- 

 dise which has increased so much, as that the price has been swollen in 

 reducing it from gold to silver. In that regard the returns from the 

 United States Statistical Bureau are more in conformity with the facts. 



