Question

What role did World War I play in the development of public investing in the United States?.

Answer 1

Role World War I play in the development of public investing in the United States: -

Although the United States was actively involved in World War I for only nineteen months, from April 1917 to November 1918, the mobilization of the economy was extraordinary. Over four million Americans served in the armed forces, and the U.S. economy turned out a vast supply of raw materials and munitions. The war in Europe, of course, began long before the United States entered. On June 28, 1914 in Sarajevo Gavrilo Princip, a young Serbian revolutionary, shot and killed Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie. A few months later the great powers of Europe were at war.

Many Europeans entered the war thinking that victory would come easily. Few had the understanding shown by a 26 year-old conservative Member of Parliament, Winston Churchill, in 1901. “I have frequently been astonished to hear with what composure and how glibly Members, and even Ministers, talk of a European War.” He went on to point out that in the past European wars had been fought by small professional armies, but in the future huge populations would be involved, and he predicted that a European war would end “in the ruin of the vanquished and the scarcely less fatal commercial dislocation and exhaustion of the conquerors.

Financing the War: -

Where did the money come from to buy all these munitions? Then as now there were, the experts agreed, three basic ways to raise the money:

(i) Raising Taxes,

(ii) Borrowing from the public, and

(iii) printing money.

In the Civil War the government had simply printed the famous greenbacks. In World War I it was possible to “print money” in a more roundabout way. The government could sell a bond to the newly created Federal Reserve. The Federal Reserve would pay for it by creating a deposit account for the government, which the government could then draw upon to pay its expenses. If the government first sold the bond to the general public, the process of money creation would be even more roundabout. In the end the result would be much the same as if the government had simply printed greenbacks: the government would be paying for the war with newly created money. The experts gave little consideration to printing money. The reason may be that the gold standard was sacrosanct. A financial policy that would cause inflation and drive the United States off the gold standard was not to be taken seriously. Some economists may have known the history of the greenbacks of the Civil War and the inflation they had caused.

The real choice appeared to be between raising taxes and borrowing from the public. Most economists of the World War I era believed that raising taxes was best. Here they were following a tradition that stretched back to Adam Smith who argued that it was necessary to raise taxes in order to communicate the true cost of war to the public. During the war Oliver Morton Sprague, one of the leading economists of the day, offered another reason for avoiding borrowing. It was unfair, Sprague argued, to draft men into the armed forces and then expect them to come home and pay higher taxes to fund the interest and principal on war bonds. Most men of affairs, however, thought that some balance would have to be struck between taxes and borrowing. Treasury Secretary William Gibbs McAdoo thought that financing about 50 percent from taxes and 50 percent from bonds would be about right. Financing more from taxes, especially progressive taxes, would frighten the wealthier classes and undermine their support for the war.

In October 1917 Congress responded to the call for higher taxes with the War Revenue Act. This act increased the personal and corporate income tax rates and established new excise, excess-profit, and luxury taxes. The tax rate for an income of $10,000 with four exemptions (about $140,000 in 2003 dollars) went from 1.2 percent in 1916 to 7.8 percent. For incomes of $1,000,000 the rate went from 10.3 percent in 1916 to 70.3 percent in 1918. These increase in taxes and the increase in nominal income raised revenues from $930 million in 1916 to $4,388 million in 1918. Federal expenditures, however, increased from $1,333 million in 1916 to $15,585 million in 1918. A huge gap had opened up that would have to be closed by borrowing.

Short-term borrowing was undertaken as a stopgap. To reduce the pressure on the Treasury and the danger of a surge in short-term rates, however, it was necessary to issue long-term bonds, so the Treasury created the famous Liberty Bonds. The first issue was a thirty-year bond bearing a 3.5% coupon callable after fifteen years. There were three subsequent issues of Liberty Bonds, and one of shorter-term Victory Bonds after the Armistice. In all, the sale of these bonds raised over $20 billion dollars for the war effort.

In order to strengthen the market for Liberty Bonds, Secretary McAdoo launched a series of nationwide campaigns. Huge rallies were held in which famous actors, such as Charlie Chaplin, urged the crowds to buy Liberty Bonds. The government also enlisted famous artists to draw posters urging people to purchase the bonds.