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1901.4 : MARINE REVIEW. been issued. Since the organization of the company in 1899 it has paid a regular dividend of 5 per cent. 'Midvale Steel '\Co. of Philadelphia, whose works at Nicetown, one of the Philadelphia suburbs, are quite extensive. This company, while an important factor in the steel trade, has a peculiar interest from the fact that it has always refused information for publication about its plant or its productive capacity. _ Then there is the Lackawanna Steel Co., which will shortly remove its plant from Scranton to Buffalo, and Jones & Laughlins of Pittsburg. The output of the Lackawanna company is something like 365,000 tons a year and that of Jones'& Laughlins is only a little less. These are the chief companies which the United States Steel: Corpora- tion does not control. Their total capitalization represents about $450,000,- 000, exclusive of bond issues. The capitalization of the United States Steel Corporation is $1,100,000,000, with a bond issue of $304,000,000. The total possible annual output of the companies not in the trust and which are mentioned above, is about 10,000,000 tons. The total possible annual output of the United States Steel Corporation has not been reliably esti- mated, but it is believed to be not less than 15,000,000 tons. THAT EXPORT TAX ON COAL. IT HAS STIRRED UP THE ENGLISH SHIP OWNER AS FEW MEASURES HAVE STIRRED HIM IN THE PAST--THE CASE ADMIRABLY SET FORTH IN FAIRPLAY. The following article from Fairplay, London, shows how the ex- port tax on coal is regarded by those who are identified with the shipping interests in England. It is especially interesting in view of the prospects of foreign markets for American coal: The budget of Sir Michael Hicks Beach last week came as a bolt out of the blue on the coal trade particularly and on the commercial world generally. A duty on coal had been spoken of by many but expected by few. And the manner in which the proposal has been received shows with how little wisdom business, as well as government, is managed. Some of the arguments or contentions in opposition to the measure are hardly less remarkable, and even absurd, than some of those in favor of it. Let us say at once that we regard the tax as.economically wrong, commercially foolish, politically unwise, and financially fatuous. But we do not so regard it for all the reasons advanced by all who have raiscd their voices in opposition to it. 'Coal exporters are, of course, mainly concerned with their immediate interests, and their pressing desire is to get out of the present difficulty. Their case is so hard a one that not the most flinty-hearted chancellor of the exchequer can refuse to consider it. Were the government in the direst straits for ways and means it could not in common honesty and common sense call upon a small class of merchants all at once to contribute from a million to a million and a half of money to the exchequer. For that is what it will amount to if the one shilling duty really has to be paid by the exporting merchant on the con- tracts already entered into--which contracts will amount to probably one- half of our exports for the whole year, which the chancellor of the ex- chequer expects will yield £2,100,000. The one shilling tor duty is from four to six times more than the average profit on export coal contracts, and the exaction of it on the year's contracts would ruin all but the rich- est of our coal merchants. It is absurd to suppose that the tax can be laid on the shoulders of the foreign buyer by addition to his contract price, and nobody who knows the coal owners will for a moment expect them to assume the burden. But we do not oppose the duty because of its immediate incidence. That can be and doubtless will be adjusted by remission or exemption in the current contracts. Such remission or ex- emption, however, will materially reduce the revenue from the tax this year, and in the meantime the imposition has caused a vast amount of disturbance, dislocation and friction that cannot but have sevious effect on the trade and shipping of this country. In this disturbance may be seen one of the most obvious objections to'the scheme, for it is the essence of good finance to raise money without dislocation of any branch of trade. At the outside Sir Michael Hicks Beach will collect two millions, but in all probability he will not this year collect more than one million from the coal duty and in doing so he will disorganize the business and the relations of coal owners, coal exporters and ship owners. The losses thrown upon these trades will far exceed the amount of the shilling duty, whoever has ultimately to pay that duty. In plain words the money the chancellor will gain by the new impost is not worth all the row it has catised and will cause. The scheme is, therefore, financially fatuous, and that it is politically unwise the government will have abundant opportunities of realizing in the near future when they see their majorities at the polls growing small by degrees and beautifully less. The coal trade is a very big trade and there is an immense elec- torate connected with it. But more than that--anything that affects coal affects the whole business and social life of the country, and this impost will affect it very injuriously. We have seen it stated somewhere as the opinion of somebody or other in the coal trade, that a shilling duty will have no effect on coal after things settle down. This just shows how people will not look beyond their noses. Coal is our main source of wealth. It constitutes four-fifths of the quantity of our exports. It fur- nishes outward cargoes, therefore, for four-fifths of the vessels, British and foreign, which come to our ports. It is alike the purveyor and the sustainer of our merchant marine. Fully one-third of the coal we ship to foreign ports is afterwards consumed by our own steamers. If the shilling is put on to the price, British ship owners will have to pay one- third of it. If it is taken off the freights British ship owners will have to pay three-fourths of it. If it is neither put on to the purchaser abroad nor taken off freights, it will, first of all, come off the coal owner when making special prices for export; but he, in turn, will put it on to the home consumer, or on to the colliers, or both. One thing that may be taken as absolutely certain is that the export coal duty will not be ac- cepted by the coal owners as a tax upon them and their "enormous profits." They make no foolish pretence about it, but frankly say that whoever has to ultimately pay the duty it will not be they--and they will take precious good care of that. Therefore, those who hail Sir Michael Hicks Beach's proposal as a just measure of retribution upon the coal masters are hugging a foolish and dangerous delusion. Can any or all of ihe indicated consequences follow without serious effect on the coal trade? It is London journalists, mostly, who think no great harm will fore and they as a rule know as much about coal as they do about hina, Se How little Sir Michael Hicks Beach himself knows about it he showed, only too clearly in his budget speech. "If this country by her superior natural advantages could afford to supply coal on such terms as to make it to the advantage of foreign countries to buy, those foreign nations had no right to complain of the duty placed on the exportation of the article.' They will not complain--they will simply look about for cheaper coal, either within their own borders or elsewhere. It is all one to them whether British coal is made dear by miners' wages, railway rates harbor dues, ocean freights or export duties, ° If it is too dear, laid down at their doors, they will not have it at all. It is a pure delusion that foreign consumers must have British coal whatever it costs. They will pay more for some qualities of British coal than they will for any other coal, because they get value for it, but when the excess price exceeds the comparative value they do without it. Sir Michael Hicks Beach urges that because foreigners did not cease to buy coal from us last year when both prices and freights were several shillings higher than in the previous year, therefore they will not cease to buy it because we put on a shilling by way of duty. But last year prices and freights were rising in all parts of the world, and such was the industrial activity that the demand for coal for the time being exceeded the supply. The reverse is the posi- tion now. We are no longer declining orders for coal, but have to go a begging for them--a fact which the chancellor of the exchequer does not seem to be aware of. He concludes that the producers of coal in Europe were unable to "rival" our coal even at the increased prices and freights of last year. They simply could not produce enough for their own home and export trades. All the coal producing countries of Europe are ex- porters as well as importers of coal, and they all experienced last year a pressure of export demand, just as we did. The cause of this was com- plex, as has been explained in our columns from time to time, and the fact that foreigners went on buying coal from us last year when the deliv- ered price was continuously going up is no proof that they will always do so. The chancellor's contentions that "the imposition ot a shilling duty which is infinitely less than the fluctuations in the prices over a long series of years during which our exports of coal have increased, would do no real injury at all to our coal trade" is utterly illogical. There is all the difference in the world between a rise undér natural economic condi- tions and a rise created by arbitrary restrictions and fiscal burdens, _ It is curious to find the finance minister of a free trade country like this arguing that British coal producers bear the import duties of coun- tries to which coal is exported. It is even more curious to find a man of the chancellor's intelligence expressing the conviction that an export duty on our coal will fall upon the consumer abroad. lt is kind of him, no doubt, to express regret that some of the consumers abroad will be British ship owners, and he is sorry he can make no exemption in their favor. But that is of little consequence when they have such a dose of soothing syrup as this: 'The additional price which they would have to pay for their coal would be but a small percentage cn the cost of that coal at the foreign port at which they would have to buy it, and the bur- den that it might impose upon the shipping industry would be the merest trifle when compared with the burdens imposed upon that industry by the great increase in the price of coal last year or on some previous occa- sion." Perhaps if the chancellor saw a foreign bunker bill he would have more respect for "'small percentages," but what are we to think of the following? "I must say that having regard to the enormous profits which the shipping industry has been making of late years, having regard to the fact that it of all the industries in this country might fairly be ex- pected to make some contributions--some special contributions--towards the increasing cost of our navy--I do not think I am asking too much of the shipping industry if I ask them to bear this small additional burden for after all they may relieve themselves of it to a great extent if they choose. If they think they can devote more bunker space-to coal and less to cargo, then they will escape the duty altogether." | O,. most wise judge! Most just judge! Here is a chancellor of the exchequer who thinks that the shipping industry, which is losing money hand over fist, is still making enormous profits; who thinks that sea commerce is carried on solely for the benefit of the carriers, and not for the owners and consumers of the goods; that the navy is required mainly for the protection of ship owners, and not of the property they convey; that the shipping industry ought to be specially taxed through coal, the duty on which is expressly declared by the chancellor himself to be neither on the producers nor the consumers of this country. And that it will. be good business to save a shilling a ton in bunkers by losing several shillings per ton on several hundred tons of cargo space! This impost: of a shilling is not a tax upon coal, but upon the trade in coal, Neither the coal owner nor the exporter nor the foreign consumer will pay it. It will come off the price for export and be laid on the cost of production. That is to say it will be divided between the home consumer and the col- lier, And if it tends to conserve our national coal resources by restricting Oe then it will not produce the revenue for which it has been evised. _ The business results of the great Hamburg ocean steamship compa- nies for 1900 have just been compiled, says the Liverpool Journal of Commerce. The six companies referred to show profits of £642,750, against £435,750 in 1899, and the average dividend is 10.47 per cent. upon a combined capital of £6,135,000, against 8.52 per cent. upon £5,112,000. Only one company failed to increase its dividend--the South American, owing to the tariff war, which has been settled. It is stated that the figures here given would have been still more favorable if the companies had not made unusually large write-offs for the year; and these, except in the case of the Hamburg-American line, have not been made public. The Hansa Steamship Co. of Bremen has declared a dividend of 14 per cent. against 7 per cent. The steamship M. S. Dollar of 4,500 tons dead weight, the contract for which was placed through Mr. Samuel Holmes of 66 ad ek, New York, with the New York Ship Building Co. of Camden, N. J... was successfully launched on Saturday last. 7