It seems highly probable, therefore, that the annual Debt service will
ultimately amount to nearly 400 millions, and may be much more if the
War goes on over 1919. It is a gigantic burden to bear. Mr. Bonar Law
has stated in the House of Commons that a loan of one thousand millions
represents the labour of ten million men for a whole year, so we may
take it that the annual charge for the National Debt will require the
whole labour of four million men to meet it, and that this charge will
be continuous for many years. The normal expenditure after the War,
apart from Debt service, has been reckoned to be 270 millions. It will
certainly be more unless rigid economy is practised and all the new
schemes which are being proposed involving expenditure of money are
carefully scrutinised to see whether the expenditure is such as the
country ought to undertake in view of its financial obligations. As the
Debt service will be practically constant and irreducible unless revenue
largely exceeds the total annual expenditure, which is very improbable,
it is clear that a strong effort must be made to reduce this expenditure
and also, so far as possible, to increase the State revenue. Unless this
is done there will be a deficit even after the War, and the Debt will
have to be increased to meet it. There is no question of greater
urgency, and it must be resolutely faced. We shall probably find a
disposition, both in the Government and in Parliament, to shirk it. The
influence of the extension of the electorate will, in all likelihood, be
against rather than in favour of economy. There is a common assumption
that people can get the State to pay for things instead of paying for
them themselves; that there is no need to practise personal economy or
to save because the State will provide. Wage-earners who began by
practising some self-denial in order to save have said, "What is the use
of troubling? The man who saves is really no better off than the man who
spends all his earnings, as the State will provide what is required to