PROBLEMS OF EUROPEAN RECONSTRUCTION.

The article discusses the economic conditions of Europe following the destruction caused by the World War II. Physical destruction of property is not the only damage the war has wrought. The enormous costs of maintaining armies in the field have everywhere resulted in great wear and tear of industrial equipment and the using up of stockpiles accumulated in the course of years and even decades preceding the war, and, in many cases, in enormous foreign indebtedness or, at best, in a considerable reduction of foreign holdings. The fact that many countries were knocked out of the war as early as 1940 did not change the situation for them, since Germany has waged her war in part at the expense of the occupied and subjugated nations. The bearing of inflation upon the economic recovery of the countries affected is evident. In countries with a large middle class living on savings, this decrease in the value of the currency means a considerable decline in the purchasing power of a very important section of the population and economic ruin for thousands of them.