Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 68, no. 1762: December 21, 1901

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lecember 2t, tpOl. ftECORD AND GUIDE. 86t ESTABUSHED-^ tf^PH 21^^ IBS a, Dr/oTa3ToI^LE:CT;.i^.BuiLDif(G *;,RpKnrCTUREi{ousEaomDEQaRfnml» BusiiJe.^s AtbThemes of Gi:rtol^. IKCEHPT. aCE PER YEAR IN ADVANCE SIX DOLLARS Published eVery Saturday. Commualoationa slioulil be addresBed to C. W. SWEET, 14-16 Vesey Street. New YorK expected for some time to come. Bankers report a renewed demand for investment securities of the best classes^gener- ally those of governments and municipal bonds, which, though indicative rather of caution than enterprise, gives an air of more spirit to financial centers. C. UNDSEY, Business Manager Telephone, Cortlandt 3167 Entered at the Post Office at New Tork. N. Y.. as seeond-class malier." No, 1763 .1. LXVIII, DECEMBER 21, 1901. . X THILE it has heen found possible to steady the stock mar- t V ket and prevent bad breaks, there is no prospect for upward movement of good proportions. If there was, such movement would be a very unwise, and could only be an stable one, considering the fact that the banks only yester- y, so to say, got themselves into fairly good shape by calling ms. The circumstances of the hour forbid the hope of cheap- money before the new year has well opened. A period of or business in Wall Street is not to be regretted if the flour- ling conditions that prevail elsewhere are maintained. It is doubtedly a fact that business is very good throughout the untry, although speculation languishes, or ts left almost fin¬ ely to the professional operators. This is a good thing. It ows that people have forsaken the fascination of the tape r their legitimate pursuits, and the country will in the ,ead much better off for it. So lar as the securities themselves are ncerned interest centers on Amalgamated Copper, which has r the second time in three months reduced its dividend. The >uble with Amalgamated seems to be that it has for months en reducing its own production and holding up the market r its rivals to sell on. It is understood that while Amal- mated has been piling up stocks, the rich Michigan and Ari- na mines, declining to enter into an agreement as to either ices or production, have, by making concessions to buyers, arketed their whole product, and in some instances have dis- sed of production ahead at good prices. This left Amalga- ated no alternative but to eut prices and open a war in which i rivals were strategically the better off, and itself dependent on an increase in the foreign demand for copper. This will me in time, because Europe is getting every day nearer a new S movement in electrical transit; but Europe moves slowly, d meantime, what is to be done with a productive capacity in pper immensely superior to all possibilities in the way of mand? TT ORE evidence of an improvement in the business condi- '•i. tion of Europe comes to hand as the year is drawing to close. Not only have the prices of British Consols and other )verEment securities advanced substantially, but this is also e fact regarding German industrial issues, which were the lief sufferers by the general depression in trade. The latter 'e still very much below their figures for the boom period of IO years ago, but they seem to have reached bottom last Sep- mber, -and are now enjoying a not unnatural rally. This re- rs more particularly to the chief coal, iron and electrical se- irities, but bank stocks which were depressed by the expo- ires and failures in banking circles last summer have also Hied. Another thing that is exciting hope is the probable ,rly close of the Boer war, or if not its close, its reduction very small proportions. This hope is not occasioned so much ' War-Office statements as by some made by the chairmen of e great South African banking and mining companies, whose inual meetings have recently taken place, and who, according custom, addressed their stockholders upon the future pros- !Cts of the territory in which their properties are operating, lese statements while conservative in tone, extremely so in- :ed, were quite hopeful for the future. Undoubtedly, an offi- iil end of the war would remove an incubus from the world's isiness and lead to its ultimate expansion, though the first iects of a sudden stoppage of the British Government's dis- irsements for supplies and materials would be followed by scomfort in some quarters and possibly by trouble. There ,s recently been a very wholesale and, apparently, wholesome tting of prices for basic materials in the European markets, at. though at flrst sight indicative of bad business, suggests ! second, a possible stimulation in manufacturing that may 'oduce a rally in activity, if a revival complete is not to be Taxation. FROM the fact tkat the discussion of it opened a month or so ahead of the assembling of the State Legislature, it may be presumed that there is general fear that the subject of taxa¬ tion wlli occupy a good deal of the attention of that body, next and the succeeding two or three months. This expectation does not raise the spirits of the urban taxpayer, because any con¬ sideration given to taxation in Albany ends in either directly increasing his burdens, or the taking away of some of his tax assets, which indirectly does the same thing, by lessening the distribution of those burdens. This was conspicuously the result of the action of the Legislature this year, as we took occasion to show that it would be when the various tax meas¬ ures, recommended by Governor Odell, were before it. 'The increase in the tax burdens of the past and the ever growing demand of the governing bodies for more and more money to carry on their work witb, must serve to force the question of taxation upon the attention of all thinking men, and produce action by representative bodies everywhere, But it is in the cities where the consideration is the gravest, because of the use to which the State puts its power over them, that is, to despoil them for the sake of the rural sections. The statement is already made that Governor Odell will recoramend the pas¬ sage of a bill taxing mortgages one-quarter of one per pent. We are glad, therefore, to see tiiat representative association^ are taking the matter up seriously, i^'ith the yiew of imppesgr ing the Legislature with the feeling of this community regarding it. It was one of the chief topics dwelt pn at the annual .diiir- ner of the Builders' League, a report pf which is given Jn an¬ other column, Very appropriately the directorate of the Rea! Estate Board of Brokers' have framed a memorial to the Gov¬ ernor, not merely objecting to a tax on mortgages, but pr^yr ing for their total exemption from taxation. Some weelfs ^gp the Chamber of Commerce of this city adopted a report frpm their Committee on State and Municipal Taxation, which lye quote here because it so aptly and accurately portrays the pgn? sequences of recent tax legislation: "Your Committee believes that the tendency of the Legisla^ ture to create indirect revenue for State purposes, and to look to this revenue exclusively for State purposes, is unwise, be¬ cause it takes away from taxpayers that interest in State ex¬ penditures and State taxation which is present when taxation is direct; weakens the sense of responsibility of legislators; has already so operated as to throw nearly all of the burden of State expenditures on the urban political divisions; the prin¬ ciple of uniformity in taxation has been lost sight of; it takes from the political divisions, which need for local purposes nearly ten times as much money as the State needs for its pur¬ poses, some of the best subjects of taxation, and thus throws a heavier burden on those remaining; it encourages the dis¬ position to extend the charges of the State to subjects hereto¬ fore considered local, aud which, in some instances at least, must be considered purely local. "Your Committee has on several occasions urged that the taxation of mortgages is unwise, because: The tax cannot fall otherwise in the end than upon the pi'operty mortgaged; the incidence of taxation upon real property is already heavy; the tax can only be collected at much expense and vexation. It is the purpose of your Committee to advocate the views which have been thus stated before the coming Legislature if the oppor¬ tunity or occasion to do so occurs." It is to be hoped that other influential bodies will follow the example of the bodies named above, and enter a protest, which shall be none the less emphatic because clothed in the courteous phi-aseology of a memorial, against the rural dictum which is now controlling the State policy in taxation, that this eity should pay the. whole taxes of the State. It has been stated upon the authority of the Tax Department that the practical efEect of the tax bills passed last session was to deprive this city of half a million of dollars of its income from taxation, after making all allowance for the lessened demands of the State on the eity that will result from the former's collecting directly part of its own income. This illustrates how it comes about that the burden of State expenditure, as the Chamber of Com¬ merce Committee points out, neany all falls upon the urban political divisions. Undoubtedly, this is an unfair use of power, for while we speak of its being the policy of the State, it Is really the policy only of the rural portions, first in representa-