Review of the Month

WITH the economic situation of the world what it is, we may expect important events in every month of 1922, and January showed us some-what of the nature of things that will happen. The Germans announced their inability to meet in full the reparation payments that were due Jan. 15. The Su-preme Council arranged a plan for them to pay some thing on account every 10 days, and called a conference at Cannes to talk things over. While this conference was in progress Premier Briand resigned and was suc-ceeded by Poincaré. This emphasized the growing differences between British and French policies and interests. The French want to exact the utmost from the Germans; so do the British. The latter think, however, that the French aims will so cripple the Germans that they can not work properly and hence can not trade. Great Britain, with a huge unemploy-ment problem, must have trade. The French thought that Briand was unduly deferring to the British and withdrew their support of him. The other important political developments of the month in Europe were the establishment of the Irish Free State, relieving the British of the vexatious Irish question; and the growing tendency to recognize the Soviet government of Russia and admit its representa-tives into international conferences. In the United States the great political event was the establishment of the dominance of the agricultural bloc in the Senate, which implies the passage of agrarian legislation that will probably be unwise. Economically, there was no progress in the United States. If anything there was probably some reces-sion in the physical volume of business. There were some further reductions of wages, but these were irregular, geographically, and moderate in amount. The great unionized trades maintained the jam. Events of great importance were the formal demand of the anthracite coal miners for increased wages on April 1 and the declaration of the bituminous coal miners that they would resist a reduction at that time. The attitude of these groups is believed to presage labor troubles in the spring. In the metal markets affairs were dull during Janu-ary, but prices were generally firm, save for a little further weakening in iron and steel. In the matter of production, however, there was some quickening of activity, especially in copper, zinc and iron.