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South African Capital Imports, 1893–8

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 November 2014

Acheson J. Duncan*
Affiliation:
The Johns Hopkins University
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Extract

In 1886 a large gold field was discovered in the heart of South Africa. This led not only to a significant change in the comparative advantage of the country, but also to a considerable inflow of both labour and capital. The movements of these productive factors came in spurts and for many, years set the pattern for, or at least synchronized with, the cyclical swings in the South African economy.

One of the most striking of the capital movements of this period was occasioned by the gold mining boom of 1894-5. The initial wave of foreign investment in the gold mining industry came in 1888-9. However, the excessive exuberance of the early speculators, the difficulties arising from the occurrence of pyritic ore below water level, and the development of a world-wide business crisis in 1890 all conspired to make this initial boom short lived. Furthermore, the gold mining industry needed to acquire maturity and respectability before it could arouse the interest of more conservative investors. It was therefore not until the middle nineties that the major wave of foreign investment developed.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association 1948

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References

page 20 note 1 This long-run change has been reviewed by Gilbert, D. W. in “The Economic Effects of the Gold Discoveries upon South Africa: 1886-1910” (Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. XLVII, pp. 553–97).Google Scholar A more extensive study was undertaken by the writer and is in manuscript form in the Princeton University Library. See A. J. Duncan, Studies in the Theory of Trade Adjustment.

page 20 note 2 See p. 21 below.

page 20 note 3 See pp. 42-3 below.

page 21 note 4 See pp. 39-41 below.

page 21 note 5 Apparently the usual procedure was for the foreign investor to buy South African securities in the foreign, not the South African, markets.

page 22 note 6 See pp. 43-5 below.

page 23 note 7 See Taussig, F. W., “International Trade under Depreciated Paper—A Contribution to Theory” (Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. XXXI, pp. 380403 Google Scholar).

page 23 note 8 See Viner, J., Canada's Balance of International Indebtedness, 1900-1913 (Cambridge, Mass., 1924)Google Scholar, chaps. VII and VIII, and Angell, J. W., “Equilibrium in International Trade: The United States, 1919-1926” (Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. XLII, pp. 388433 Google Scholar).

page 23 note 9 Viner, , Canada's Balance of International Indebtedness, p. 190.Google Scholar

page 23 note 10 Viner has pointed out, however, that the classical writers occasionally called attention to the equilibrating effects of shifts in demand brought about by the money transfer. See his Studies in the Theory of International Trade (New York, 1937), pp. 293304.Google Scholar

page 23 note 11 See Ohlin, B., Interregional and International Trade (Cambridge, Mass., 1933), pp. 412–13.Google Scholar

page 24 note 12 See Machlup, F., International Trade and the National Income Multiplier (Philadelphia, 1943)Google Scholar, especially chap. VIII, and Metzler, Lloyd A., “The Transfer Problem Reconsidered” (Journal of Political Economy, vol. L, 1942, p. 398).Google Scholar

page 24 note 13 For example, see F. W. Taussig, “International Trade under Depreciated Paper”; Graham, F. D., “International Trade under Depreciated Paper: The United States, 1862-1879” (Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. XXXVI, pp. 220–73)Google Scholar; Viner, , Canada's Balance of International Indebtedness, pp. 209–10.Google Scholar

page 24 note 14 See for example, Ohlin, B., Interregional and International Trade, pp. 429–30Google Scholar; Haberler, G., Theory of International Trade (London, 1936), pp. 6676 Google Scholar; Graham, F. D., “The Theory of International Values” (Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. XLVI, pp. 608–9Google Scholar; R. Wilson, Capital Imports and the Terms of Trade, chap. IV; Iverson, Carl, Aspects of the Theory of International Capital Movements (London, 1935)Google Scholar, passim, and T. O. Yntema, A Mathematical Reformulation of the General Theory of International Trade, chap. V.

page 24 note 15 Cf. Viner, J., Studies in the Theory of International Trade (New York, 1937), pp. 326–60.Google Scholar

page 24 note 16 See Graham, F. D., “The Theory of International Values” (Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. XLVI, pp. 608–9Google Scholar).

page 25 note 17 Arndt, E. H. D., Banking and Currency Development in South Africa (1652-1929) (Cape Town and Johannesburg, 1928), p. 153.Google Scholar

page 25 note 18 Union of South Africa, Monthly Bulletin of Union Statistics, Mar., 1922, ho. 2. The £7 million include both foreign and domestic desposits.

page 26 note 19 An estimate based on recorded imports and exports of specie. See The Blue Book for the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope, 1883, p. 647 Google Scholar, and subsequent volumes of Cape of Good Hope, Statistical Register.

page 26 note 20 If “fixed” deposits are not included, bank media came to about half of all circulating media.

page 27 note 21 Gold in hand-to-hand circulation increased £1 million during 1895, but bank reserves increased £4,800,000.

page 27 note 22 The maintenance of 35 per cent to 40 per cent reserves was probably very desirable, however, in a country in which specie was the dominant form of hand-to-hand currency.

page 28 note 23 Cf. Viner, , Canada's Balance of International Indebtedness, pp. 164–77.Google Scholar

page 30 note 24 Report on the Trade, Commerce, and Gold Mining Industry of the South African Republic for the Year 1897, p. 43. Great Britain, House of Commons Sessional Papers, 1899, vol. 64, C-9093.

page 30 note 25 Ibid. Also see Amphlett, G. T., History of the Standard Bank of South Africa, 1862-1913, pp. 129–30.Google Scholar

page 30 note 26 Cape of Good Hope, Statistical Register.

page 30 note 27 Compare above, Chart V.

page 31 note 28 These figures represent the excess of the mines' payments for wages, supplies, taxes, and dividends over the amount of gold produced. The original data were taken from the Chamber of Mines annual reports and are not entirely complete.

page 31 note 29 Rough estimates based on data obtained from the annual reports of the Chamber of Mines and the Government Mining Engineer.

page 31 note 30 Based on data obtained from the Annual Report of the Transvaal Chamber of Mines, 1902, Annex, p. 16 Google Scholar; South African Mining Journal, 1893, p. 708 Google Scholar; Report on the Trade Commerce and Gold Mining Industry of the South African Republic for the Year 1897 (Hpuse of Commons Sessional Papers, 1899, vol. 64)Google Scholar, and Union of South Africa, Official Year Book.

page 31 note 31 Data obtained from various sources such as the Annual Report of the Transvaal Chamber of Mines; Cape of Good Hope, Statistical Register and Report of the General Manager of Railways; and Conacher, J., Report Upon the Distribution of Oversea Traffic between the South African Railways, etc., p. 23.Google Scholar

page 31 note 32 Based on data taken from the annual reports of the Chamber of Mines and the Government Mining Engineer.

page 32 note 33 See note 28.

page 32 note 34 See Table IA, p. 43.

page 32 note 35 To a small extent South Africans also bought South African goods that might otherwise have been exported, such as coal, maize, oats, and the like.

page 33 note 36 Commodities whose imports or exports averaged less than £1,000 in the years 1892-3 were classed as domestic commodities.

page 34 note 37 See annual reports of the Cape Town, East London, and Orange Free State chambers of commerce, 1895-7.

page 34 note 38 The unexpected movement in native wages on the Rand was the result of institutional changes in the labour market. Prior to 1896 there had been severe competition among the mines for native labour which drove native wages to the highest levels yet attained. To mitigate this pressure on costs, the mines formed a monopolistic (or more correctly monopsonistic) recruiting agency which not only set native wages on a lower level, but also sought to increase the supply by extended recruiting in native areas. Although the increased cost of recruiting offset to some extent the reduction in wages, there was a net gain to the mines as a result of this employers' combination.

page 35 note 39 Annual report of the Witwatersrand Chamber of Mines.

page 35 note 40 White wages on the Rand did not continue to rise in 1898, however.

page 39 note 1 Raymond, Harry tells us in his B. I. Barnato—A Memoir (New York, 1897), p 127 Google Scholar, that Barnato himself engaged and took to South Africa the most experienced mining engineers he could procure from the United States, including John Hays Hammond, J. V. Clement, O'Connor, Starr, and others.

page 39 note 2 Transvaal Chamber of Mines, The Gold of the Rand. A Great National Industry (1887-1927), p. 31.

page 39 note 3 Hatch, F. H. and Chalmers, T. A., The Gold Mines of the Rand (London and New York, 1895), p. 84 Google Scholar, and de Launay, Louis, Les Mines D'or du Transvaal (Paris, 1896), p. 441.Google Scholar

page 39 note 4 Chamber of Mines Report, 1911, pp. 329–30Google Scholar, or almost any other of these reports for later years.

page 39 note 5 Hatch, and Chalmers, , Gold Mines of the Rand, p. 87.Google Scholar

page 39 note 6 Ibid., p. 88.

page 39 note 7 The South African Mining and Engineering Journal, 03 26, 1892, p. 463.Google Scholar

page 40 note 8 Hatch, and Chalmers, , Gold Mines of the Rand, p. 89.Google Scholar

page 40 note 9 Specie is here used to mean coin. “Raw gold” refers to the output of the mines which was shipped to England for refining.

page 40 note 10 The Economist, 1897. “Commercial History and Review of 1896,” p. 34.

page 40 note 11 Peake, E. G., An Academic Study of Some Money Market and other Statistics, p. 93.Google Scholar

page 40 note 12 Annuaire Statistique de La France, vol. XV, pp. 648–9.Google Scholar

page 40 note 13 The Statist, vol. XXXIV, p. 689.Google Scholar

page 40 note 14 Ibid., p. 286.

page 40 note 15 See Mitchell, Wesley C., Business Cycles, The Problem and Its Setting (New York, 1927), pp. 429–31.Google Scholar

page 40 note 16 Hatch, and Chalmers, , Gold Mines of the Rand, p. 3.Google Scholar See also United States, Consular Reports, vol. 45, pp. 214–18Google Scholar, for an account of Schmeisser's report.

page 41 note 17 The Statist, vol. XXXIV, p. 314.

page 41 note 18 Ibid., p. 423.

page 41 note 19 Ibid., p. 549.

page 41 note 20 The grammatical structure of this sentence is as in the original.

page 41 note 21 The Statist, vol. XXXV, p. 328.

page 41 note 22 Ibid., p. 394.

page 41 note 23 The Economist, 1895, p. 1676.Google Scholar

page 41 note 24 Bankers Magazine (London), vol. LXI, pp. 66–7.Google Scholar