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310 ECONOMIC INQUIRIES AND STUDIES
that with £2 6s. 6d. per head in 189 I, the people were
much less burdened than with £2 lOS. 8d. per he~d in
1861, and that they would be no more burdened now
than they were formerly, even if there should be a con-
siderable increase in the expenditure per head. The
point is one for investigation and not for assumption on
any side. That there has been an enormous increase of
wealth is however obvious from two sets of facts, which
are corroborated by many olhers. First, there has been
an enormous increase in the consumption of such articles
as tea and sugar,-in the former case from 2.69Ibs.
per head in 186 I to 6. I 1 lbs. per head in 1900, and in
the latter from 3s-1lbs. to 881bs. per head (see supple-
mentary tables), increases which would have been im-
possible without a material improvement in the well-
being of the masses. Next there has been an enormous
increase of the yield of a penny of the income tax, from
£1,100,000 in 1861 to £2,400,000 at the present time
(see Table IX.), although in the interval the lower limit
of the tax has been raised from £100 to £160, and the
limit up to which abatements are given has been raised
from £150 to £700. It cannot be assumed then that
the country is now burdened more in proportion to its
resources by the expenditure of the present time than
it was by the expenditure of 70 mimon £ in 1861.
Both sides of the account have to be looked at, and
not one only.
The growth of expenditure about 1861, it may be
interesting to note, was discussed at the time just as
the expenditure of the present day is being discussed
in some quarters. On Jrd June, 1862, Mr. Stansfeld
moved a resolution of protest against growing expendi-
ture, and was strongly supported, Mr. Disraeli dwelling
on "bloated armaments," while Cobden and other
authorities joined in the onslaught. There was, how-
ever, no real discussion of what the expenditure of the
State should be and for what purposes, and of what
could really be borne by the community, any more than
there is now or ever has been at any time in my recol-