§ 42. Mr. PARKINSONasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury approximately what our American War Debt would amount to if the commodities forming it had been supplied by America to Great Britain at the prices now ruling in 1932 as compared with those ruling at the time when the United States supplied the commodities which formed the substance of the American war loan to Great Britain?
§ Major ELLIOTThe outstanding British War Debt to the United States is $4,398,000,000 or £904,000,000 at par of exchange. It would be too complicated to base a calculation on the change in price of the actual commodities bought, but the United States Bureau of Labour Index number of wholesale prices has fallen by about one-half—from an average of 189 during the period between April, 1917, and November, 1918, to 94.6 in March, 1932.