Page:Walter Renton Ingalls - Wealth and Income of the American People (1924).pdf/94

72 Our credits have increased in four years by about 15.8 billion dollars. Our debits have decreased by about two billion. We have, therefore, gained apparently about 17.8 billion dollars in our external position, or about 17.2, if we write off the foreign internals. I say that we have gained this “apparently,” for there is doubt whether we can collect all that is owed to us. There is indeed a question as to whether or not we ought to try to collect it; whether or not we should not cancel it in part at least and write it off as a cost of the war. However, discussion of this will best be reserved until the whole situation has been presented.