Frankfurter Zeitung from 1922: Without emergency money, there is a risk of unrest
AFrom local administration circles we have been written from Berlin: “It is absolutely correct that the issue of emergency money must not lead to controlling one’s own shortage of money and that the Reich finance administration must exercise strict control over the amount of emergency money issued and that the fastest recovery and redemption must be ensured. What is not understandable, however, is that the Reich authorities show very little understanding for the whole situation that forced the issue of emergency money.
In any case, the large cities of the Rhenish-Westphalian industrial district only approached the production of emergency money with reluctance and at the urging of mining, industry and trade, and at the express request of the Reichsbank offices themselves. They were only allowed to do so when large factories were repeatedly unable to pay their workers properly as a result of the shortage of funds, so that unrest broke out.
On the other hand, it was not necessary to attach overly aggravating conditions to the issuing of emergency money. This includes the condition that the redemption date, which could be extended to a maximum of two months, must be stated on the note itself or at least must be made public at the same time as it is issued. This significantly impairs the circulability. The transfer of the equivalent value to the Reichskreditgesellschaft mbH, which was previously unknown to the municipalities, is an unnecessary complication and is rejected by the issuing offices. It must be sufficient if the equivalent value is guaranteed to a Reich control office, even if the guarantee is given that the relevant amounts are available to the issuing offices on the redemption date.
It is incomprehensible why all these large capitals, which can be used very well in the industrial district, should all flow to Berlin. Of course, the Reichskreditgesellschaft would also have to invest these amounts profitably in order to be able to raise the interest.
Very many towns in the industrial district, for example, are forced to take more or less into their own hands the potato and coal cellars for their inhabitants, for which they have to raise large capital for a very short time. Even the big cities, which alone are suitable for this purpose, should hardly have any reservations about financing such transactions with the equivalent of emergency money.
Otherwise, these cities are forced to temporarily mobilize capital at high bank interest rates, which either pushes up potato prices or burdens taxpayers altogether. (If one deviated from the principle that issuing emergency money should not be a way of obtaining credit, it would be difficult to draw a correct line. The editors)
The behavior of some other Reich administrations, in particular the Reich Postal Administration, which refuses to accept such emergency money at all or also makes it dependent on “conditions” is completely incomprehensible. The issue of emergency money is merely a matter of support for the Reich finance administration or the Reichsbank by the agencies issuing emergency money. One would think that this action would then at least be supported by other Reich authorities. Instead, the postal administration, for its part, sets the condition for the issuing offices to acknowledge in writing that, among other things, the issuing offices should undertake to redeem counterfeit notes that are accepted at the post office without further ado.
The fact that such an obligation cannot be assumed is already evident from the fact that this would eliminate all caution against counterfeits, and in fact would actually arouse the temptation to forgeries. If such a guarantee from the post office appears to be indispensable, it would have to be granted by the Reichsbank or the Reich finance administration, in whose interest the emergency money was issued.”
