Many Czech undertakings have their central offices and rights of domicile there because the scale of taxation and the municipal rates of Vienna are lower than in Bohemia.
That explains why the rateability of Bohemia tends to drop, while that of Vienna and Lower Austria tends to rise. If we could include those figures in the statistics, and if we entered the precise rateability of those Bohemian undertakings that are domiciled in Vienna, in the archives of the Bohemian lands, the difference would be still more in our favour. But even as it is, the rateability of the Bohemian lands is 11·90 crowns per head, whereas in the rest of the Austrian lands it is only 6 crowns.
Still more significant are the statistics of indirect taxation in Austria (taxes on beer, sugar, spirits, salt, paraffin, tobacco, and excise taxes, etc.). With the exception of spirits, the consumption of all those articles is far greater in the Bohemian lands.
The Bohemian lands are, indeed, the “pearl of Austria,” not only from the point of view of agricultural and industrial production, but also, and as the inevitable result thereof, from the financial standpoint. In the other lands of the Monarchy the State expenses are greater than the income received from them in return, and this deficit is made good by the Bohemian countries. In view of the foregoing facts few people will entertain any doubts as to Bohemia’s chances of being self-supporting and progressive.
Bohemia has, unfortunately, no seaboard (except in one of Shakespeare’s plays), and that, no doubt, is a great drawback as compared, for instance, with little Denmark and the other sea-bordered countries. But Bohemia does not stand alone in that respect; she is no worse off than Serbia, Hungary, Switzerland. The example of Switzerland shows that not only political independence can be preserved, but also that modern means of communication enable even a landlocked country to maintain a flourishing industry. Switzerland has not even any coal, and yet she has succeeded in becoming an industrial country. Bohemia, on the other hand, is very rich in coal, and will therefore be able to run the necessary railways. But she will have at her disposal Trieste, which, it may be presumed, will be a free port; and she will also have the Serbo-Croatian ports and Polish Danzig, should her relations with Germany prevent the use
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