Notwithstanding, however, the increased ex penditure of the Canadian people as a whole, a sufficient surplus of funds has been available from their incomes to enable them to raise, without any serious difficulty, increasingly large domestic loans for the use of the government in the prosecution of the war. The following have been the special domestic war loans effected by the government; in November 1915, $100,000,000, S tember 1916, $100,000,000, March 1917, $150,000,i I I, November 1917, $400,000,000. Large additional amounts have been supplied to the government in the purchase of war certifi cates and in special loans. Most of the in creased capital for war industries has been plied from within the-country, while the banks have aided in financing British and allied pur chases in Canada. There are also the loans for municipal and provincial purposes which have been largely taken up within the country; As regards the direction of Canadian trade, it has been the good fortune of the country not to experience any appreciable dislocation of its normal trade connections since the outbreak of the war. Before the war nearly 90 per cent of Canada's export trade was with the two coun tries, Great Britain and the United States, and during the war that percentage has been prac tically maintained. Before the war 85 per cent of Canadian imports came from the same coun tries, and the only effect of the war has been to raise the percentage to a little over 90 per cent. At the same time, the details of the trade with these countries has naturally been consider ably altered. There has been a very consider able diversion of the exports of Canada to Britain, and a corresponding transfer in the source of Canadian imports from Britain to the United States. When the war is over, there fore, we may expect very little change in the direction of nine-tenths of our world trade, be yond a readjustment of details as between Canada and her two chief trading allies. The loss of trade with the enemy countries has been of no material importance to Canada as a whole, though it naturally affected somewhat seriously a few trading houses.
As to the changes in the nature of the prod ucts called for owing to the war, it is to be ob served that a veritable revolution has been wrought in one department of Canadian export, that of manufactures. Fifty-four million dol lars represented the value of the export of the Canadian manufactures in 1913, increasing to for 1914, $191,000,000 for 1915 and ,000,000 for 1916; while for eight months to vember 1917, the amount was $489,000,000.
This of course represents munitions of war of all kinds and involves a correspondingly great increase in imports of materials and equip ment which enter into their production. The usual allowance must of course be made for in creased prices. Incidently the prosperity of the munition industries and their subsidiary de pendents indicates the difficulty of inducing labor and capital to turn, during the war at least, from these tempting fields of sure profits and high wages to the more uncertain realm of agriculture. At the same time the next largest export has been in agricultural products, which, though less in aggregate value than manufac tures, indicates a larger actual return from the point of view of the trade balance, apart from individual profits. The increase in agricultural exports has been due more to the proportion of certain products sent abroad, and the high values attached, than to an actual increase in the agricultural production of the country, which naturally varies with the harvests. The great harvest of 1915 has not been since ap proached. The exported agricultural products, apart from animal products, increased from $127,000,000 in 1914 to $364,000,000 in 1916, and for the eight month period to November 1917, amounted to $384,000,000. Next came animal products; increasing from$68,000,000 in 1914, to $117,000,000 in 1916, and $124,000,000 for the eight months of the past year. The export of the products of the mine, the fisheries and the forest have not materially increased for the past couple of years.
Altogether a close survey of the economic conditions in Canada, since the outbreak of the war, compels the general conclusion that, what ever reaction may require to be faced at the close of the war, whatever may be the subse quent effect of the great national debt which Canada in common with the other belligerent .nations is piling up, and whatever readjustment may be necessary to meet the changed economic conditions and relationships of the outside world, the chief effect of the war up to 1918 has been to increase the prosperity of the Cana dian people as a whole, to increase their com mand of ready money, and, in consequence, to raise, for large numbers at least, their physical standard of living.