FRANCE: Budget

M. Etienne Clementel, Minister of Finance and le Senateur de Puy—de—Dome, presented to the Finance Committee of the Chamber of Deputies the budget for 1925. A feature of the new proposals is the retention of Premier Poincare's hated 20% tax increase (TIME, Jan. 28). No loan was suggested, although it had been widely circulated that one would be asked for.

Expenditures reached the record figure of 32,500,000,000 francs (about $1,700,000,000) ; receipts amounted to only 26,500,000,000 francs (about $1,400,000,000). The difference—about 6,000,000,000 francs—is to be met by rigorous enforcement of the...