Table 14.-Economic Character of the Foreign Trade, by Quarters [Values in millions of dollars] 1922 1923 1924 Class Domestic exports, Jan.- Apr.-July- Oct.- Jan.- Apr.- July- Oct.- Jan.- Apr.- July- Oct.- On account of the operation of the new tariff, effective Sept. 22, the third quarter for imports covers the period July 1 to Sept. 21, and the fourth quarter from Sept. 22 to Dec. 31, import data by economic classes for the exact calendar months September and October not being available. Balance of Trade by Economic Classes. As the excess of exports over imports in our trade with Europe is the chief factor in establishing our favorable balance of trade from a geographic standpoint, so is the excess of exports of finished manufactures over imports of this group the most important factor in our favorable balance from a commodity standpoint. In 1924 exports of this class were considerably more than double imports. (See Table 15.) In contrast with 1922 and 1923, exports of crude materials in 1924 exceeded imports of this class, but as has been usual in recent years, imports of crude foodstuffs and of semimanufactures. were somewhat larger than exports. Table 15.-Balance of Trade by Economic Classes It should be borne in mind that the specific commodities making up the several great economic classes are quite different in export trade nd in import trade. This is expecially true of crude materials, food stuffs, and semimanufactured articles; but even as to manufactured products the individual items are for the most part essentially different, our manufactured exports being characterized by articles which enjoy the advantage of mass production or of special natural resources, while in our imports articles requiring a large amount of hand labor are most important. Foreign Trade of Each Continent by Economic Classes. Tables 16 and 17 distribute the exports to and the imports from each of the continents of the world according to the five great economic classes. Data for 1924 are not yet available. The percentages bring out both the share which each class occupies in the total trade with each continent and also the share of each continent in the total trade of a given class. In 1923 of our exports to Europe 40.6 per cent consisted of crude materials, while of our total exports of crude materials 69.7 per cent in that year went to Europe. Our exports to all of the other continents show a predominance of finished manufactures. North America takes more of our finished manufactures than any other continent, and Asia and Oceania together take not very much less than Europe. Of our imports from Europe about two-fifths (40.3 per cent in 1923) consist of finished manufactures, but finished manufactures figure but little in our imports from any other continent. Foodstuffs are the largest factors in our imports from both North America and South America, including such extremely important semitropical commodities as sugar, coffee, and cocoa. Crude materials constitute nearly two-thirds of our imports from Asia and Oceania, raw silk, rubber, oil-seeds, oils, gums, and similar exotic products making up these large figures. Asia and Oceania furnish fully half of our imports of crude materials, while North America supplies considerably over half of our imports of foodstuffs. Europe furnishes three-fifths of our imports of finished manufactures, and Asia and Oceania one-fourth. Some marked changes in the characteristics of our trade with the several continents appear by comparison of postwar with immediate pre-war years. In our exports to Europe there has been a marked decline in the relative importance of crude materials and of semimanufactures, and a renewed importance in foodstuffs, this latter not appearing, however, in 1923 in any such degree as in 1922 and 1924. Semimanufactures, notably copper, various semifinished iron and steel products, and yarns, constitute a decidedly larger proportion of our exports to Asia in recent years than before the war. As regards the character of our imports from the different continents, a conspicuous change appears as compared with the immediate pre-war years, in the case of North America, with a marked decline in the relative importance of crude materials, and a corres ponding increase in that of finished manufactures. In our imports from Asia and Oceania there has been a decided rise in the proportion of crude materials. Table 16.-Foreign Trade with Each Continent by Economic Classes NOTE.-Years 1910-1914 and earlier periods are fiscal years ending June 30; later periods, calendar years, Oceania and Asia combined, as Philippine Islands are included in Oceania prior to 1922 and in Asia after that year. Classification by economic classes as originally reported, hence 1921 figures do not exactly check with Table 11. See note Table 11. Europe during recent years has taken a smaller proportion than before the war of our exports of crude materials, semimanufactures and manufactures, and except in 1923 (when it was unusually low), Europe's proportion of our exports of foodstuffs has been about the same as before the war. The decline in Europe's share in the other export classes has been accompanied by conspicuous increases in the shares of North America and of Asia and Oceania in our exports of crude materials, and of Asia and Oceania in our exports of semimanufactures and finished manufactures. Table 17.-Percentage Distributions of Total Trade with Each Continent by Economic Classes, and of Total of Each Economic Class, by Continents [For percentage distribution of total trade see Tables 6 and 11] TRADE BY COMMERCIAL REGIONS A more specific picture of the geographic distribution of our trade is gained by subdividing each continent into trade regions. (See Tables 18 and 19 and Chart X.) The grouping of countries into regions is based chiefly on trade routes. This method of grouping, however, tends also to bring together countries more or less similar as regards their geographic conditions, the character of their people and of their industries, and the character of the goods which we send to or receive from them. The names of the individual countries making up each trade region are shown in Tables 35, 37, 39, and 41. Northwestern and central Europe, embracing such highly developed countries as the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Belgium, and the Scandinavian States, and so densely populated as to require large supplies of foodstuffs and raw materials from abroad, still takesnotwithstanding the diminished buying power resulting from the |