The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1923, Page 65

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Che Lutheran Pioneer.

A MISSIONARY MONTHLY.

PUBLISILED BY 'TITE

EVANGELICAL LUTHERAN SYNODICAL CONFERENCE oF NortH AMERICA.

REV. F. J. LANKENAU, EDITOR.

Published monthly by Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis, Mo.
Entered as second-class matter at the Post Office at St. Louis, Mo.,

Subscription price, 50 cts. per annum, pay: able strictly In advance,

under the Act of March 3, 1879.

Acceptance for mailing at special rate of postage provided for in section 1103, ‘Act of October 3, 1917, authorized on July 5, 1918.

Vol. XLV.

18: LOUIS, MO., SEPTEMBER, 1923.

No. 9.

OUR MONTHLY MISSIONARY MOTTO.

Whoever is not interested in missions is either woefully ignorant
or wilfully disobedient.

Some Reflections Prompted by a News-
paper Clipping.

The following newspaper clipping fell into the

Editor’s hands a few days ago: —
“UNITED STATES SPENDS 13 BILLIONS FOR
LUXURIES.
“Government Receives $1,000,000,000 Tax on
Recreation and Gewgaws in Year.

“Washington, July 8. — About $13,000,000,000
a year now is being spent on luxuries, recreation,
movies and other amusements, and personal finery,
Federal tax receipts show.

“More than’ $1,000,000,000 a year in taxes are
being received by the Government as a result of
purchases of foibles. ‘This is nearly one quarter
of. the total ordinary recéipts of the Government.

“Sporting-goods, autos and motorcycles, amtse-
ment parks, fancy bathing-suits, summer hats for
women and Panamas for father, are now netting
the Government thousands daily. Cigarets, cigars,
and candy bring in millions each month. The pen-
nies that are paid with the purchase of soft drinks
and soda water are helping to pay the annual in-
terest charge of $900,000,000 on the national debt.

‘Battleships are being built with the tax on
motion pictures, sporting-goods, face-powder, cos-
metics, and other beautifiers.

“Chewers of gum in the past twelve months
have contributed more than $1,000, my in taxes to
the Federal treasury.

“Tennis racquets and sporting-goods paid nearly
$4,000,000. Summer furs alone cost approximately

$5,000,000 and netted the Government the tidy
little sum of $500,000 in taxes, the report shows.

“Toilet soaps and powders brought more than
$2,000,000 in taxes into the Government’s coffers
in the fiscal year just ended, indicating total pur-
chases of these articles of about $20,000,000.

“Smokers in the past paid the Government in
excess of ovef $232,000,000 in taxes over and above
the actual cost of tobacco and cigars to dealers.

“More than $23,000,000 poured into the Gov-
ernment pocketbook from taxes on engagement
diamonds and other jewelry, indicating total pur-
chase of taxable jewelry of something like ten times
the collected amount.”

The Government tax returns as reported in this
clipping show that the people in the United States
in one year spent about $15,000,000,000 for luxuries,
that is, for things that they do not need. In other
words, on an average every man, woman, and child
in this country spends every year over $120 for
amusement and pleasure.

Let us now apply these-figures to ourselves.
There are in our Lutheran Synodical Conference .
about 1,250,000 baptized members. If these mem-
bers of the five bodies comprising the Synodical
Conference are average spenders, — and there is no
reason to think that they have not been such, —
they spend about $140,000,000 for luxuries a year.

Now let us see how much these same Lutherans
belonging to the. Missouri, Wisconsin, Norwegian,
and Slovak synods, as well as our Negro Missions,
pay for missions in a year. “You know that mission-
work is the chief work of the Christians; it is to