But, as we have already seen, many large items are incapable of reduction without reacting on the volume of exports.
Let us put our guess as high as we can without being foolish, and suppose that after a time Germany will be able, in spite of the reduction of her resources, her facilities, her markets, and her productive power, to increase her exports and diminish her imports so as to improve her trade balance altogether by $500,000,000 annually, measured in pre-war prices.

This adjustment is first required to liquidate the adverse trade balance, which in the five years before the war averaged $370,000,000; but we will assume that after allowing for this, she is left with a favorable trade balance of $250,000,000 a year.
Doubling this to allow for the rise in pre-war prices, we have a figure of $500,000,000.

Having regard to the political, social, and human factors, as well as to the purely economic, I doubt if Germany could be made to pay this sum annually over a period of 30 years; but it would not be foolish to assert or to hope that she could.
Such a figure, allowing 5 per cent for interest, and 1 per cent for repayment of capital, represents a capital sum having a present value of about $8,500,000,000.[130] I reach, therefore, the final conclusion that, including all methods of payment--immediately transferable wealth, ceded property, and an annual tribute--$10,000,000,000 is a safe maximum figure of Germany's capacity to pay.

In all the actual circumstances, I do not believe that she can pay as much.

Let those who consider this a very low figure, bear in mind the following remarkable comparison.