CUBA: Subtraction

Like all capable dictators, Cuba’s strong man, Colonel Fulgencio Batista, shows much concern over the common people. Although he holds no elective office, benevolent Tyrant Batista often leaves the studied luxuries of Havana and, like Mexico’s Lázaro Cárdenas, gets firsthand impressions in the decidedly less comfortable interior. Cuba’s economic pains, including unemployment, have been only partly cured by the U. S. Good Neighbor policy which reduced the U. S. tariff on the island’s big product, sugar. Last week, Colonel Batista moved to help Cuba’s unemployed. He did not plan bond issues, increased taxation. Born and brought up as a common man, he decided like a common man that the problem was one of elementary subtraction.

Among other economies he decided to lop a chunk off the salaries of the “highly paid” State employes and dedicate it to the unemployed. Total economy drive sum: $6,000,000, trifling by U. S. relief standards but nearly 8% of Cuba’s revenues, the equivalent of $425,000,000 to the U. S. Treasury.