Page - 575 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

The War Bonds 575 Municipality of Wiener Neustadt 1,300,000 kronen Municipality of Karlovy Vary (Karlsbad) 2,500,000 kronen Municipality of Linz 2,500,000 kronen Municipal authority of the town of Subotica (Szabadka) 4,000,000 kronen Municipality of Liberec (Reichenberg) 3,600,000 kronen Municipality of Vienna 166,600,000 kronen, etc. Other cities, market towns and villages may have been less enthusiastic. However, from November 1916, there was no escape. Civic employees and others were generously given wage advances with an interest rate of five per cent.1339 However, since the war bonds at the time offered a rate of 5 ½ per cent, a small profit could still be made. Hundreds of articles appeared in the newspapers, such as 40 contributions in the Neue Freie Presse alone for the second bond. The slogan was : ‘Best rate of interest with maximum security’. Thousands of advertisements were placed for each bond. Servant girls, cooks and chambermaids made applications to their professional groups ; a three- line rhyme was circulated as an apparent wise saying : ‘Warmer Mai / Geld wie Heu / Günstig für die Kriegsanleih’ (‘Warm May / Money like hay / Good for the war bond’).1340 The rhymes written by Gustav Hochstetter, ‘Das Lied vom Feldgrauen Geld’ (‘The Song of Field Grey Money’), were also of a light nature, culminating in the refrain : ‘Oestreich kämpft mit einer Welt, / Und zum Krieg gehört auch  – Geld ! / All ihr Männer, all ihr Frauen, / Die ihr Oestreich Heimat nennt, / Habt zum Vaterland Vertrauen, / Gebt ihm, was ihr geben könnt.’1341 (‘Austria fights against a world, / And what the war needs too is  – gold ! / All you men and all you women, / Who call your Austria your home, / Have faith in your fatherland, / And give it everything you can.’) From the second bond onwards, most credit institutions asked the best artists to design posters and, as a result, exhortations to subscribe to the war bonds sprang out from all advertising spaces, showcases and advertising pillars. In order to underline their attrac- tiveness, the Austro-Hungarian Bank decided to copy the model used by the German Reichsbank, offering the bonds and paying interest on them at particularly favourable conditions.1342 The rate of interest was increased from 5.5 per cent to 6.25 per cent. The owners of bond securities were already recommended for the fourth bond to exchange their older securities with a term of 20 years for those with a term of 40 years. As a result, the repayment periods were extended. There was no banking confidentiality with regard to the war bonds. The names of nearly everyone who subscribed larger and substantial amounts were published. All