Chapter 951

There was only one eternal theme in this world – interests. Great Britain and France had a serious conflict of interest, and there was not enough external pressure, so it was naturally impossible to truly unite.

The reason why the Paris government would rather pay a great price to win over the Russians than to move closer to the British at the first opportunity despite the great pressure the German and Russian Empires had put on the French people was enough to explain the problem.

After the Franco-Prussian War, Germany and the British became the biggest enemies of France. In the following decades, Britain and France almost went to war several times.

The conflict between Germany and France was able to surpass the conflict between Britain and France because of William II's death wish. He repeatedly stimulated the national sentiment of the French and was used by the British.

After realizing that the Germans threatened their interests, the British took the initiative to show goodwill to the French.

Even so, the Government of Paris hesitated for a long time before putting down their pride and becoming the younger brother. Otherwise, the two sides would not have compromised so easily.

Needless to say, France, which was at its peak, did not feel threatened. Why should they be the younger brother of the British?

Thinking of this, Franz was relieved. The conflict between Britain and France, the conflict between Austria and Britain, and the conflict between Fao were intertwined, which was the most stable pattern.

In the case of a serious conflict of interest, the fact that the three countries, Britain, Fao, and France could sit together showed that diplomacy was really delicate.

After the external problems were solved, it was the turn of the internal problems. In recent years, Austria's economy seemed to have grown wings and flourished with the help of the second industrial revolution.

Not only Austria, but the entire European continent's economy was booming. Take the railway industry as an example, from 1870 to 1875, the total mileage of European railways increased by 58%.

Among them, the Prussian Federation and the Russian Empire grew the fastest, followed by France and the Nordic Federation. Britain and Austria developed the railway earlier, and now the growth rate had slowed down.

Of course, this growth rate was related to the foundation. Austria's slow growth rate did not mean that the railway mileage was less than other countries.

Russia's growth rate was the most heaven-defying. Others grew by percentage, but they grew by several times.

This was not because the Tsarist government was good at building railways, but mainly because Russia's railway industry was slow. After the Prussian War, the total mileage of the Russian Empire was less than 3,000 kilometers. It was really not difficult to double it.

Austria, on the other hand, had a total railway mileage of more than 60,000 kilometers in 1870. With a base number like that, the growth rate naturally slowed down.

The Great Railway Plan proposed by Franz was no longer just a plan. After more than 20 years of hard work by the Government of Vienna, it was nearing its end.

Perhaps 20 years ago, 100,000 kilometers of railway was just a pipe dream. But today, the total mileage of the railways in operation and under construction in Austria had exceeded 100,000 kilometers.

By the end of 1875, the total mileage of Austria had reached 76,000 kilometers. In less than five years, the railway mileage of Austria would exceed 100,000 kilometers.

Of course, the main reason for the data explosion was not only the rapid development of the domestic economy, but also the "African localization strategy."

Up until now, 23 cities and regions had been approved by the Imperial Parliament to be added to the mainland, and the area of this part of the territory was close to a million square kilometers.

As the land area expanded, the demand for railways naturally increased as well. Nearly 10,000 kilometers of railways had been opened to traffic in this part of the territory, and as many as 8,000 kilometers of railways were under construction.

This data was strictly confidential. Once it was released, it would definitely shock the world.

Of course, confidentiality was relative to ordinary people. For politicians, it was not a secret. The railway could not be hidden, and it was easy to find out.

In this era, the railway did not represent the strength of a country. Austria had the highest railway mileage in the world, followed not by John Bull or France, but the United States of America.

If the United States had not been divided, they would have the highest total railway mileage because the United States of America ranked third in terms of total railway mileage.

This made people very helpless. The European countries had limited land area. The regional railway density might be higher than the United States, but the total mileage could not be compared.

The country with the highest railway density was Britannia. The British Isles were surrounded by the sea, and there were an astonishing 23,000 kilometers of railway that had been opened to traffic.

Even Austria was left in the dust by such a density. Not to mention now, even if Franz's Great Railway Plan was fully implemented, it would not be able to catch up with the British.

Knowing was one thing, but Franz had no intention of imitating. One of the main reasons why the British railway density was so high was that there was serious duplication of construction.

One had to know that the British railway distribution was extremely uneven. Capitalists only invested in the railways in the economically developed areas, and no one cared about the economically backward areas.

The British Isles were surrounded by the sea, and it was only an economically developed area. Why did they need so many railways? If it was properly planned and distributed, the British transportation could go up another level.

Obviously, this was impossible. Capital pursued profit, and profitable businesses were snatched by people, and loss-making businesses were ignored.

In Austria, if Franz had not used monopoly as a bait to trick the capitalists into tying the railways in the developed and backward areas together, the domestic railway construction would have followed in the footsteps of the British.

Austria's railway bundling plan encountered an economic crisis on the eve of dawn. The capitalists who thought they would make a lot of money directly lost money because of the lack of funds.

The same trick could only be played once. Before that, Austria had not completed industrialization, and did not even have the qualifications to enjoy the economic crisis. Naturally, people were not vigilant.

The capitalists ignored the risk of long-term investment, and were fooled by the word "monopoly", so they fell into the trap.

Not to mention the inexperience of local capitalists, even international capitalists such as Britain and France were no exception. They were fooled by the word "monopoly", and hundreds of millions of Aegis investments were directly tied up in railway construction.

The financially strong persisted, and the weak were forced to sell, allowing the Government of Austria to continue with the unfinished railway plan.

Until now, railway investment was still popular, but it had nothing to do with madness. The most important thing was the policy. The Government of Vienna had intervened in the railway freight pricing.

There was a ceiling price everywhere. At the same time, the government also stipulated that the railway was a public infrastructure with a certain public welfare nature. The railway company's annual profit could not exceed 30%.

Frankly speaking, this number was still very tempting. Apart from the financial industry, there were almost no industries that could have a 30% profit.

However, this was a completely different concept from the profiteering that capitalists chased. After all, the railway was a large investment project, and the calculation of profit was based on turnover, not the total investment.

If the total investment was calculated, there was no railway in Austria that had an annual return of more than 30%. There was no railway in the world, which was impossible.

The only advantage was probably the stable income. The Austrian railway's turnover had been growing steadily, and the annual growth rate was generally no less than 3%.

Due to the impact of economic development, the turnover of some sections of the road had skyrocketed by dozens of percent a year.

In addition to freight, the railway company had other profit models. For example, the real estate projects around the station were all the railway company's industries or participated in the investment.

The station was not a high-end thing, and there were many places that could be repaired. The railway company was not stupid. If there was no profit, why would they build the station there?

Moving forward or backward did not affect the normal operation of the railway. In this day and age, there was no competition between planes, cars, and railways. Even if the station was a few kilometers away, people still had no choice.

After flipping through the report, Franz showed a satisfied smile. In 1875, Austria's economic growth rate exceeded 8% again. The dividends brought by the second industrial revolution had begun to ferment.

Among them, the performance of the electric power industry was the most outstanding, and the annual growth rate reached an astonishing 23.6%.

In contrast, the development speed of traditional industries was inferior. For example, the textile industry, which emerged at the beginning of the industrial revolution, was now growing at a pitiful 1.8%.

However, behind this data, Austria's textile production capacity increased by 5.6%. The meaning of this was too obvious. The growth rate of production capacity far exceeded the growth rate of the industry, which meant that the industry's profits were declining.

Of course, technological progress also led to the decline of production costs. Specific to a specific company, the profits may increase.

However, the slowdown of the industry's growth rate was an indisputable fact. Increased competition in traditional industries, and the decline of profits was the general trend.

This was not something that could be changed by manpower. The further the development of science and technology, the higher the added value of the product. Primary industries without any technological content would only have less and less profits, and in the end, they could only compete with costs.

Of course, there were exceptions. For example, the steel industry. In terms of time, it had a history of thousands of years. It was a proper traditional industry, but the steel industry's growth rate was still rapid.

In 1875, Austria's steel production exceeded 8 million tons, leaving England behind and becoming the world's first.

During the same period, the world's major steel production:

Austria 8.23 million tons, steel production 960,000 tons;

England 7.42 million tons, steel production 760,000 tons;

France 2.74 million tons, steel production 235,000 tons;

German Federal Empire 1.556 million tons, steel production 315,000 tons; (including the Rhineland region)

The United States of America produced 1.54 million tons of steel and 146,000 tons of steel;

The Russian Empire produced 1.042 million tons of steel and 24,000 tons of steel.

The Pubo Federation produced 968,000 tons of steel and 126,000 tons of steel.

The United States of America produced 346,000 tons of steel and 38,000 tons of steel.

…

The rest of the countries could be ignored. The statistics showed that the French had fallen behind, and the gap was still widening.

It wasn't that the Government of Paris didn't know how to develop the economy, it was completely forced by reality. The coal mines in France were buried relatively deep, the coal seams were shallow, and there was gas.

The mining cost was high, but the quality was not good. It could be used for smelting iron, but not for smelting steel. Import was the only way out.

In this context, the French also played with black technology, that is — — charcoal smelting iron. As far as Franz knew, French steel companies were still researching — charcoal steelmaking.

This was no joke. A considerable part of France's steel output was produced from charcoal. Many French metallurgists swore in the newspapers that the quality of iron produced from charcoal was the best.

Don't be surprised. Charcoal steelmaking was a traditional process with thousands of years of history.

Now the French were still researching charcoal steelmaking technology and had achieved progress. In the laboratory, the French had already used charcoal to produce qualified steel.

Unfortunately, it couldn't be mass produced. In the industrial trial production, the quality of the steel produced by this technology could not be guaranteed, and even the cost was high.

These practical problems didn't dampen the enthusiasm of the French capitalists. They continued to work on this road of no return.

The capitalists had a reason to do this. France's coal production was insufficient and the quality was poor, but the forest was rich. Once the charcoal steelmaking technology broke through, they could instantly get out of trouble.

If they learned from Britain and Austria, they could only rely on imports of coal. The cost alone had made the French steel industry lose its competitiveness in the market.

In France, a country with a developed financial industry, most steel companies were listed companies. Regardless of whether they could succeed or not, they had to draw a pie that would make investors believe in it. Charcoal steelmaking was not surprising.

Under the trend of profit, the capitalists also had to believe that this was correct. Otherwise, how could they drive up the stock price?

Compared to the same period in history, the development of the steel industry in France in this era was quite good. The one that suffered the most was the divided United States.

The United States inherited most of the American industry, but the development was not smooth. Without the southern market, they had to make up for the damage caused by the war, so the economy of the United States naturally couldn't do well.

The United States inherited two-thirds of the United States, but its overall national strength was less than half of the same period in history. Market shrinkage and labor shortage were the main factors that restricted the economic development of the United States.

Due to the butterfly effect, the number of immigrants from Europe to the United States in the last two decades was less than a third of the same period in history.

Without people and markets, the industry would inevitably shrink. This was not something that could be changed by manpower.

Coupled with political factors, the United States government's reputation was ruined by the defeat, and many federal states didn't pay attention to the central government.

Each federal state had a set of leadership, and everyone's policies revolved around the state. The so-called big picture concept, sorry, didn't exist at all.

It was common to see some federal states set up trade barriers to protect the state's industry and commerce; it was also common to see some states open their doors to industrial and commercial products from all over the world.

These policies were for their own benefit. The government set up trade barriers to protect the industrial products that could be produced locally.

The industrial products that couldn't be produced locally and had to be purchased from outside, naturally, they would be bought from whoever was cheap and easy to use.

Due to these series of factors, in order to recover the economy after the war, the United States of America, which lacked labor, had to import people of color.

In particular, cheap labor was the most popular among the capitalists. The labor provided by these labor export companies, except for the nominal personal freedom, was essentially no different from slaves.

The United States of America's steel industry could have its current scale, and these cheap labor from outside could not be ignored.

However, the after-effects were also quite serious. This kind of predatory exploitation caused the racial conflicts in the United States to rise day by day.

To solve these problems, it wasn't something that could be done overnight. At the very least, there had to be a strong government to integrate all the federal states.