2.
251
European officers serving in the Colony. Their expenditure may
be divided into three categories :-
A. Home remittances which of course are purely sterling,
B.
According to standing rules these are not expected to
exceed half salary and in the great majority of cases
are probably far less.
Goods imported from Europe or United States of America.
The cost of these in Hong Kong currency varies more or
less directly with the value of the Hong Kong dollar
but the price does not since such elements as dividends
interest and wages of Chinese staff are payable in
dollars.
C. Servants, transport and local produce, the cost of which
rises and falls very little with the fall and rise in
exchange.
Consequently it can confidently be said that a sharp fall in the
sterling value of the Hong Kong dollar provides the sterling
officer with more money than he can equitably be said to need, at
any rate during the earlier months of such fallen value. An
officer who received $10 for each £1 in October does not require
$16 for each £1 in the following March. In fact if he is so paid
for March he will be better off on his "cut" salary than he was
in October on his uncut salary at the expense of the taxpayer.
(It is of course equally true that a sharp rise in the sterling
value of the Hong Kong dollar would leave the officer with less
money than he can equitably be said to need and it is for that
reason that the officer has been given the protection of an upward limit of $1 - 28/-.)
3.
For the reasons just given it is suggested that sterlin salaries for the first quarter of 1936 (less Widows' & Orphans