Importer

“ Most imports arrive and are passed through Customs under the consumption entry, which permits the importer to pay the duties, obtain a release, and get immediate possession of all of his merchandise.
When merchandise is brought into the country under a warehouse entry, the major part of the merchandise is sent to a Customs bonded warehouse for storage. No duties are deposited when the papers are filed except for that portion of the merchandise which is to be taken immediately by the importer. ”

“ The officers of the government on the one part, and the importer or his agent on the other, are brought into communication and intercourse by the act of entry of the import, and opportunities for explanation easily occur for every difference that may arise. ”

“ The broker plays a prominent role as the middle man in the import-export business, but this does not mean that an importer must necessarily seek the services of a broker in bringing merchandise into the country. ”

“ The day are gone when the merchant adventurer sent out his ships, laden with merchandise, which were to bring home to him the produce of distant lands. There are, of course, a number of merchants who, having their own establishments in foreign parts, do both an import and an export business, balancing their own transactions without many bills of exchange passing; but, on the whole, trade is now much more specialised, there are importers and exporters, and their transactions are entirely independent of each other. ”

“ But a duty laid upon an article which may be produced here stimulates the skill and industry of our own country to produce the same article, which is brought into the market in competition with the foreign article, and the importer is thus compelled to reduce his price to that at which the domestic article can be sold, thereby throwing a part of the duty upon the producer of the foreign article. ”

“ A number of different agreements exist between bankers and importers to whom the bankers issue credits, as to the terms on which the importers are to be allowed to take possession of the merchandise when it arrives here. Sometimes the goods are put into store and handed over to the merchant only when he shows that he has sold them and needs them to make delivery. Sometimes they are warehoused at once, and parcelled out to the importer only in small lots, as he needs them. ”

“ The incidental aid against foreign competition which they still enjoy gives them an advantage which no other pursuits possess, but of this none others will complain, because the duties levied are necessary for revenue. These revenue duties, including freights and charges, which the importer must pay before he can come in competition with the home manufacturer in our markets, amount on nearly all our leading branches of manufacture to more than one-third of the value of the imported article, and in some cases to almost one-half its value. ”

“ The merchant importers, like all other merchants, we may believe, endeavor, as well as they can, to suit their occasional importations to what, they judge, is likely to be the immediate demand. With all their attention, however, they sometimes overdo the business, and sometimes underdo it. When they import more bullion than is wanted, rather than incur the risk and trouble of exporting it again, they are sometimes willing to sell a part of it for something less than the ordinary or average price. ”

“ Goods brought into the country by importers, are frequently sold, in succession, to several merchants of different grades, before they come to the hands of the consumers. Cloths or stuffs of different kinds, for instance, may be first sold by the bale to one merchant, who, in turn, may dispose of them by the package to another, and this last may retail them in small quantities to a greater number of customers. ”

“ The returns of quantities are compiled from the officially controlled declarations of importers and exporters. These declarations state the countries from which the articles are directly imported and to which they are directly exported. An article coming, for example, from the East Indies via London is recorded as coming from England. The recorded imports include all articles imported, whether for consumption inland or for re-exportation. ”

“ At times when imports run especially heavy, demand from importers for exchange often outweighs every other consideration, forcing rates up to high levels. A practical illustration is to be found in the inpour of merchandise which took place just before the tariff legislation in 1909. ”

“ The demands of the importing departments for foreign exchange were met by the Treasury, after they had been scrutinised by the Exchange Requirements Committee, a body set up on 29th August 1939 with representatives from all the importing departments, the Treasury, and the Bank of England. The demands of private importers were controlled by the Import Licensing Department of the Board of Trade. ”

“ European importers cater to the popular taste, even to the packing and shipping of goods, making a reduction in bulk and weight by shipping in bales instead of boxes, giving long credit on all bills, and by every available means endeavor to save trouble to their customers. ”

“ A manufacturer of hats or straw-goods designs a variety of styles for an approaching season's trade, and turns out the quantities ordered and no more. By similar methods many importers avoid carrying large stocks of goods, and are becoming more and more commission-merchants, or brokers, unburdened by the rent of extensive premises and the losses incidental to buying for chance sale. ”

“ Not upon goods or merchandise imported, but upon imports, upon any and every thing imported or brought into the country. And the words include men, as well as merchandise. That the meaning of the word imports includes men as well as things cannot, it seems to me, be denied. In common parlance, we say, when a new manufacture is established, in which we have had no experience, we must import our workmen from Europe, where they have experience in these matters. ”

“ There is no doubt that our prohibiting the importation of a particular article, which, but for the prohibition, would have been imported, enables us to obtain our other imports at smaller cost. The article for which we have the greatest demand, and for which our demand is most increased by cheapness, is that which we should naturally import preferably to any other; now of this article we should import the quantity necessary to pay for our exports, on terms of interchange less advantageous to us than in the case of any other commodity. ”

“ The manufacturer or the merchant must take the pains to accommodate a direct import trade to the exigencies of the local market. As an example, smaller bales and shorter lengths are requisite in the piece goods. The establishment of sample warehouses at the treaty ports, and in the more important trade-centres of the interior, where bales of shirting, cotton and woollen goods, cases of farming implements, &c., could be opened and sold for cash, would appeal to the natives. ”

“ It encourages the importation of the materials of manufacture, in order that our own people may be enabled to work them up more cheaply, and thereby prevent a greater and more valuable importation of the manufactured commodities. I do not observe, at least in our Statute Book, any encouragement given to the importation of the instruments of trade. When manufactures have advanced to a certain pitch of greatness, the fabrication of the instruments of trade becomes itself the object of a great number of very important manufactures. ”

“ And be it further enacted, That all articles exported shall be valued at their actual cost, or the values which they may truly hear at the time of exportation, in the ports of the United States from which they are exported: and that all articles imported shall be valued at their actual cost, or the values which they may truly bear in the foreign ports from which they are exported for importation into the United States, at the time of such exportation. ”

“ The other modes of payment for the excess of imports are, of course, well known to you all. In the first place, the difference is much greater in appearance than in reality, because of the difference in values, the imports being charged at their value on arrival here, while the exports represent their value in this country, not the price at which the goods are eventually sold—the stated values are nett—and the profits of our merchants should be deducted from the value of the imports, and added to that of our exports respectively. ”

“ The shipping of imports and exports is almost entirely in the hands of Germans who conduct all the great commission houses and do a very profitable business. The importation of goods is oftentimes a complicated matter for in addition to the fixed import duties there are the fees for manifest, custom-house permit, transfer fee, sanitary fee on goods destined for the interior, and a municipal impost at some towns. ”

“ These restrictive laws often compel merchants to buy what they require, at greatly enhanced prices, articles not produced in the country from whence they are imported; as is the case in your importations from England of cotton, sugar, coffee, hemp, jute, silk, foreign wool, and numerous other articles, all arising in a great measure from the fact that the differential duties [315] imposed by your Navigation Laws oblige you to import foreign manufactures or produce, either in your own ships or in the ships of the country where the articles were produced. ”

“ The first branch of foreign trade, which is the export and import of goods, depends on the money. if one half of the people are imployed, and the whole product and manufacture consumed; more money, by imploying more people, will make an overplus to export: if then the goods [Pg 24] imported ballance the goods exported, a greater addition to the money will imploy yet more people, or the same people before employed to more advantage; which by making a greater, or more valuable export, will make a ballance due. ”

“ THOUGH the encouragement of exportation, and the discouragement of importation, are the two great engines by which the mercantile system proposes to enrich every country, yet, with regard to some particular commodities, it seems to follow an opposite plan: to discourage exportation and to encourage importation. ”

“ The exports must very nearly amount to the value of foreign imports, which consist principally of sugar, wine, brandy, salt, wearing apparel, and household furniture. The import duty on European and North American produce is twenty-seven per cent. ”

“ The merchants who have the responsibility of the import trade at the different marts also must satisfy themselves that they get good things, and all the traders must obey the State merchant in these particulars. ”

“ The other, and this is even a more pressing solicitude to him, is that it is of vital importance to us to look after our external markets, to make sure that we shall always have customers, and good customers, to buy our goods, and so to enable us to pay for our indispensable imports. The Free Trader does not share this solicitude. He has got a comfortable theory that if you only look after your imports your exports will look after themselves. ”

“ We have inland navigation. Our last exports did not exceed £1,000,000. Our export trade is entirely in the hands of foreigners. We have no manufactures—depend for supplies on other nations—and so far are we from having any carrying trade, that, as I have already said, our exports are in the hands of foreigners. Besides the profit that might be made by our natural materials, much greater gains would accrue from their being first wrought before they were exported. ”

“ The interest of the mercantile class may happen to differ from that of the whole community. For example; it is, generally speaking, the interest of the merchant to import and export every thing; the interest of manufacturers to lessen imports in order to raise the price of domestic fabrics, and to check exports, where they may enhance the price of raw materials. ”

“ The case which we have just examined, is an example in how remarkable a manner every cause which materially influences exports, operates upon the prices of imports. According to the ancient theory of the balance of trade, and to the associations of the generality of what are termed practical men to this day, the sole benefit derived from commerce consists in the exports, and imports are rather an evil than otherwise. ”

“ The excess of the value of imports over that of exports, which is regarded by some as an adverse and alarming symptom in British trade, is in large part readily accounted for on the ground of shipping receipts, insurance returns, interest on capital employed in foreign trade, merchants' profits, and the income derived from foreign investments. ”

“ It can not escape notice that a duty upon the importation of an article can not otherwise aid the domestic production of it than by giving the latter greater advantages in the home market. It can have no influence upon the advantageous sale of the article produced in foreign markets—no tendency, therefore, to promote its exportation. ”

“ Fifthly.—They are to advise how Free Ports or Landing-places for Foreign Commodities imported (without paying of Custom if again exported) may be appointed in several parts of this Land, and in what manner the same is to be effected.
Sixthly.—They are to consider of some way, that a most exact account be kept of all commodities imported and exported through the Land, to the end that a perfect Balance of Trade may be taken, whereby the Commonwealth may not be impoverished, by receiving of Commodities yearly from Foraign parts of a greater value than what was carried out. ”