No. 42.
Mr. Kasson
to Mr. Evarts.
Vienna, September 1, 1879. (Received September 17.)
Sir: The following statistics of the production and consumption of beer in this empire of mingled races may be of interest to American statisticians, and perhaps to the Treasury Department.
It appears that in 1878 the number of breweries in operation was 2,332. Their production reached 11,323,414 hectoliters of beer, which was less by 215,000 hectoliters than the production of the previous year. The exportation of beer in 1878 was 214,422 hectoliters, while 11,101,796 hectoliters were consumed.
The revenue which the government derived from this source reached the large sum of 21,041,631 florins (say $10,500,000), or nearly 2 florins (96 cents) per hectoliter.
The population of the empire that year being estimated in round numbers at 36,000,000, this consumption would appear to have been at the average annual rate of nearly 31 liters for each man, woman, and child in the whole empire.
I have, &c.,