Spending Money

Last year eight times as many Americans (255,000) visited the British Isles as Britons visited the U.S. One of the reasons: the dollar-short British Treasury limited British travelers to $28 a year for all expenses in the U.S. and Canada, beyond the steamship or plane tickets they could purchase with sterling. Last week, recognizing that restrictions "have erected an unnatural barrier between the English-speaking peoples," Chancellor of the Exchequer Peter Thorneycroft increased travelers' allowances to -L-100 (U.S. $280) a year in dollars in the U.S. and Canada, and increased businessmen's expense allowances to a top of $50 a day.

The reaction was jubilant. Travel agencies were flooded with inquiries about transatlantic tours. But there were also a few cautionary notes. English newspapers warned against $2 haircuts, "and as for food," noted the Manchester Guardian, "you cannot, it seems, sustain life on less than about $1 a meal -- even of the cheapest cafeteria type." Sighed the conservative Time and Tide: "Any British traveler arriving in New York with $280 in his pocket will soon discover just what poor relations we've become."

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