A Comparison of American and German economies in WW2

Discussions on the economic history of the nations taking part in WW2, from the recovery after the depression until the economy at war.
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LWD
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Re: Ultimate Ammunition Table

#46

Post by LWD » 22 Aug 2012, 14:39

Guaporense wrote:.... Aircraft carriers couldn't carry that much ammunition.
Really? According to http://pwencycl.kgbudge.com/E/s/Essex_class.htm an Essex class carrier carried 1,601 tons of munitions. I suspect most were bombs or torpedoes. Looking at the Wiki page for them there were ~16 in service during the war. Start factoring in multiple missions, other CVs, CVLs, and CVEs and your assumption looks rather questionable.
...Therefore the tables should not include 20mm.
Why not? How about 40mm?
Also, I didn't count navy and aircraft ammunition for Germany as well.
Are you sure? Weren't some of the rounds common between the KM, the Heer, and the LW? Note also that the US Army was responsible for procurement of some of the rounds the USN used and visa versa.

Of course you are also rather ignoring the fact that the US ammunition production was limited not by production capablity but by percieved need. The implication of course is that it is not a good measure especially by itself of either US productivity or the US economy.

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Guaporense
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Re: Ultimate Ammunition Table

#47

Post by Guaporense » 23 Aug 2012, 01:43

Guaporense wrote:I have made better tables. Overall, from 1940 to 1944, Germany made 4.7 million tons of artillery, AA, tank and anti-tank projectiles for the army over 30 mm (not 5.6 million, here I was wrong in thinking that Jason Long's figures were wrong, the artillery ammunition he didn't include consisted of 75 mm shells, not the 105mm - 210mm categories), the US, 2.7 million and the USSR 1.75 million (though, not including AA ammunition, here are the USSR's figures: http://i451.photobucket.com/albums/qq23 ... uction.png).
Here are my lastest ammunition figures:
http://i451.photobucket.com/albums/qq235/guaporense/GermanAmericanandSovietammunition.png
Not including 20mm and lower and also not including mortar (due to lack of precise data regarding Germany's mortar production) and referent only to army ammunition, not including naval ammunition production, because the purpose here is to compare munitions production for ground forces. Germany was indeed the leading producer of munitions for ground forces in WW2.

Here are the German and Soviet steel allocations for the 3rd quarter of 1944 and for the whole 1944, respectively:
http://i451.photobucket.com/albums/qq235/guaporense/GermanSovietsteelallocation.png
Soviet allocations are for rolled metal which was in terms of weight 80% of total steel production, assuming the same proportion was allocated for ammunition would mean a total steel allocation for ammunition of 130,000 tons a month, 30% of German levels. Note that before the beginning of the collapse of the German economy in the first 5 months of 1944 German steel production was 3,000,000 tons a month, compared to Soviet output of 900,000 tons a month, for the whole year.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz


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Guaporense
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Total military expenditures

#48

Post by Guaporense » 23 Aug 2012, 01:49

German military expenditures during the whole war were comparable to the US military expenditures in terms of size. German military outlays from 1940 to March 1945 were 175 billion 1939 dollars (RM deflated to 1939 prices and converted at the official exchange rates). US military expenditures from January 1941 to December 1945 were 240 billion 1939 dollars, including Lend-Lease supplies to the allies. However, the composition of these expenditures was very different, in the US aircraft, for instance, consisted of 15% of all military outlays, in Germany, aircraft consisted of 6.7% of all military outlays (using 1941 aircraft prices, note also the structure of employment).
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

RichTO90
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Re: Total military expenditures

#49

Post by RichTO90 » 24 Aug 2012, 03:12

Guaporense wrote:
RichTO90 wrote:The actual
Didn't you notice they are the same figures?
Um, no, they are not.
Guaporense wrote: ------------------------------------- Germany ------------ USA
Fighters -------------------------- 28,926 --------------- 38,873
------ single-engine ------------- 25,580 --------------- 34,140
------ twin-engine --------------- 3,066 ------------------ 4,733
Bombers ------------------------- 6,468 ----------------- 35,003
------ tactical -------------------- 5,950 ----------------- 18,958
------ strategic ------------------- 518 ------------------- 16,045
RichTO90 wrote: Combat Aircraft Germany/USA
4-engine Bombers 518/16,331
2-engine bombers 5,041/18,672
1-engine bombers 909/8,614
2-engine fighters 3,066/4,733
1-engine Fighters 25,860/34,140
The division between “tactical” and “strategic” bombers is your own invention, which obscures rather than enlightens. Neither side used such a convention. Nevertheless, let’s arrange my figures into your categories and see if they are “the same”.

German
You have 518 “strategic bombers”
I have 518 “4-engine bombers”
You have 5,950 “tactical bombers”
I have 5,950 “1-engine and 2-engine bombers”
Spot on you!

American
You have 16,045 “strategic bombers”
I have 16,331 “4-engine bombers”
You missed the Navy 4-engine patrol bombers
You have 18,958 “tactical bombers”
I have 27,286 “1-engine and 2-engine bombers”
You missed the Navy 2-engine patrol bombers and 1-engine scout, dive, and torpedo bombers

So getting German figures correct, but American figures off by as much as one-third, equals the “same figures”? How strange.

Sources?

Here we have aero engine production:

By year it appears:

1940 - 15,000
1941 - 23,000
1942 - 40,000
1943 - 54,000
1944 - 54,000

total: 186,000
Damn, I forgot Junkers! Got me. Mind you, your numbers are still incorrect.

Junkers/BMW/DB

1940 – 7,080/232/6,219/13,531
1941 – 12,375/1,445/7,341/21,161
1942 – 18,581/6,169/10,301/35,051
1943 – 16,804/14,673/19,678/51,155
1944 – 15,174/14,699/26,268/56,141
1945 – 15,129/UNK/UNK/UNK

Total 1940-1944 was 177,039
It's true that aero engine production was a binding constraint on the German aircraft industry, while the US produced a huge number of engines, more than they used.
I see, so the Germans producing insufficient engines to requirement was a “binding constraint”, but the U.S. producing sufficient numbers was “more than they used”? What an odd worldview you have. Mind you, since the corrected figures for 1940-1944 show the German ratio of required versus produced was 1.61:1 does that mean they also produced “more than they used”?

Apologies BTW, the ratio I posted:

Total Engines Required 37,055/154,788
Total Engines Produced 42,092/232,422
Ratio Engines/Airframes 1.14/1.50

Was just for 1944; corrected to include Jumo production it should be:

Total Engines Required 37,055/154,788
Total Engines Produced 56,141/232,422
Ratio Engines/Airframes 1.52/1.50

So another nice theory shot to hell, which means of course that the low German readiness rates were just because they had crap mechanics and crap material for them to work with. :lol:
Everybody lives in his/her "fantasyland". That's because each individual mind cannot grasp the whole reality. If the reality in our mind is different than mine that doesn't mean that you have the right to impose it with pathetic ad-hominem attacks. That's a Nazi type of attitude coming from a pro-American chauvinism perspective, that doesn't fit with perspectives from people from other parts of the world.
You still don’t get it do you? Wrong is wrong. Mistakes are mistakes, whether you make them or I do. The difference seems to be that I’m willing to admit when my figures are wrong, but you prefer to disappear for a year or so and then return to post the same incorrect figures again.
Attacking me from getting the page number wrong by 14-15 pages, because I cited it from memory, is infantile.
Did you “cite” the numbers from memory as well? For example:
Guaporense wrote:
RichTO90 wrote:For example, "Aircraft Bombs" in total produced were 5,924,000 short tons or 5,374,163 metric tons.
2% discrepancy, not that relevant.
Is it irrelevant? Why? Do you actually know what your German figures include as “bombs”? Do you know what the American total includes? The American figure is very precise, the German figure is potentially very imprecise. To take your favorite year, 1944 for example, the Germans produced the following types of “bombs” compared to the Americans:

GP Bombs
German
SC50 – 30,510
SC250 – 239,000
SC500 – 32,300
SC100 – 176,000
SC1800 – 132,000
American
100-lb (45KG) – 296,000
150-lb (68 KG) – 188,000
250-lb (113 KG) – 207,000 (1944 was the lowest production year, in 1944 it was 770,000 and the first 8 months of 1945 was 846,000)
500-lb (227 KG) – 2,539,000
1,000-lb (454 KG) – 398,000
2,000-lb (907 KG) – 23,000
4,000-lb (1814 KG) – 22,272

Fragmentation Bombs
SD1 – 66,879,000
SD50 – 177,000
SD70 – 270,000
SD250 – 84,400
SD500 – 2,035
American
4-lb (2 KG) – 2,226,000
20-lb (9 KG) – 19,732, 000
23-lb (10 KG) – 5,024,000
90-lb (41 KG) – 1,071,000
220/260-lb (100/118 KG) – 968,000

Armor Piercing Bombs
German
PC1000 – 82
PC1400 – 47
PC1400FX – 763
US
1,000-lb (454 KG) – 70,180
1,600-lb (726 KG) – 1,744

Incendiary Bombs
German
1 KG – 6,298,000
US
100-lb and 100-lb cluster – 190,000
500-lb and 500-lb cluster- 992,000
1,000-lb cluster – 8,000

Depth Bombs
German
None
US
350-lb (159 KG) – 70,702
650/700-lb – 3,425

Aerial Torpedoes
German – 6,577
US – 6,970

Naval Mines
German – 843
US – 18,392

You’re welcome to do your weight calculations.
Therefore the navy consumed a very small quantity of aircraft bombs, ca. 100,000 metric tons. Aircraft carriers couldn't carry that much ammunition.
There is no “therefore” about it; you are making an assumption, which again is incorrect. Who procured the items doesn’t necessarily define who consumed them. The USN utilized War Department procured bombs, while the AAF in turn utilized Navy Department procured bombs. And Navy Department aircraft, which included quite a number of “tactical” and “strategic” bombers, did not all fly off of aircraft carriers to drop their ordnance.
Therefore the tables should not include 20mm. Also, I didn't count navy and aircraft ammunition for Germany as well.
I see, so when the data doesn’t fit your preconception, you ditch the data before your ditch your preconception. Nice.
artillery, AA, tank and anti-tank projectiles…the US, 2.7 million
Uh, no, again not, for “ground artillery” including heavy field, light field, tank, and antitank ammunition, 37mm and greater, U.S. production from 1 July 1940 to 31 December 1944 was 2,982,545 short tons, so 2,705,719 metric tons, not including antiaircraft ammunition, 37mm and greater, which was another 176,983 short tons or 160,556 metric tons.
Rounds "over 118mm" procured for the Navy?

16-inch - 123,984
14-inch - 149,175
12-inch - 29,754
8-inch - 381,508
6-inch - 1,070,185
5-inch (Surface Fire) - 354,516
5-inch (AA and DP) - 12,456,000
That would weight ca. 0.55 million tons.
Um, no, afraid not. Ammunition for naval surface fire totaled 424,260 short tons, while antiaircraft was 738,366 short tons. So 1,054,716 metric tons.
And considering only the 1940-1944 production, the surface fire ammunition was only 261,000 metric tons. That's 12% of the difference between German and American army ammunition production between 1940 to 1944. I don't have data on 55 inch AA production from 1940 to 1944, to allow a complete comparison.
Again, no, the total was 260,835 actually.
I would also need to consider the large quantities of naval ammunition produced by Germany, a total of 18 million rounds of naval ammunition over 75 mm from 1940 to 1944, using the same average weight as for ground ammunition over 75 mm (4.57 million tons of projectiles from 302 million rounds), that yields a projectile weight of 272,000 metric tons. That's greater than the total American production of surface fire naval ammunition over the same period, though it surely included some AA ammunition. Yep, Germany wasted a great deal of resources making naval ammunition.
Really? I’d love to see what they produced “over 75mm in 1940, because otherwise 1941-1944 they produced:

8.8cm
1941 – 1,392,000
1942 – 10,104,000
1943 – 564,000
1944 – 84,000

10.5cm
1941 – 996,000
1942 – 2,280,000
1943 – 744,000
1944 – 600,000

Production of larger calibers was so minor they didn’t make it into the production reports. Just where did your figures come from?

RichTO90
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Re: Total military expenditures

#50

Post by RichTO90 » 24 Aug 2012, 04:26

After a bit of digging, I found some more information. U.S. production of ammunition for naval antiaircraft fire from 1 July 1940 to 31 December 1941 was 738,366 short tons, so 669,834 metric tons
don't have data on 55 inch AA production from 1940 to 1944, to allow a complete comparison.
I forgot to respond to this, partly because I was puzzled as to what was meant. I believe he is referring to the USN 5”/38 Mark 12 gun. Production was:

Antiaircraft Common (25 KG)
1940 (from 1 July) – 0
1941 – 533,000
1942 – 741,000
1943 – 2,912,000
1944 – 4,255,000
1945 – 2,655,000

Surface Fire Common (24.5 KG)
1940 (from 1 July) – 0
1941 – 8,000
1942 – 32,000
1943 – 55,000
1944 – 410,000
1945 – 75,000

Surface Fire Illuminating (24.7 KG)
1940 (from 1 July) – 0
1941 – 6,000
1942 – 53,000
1943 – 112,000
1944 – 272,000
1945 – 337,000
I would also need to consider the large quantities of naval ammunition produced by Germany, a total of 18 million rounds of naval ammunition over 75 mm from 1940 to 1944, using the same average weight as for ground ammunition over 75 mm (4.57 million tons of projectiles from 302 million rounds), that yields a projectile weight of 272,000 metric tons. That's greater than the total American production of surface fire naval ammunition over the same period, though it surely included some AA ammunition. Yep, Germany wasted a great deal of resources making naval ammunition.
Really? I’d love to see what they produced “over 75mm in 1940, because otherwise 1941-1944 they produced:

8.8cm
1941 – 1,392,000
1942 – 10,104,000
1943 – 564,000
1944 – 84,000

10.5cm
1941 – 996,000
1942 – 2,280,000
1943 – 744,000
1944 – 600,000
Surprisingly, the figure of 272,000 is not that far off. Total weight for the above would have been roughly 276,200 metric tons. The US 5”/38 production alone totaled about 304,829.44 metric tons.

ljadw
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Re: A Comparison of American and German economies in WW2

#51

Post by ljadw » 24 Aug 2012, 11:44

As usual,Guaporense is trying to reconstruct his Wolkenkukuksheim,ignoring some little details 8-) ,as
1)access to raw materials
2)air raids
3)slave labor
4)the fact that there was no need for the US to be that mobilized as Germany
5)that the US could,if needed,produce more ammunition,more tanks,more aircraft,etc,etc.
And,what is needed to construct a Wolkenkukuksheim (what in the colonies on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean,is called Phantasialand)? First,inventing an artificial value of the RM(in 1944,the cigarette was already supplanting the RM as real money) against the $.
The real 8-) benefit of this thread is,that we can have the illusion of living in 2010,and being 2 years younger .

RichTO90
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Re: Total military expenditures

#52

Post by RichTO90 » 24 Aug 2012, 22:08

don't have data on 55 inch AA production from 1940 to 1944, to allow a complete comparison.
To continue with the antiaircraft production of the USN, since it is most closely analogous to the German production, which was likely also mainly antiaircraft rounds, there are the following production figures:

5"/25 Antiaircraft Common (24.5 KG)
1940 (from 1 July) – 0
1941 – 0
1942 – 76,000
1943 – 230,000
1944 – 362,000
1945 – 205,000

3"/50 Antiaircraft Common (5.9 KG)
1940 (from 1 July) – 41,000
1941 – 234,000
1942 – 554,000
1943 – 2,318,000
1944 – 2,296,000
1945 – 977,000

3"/23 Antiaircraft Common (5.9 KG)
1940 (from 1 July) – 0
1941 – 0
1942 – 58,000
1943 – 115,000
1944 – 39,000
1945 – 0

Course, I'm wondering if Guaporense's figures are quoting projectile weight or complete round weight? Not that I think he can answer, but...

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bf109 emil
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Re: A Comparison of American and German economies in WW2

#53

Post by bf109 emil » 05 Nov 2012, 04:48

Is there statistics to show what level of GNP or production by Germany was from German population as well as raw material from German land and not occupied territories and forced labor/slaves?

i.e. almost every industry, factory, raw materials depended and relied upon forced/slave labor...what % of German production would have been lost and material shortages had Germany not had these forced workers and raw materials gained through it's brutal policies?? Something the American economy did not rely upon as did Germany.
From 1942–1944, the Germans deported nearly three million Soviet citizens to Germany, Austria, and Bohemia-Moravia as forced laborers.

At the end of the war, millions of non-German displaced persons were left in Germany, including some tens of thousands of Jews who had survived the "Final Solution," victims of Nazi policies of deportation for forced labor.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php ... d=10005180
On 5 October 1942, for example, Sauckel wrote to Rosenberg stating that 2,000,000 more foreign laborers were required, and that the majority of these would have to be drafted from the recently occupied Eastern Territories and especially from the Ukraine. The letter, (017-PS) reads as follows:
"The Fuehrer has worked out new and most urgent plans for the armament which require the quick mobilization of two more million foreign labor forces.- The Fuehrer therefore has granted me, for the execution of my decree of 21 March 1942, new powers for my new duties, and has especially authorized me to take whatever measures I think are necessary in the Reich, the Protectorate, the General-Gouvernement, as well as in the occupied territories, in order to assure at all costs an orderly mobilization of labor for the German armament industry.

The additional required labor forces will have to be drafted for the majority from the recently occupied Eastern Territories, especially from the Reichskommissariat Ukraine. Therefore, the Reichskommissariat Ukraine must furnish "225,000 labor forces by 31 December 1942 and 225,000 more by 1 May 1943. "I ask you to inform Reichskommissar Gauleiter party fellow member Koch about the new situation and requirements and especially to see to it that he will support personally in any possible way the execution of this new requirement. "I have the intention to visit Party member Koch shortly and I would be grateful to you if you could inform me as to where and when I could meet him for a personal discussion. "Right now though, I ask that the procurement be taken [Page 883] up at once with every possible pressure and the commitment of all powers especially also of the experts of the labor offices. All the directives which had limited temporarily the procurement of Eastern laborers are annulled. The Reichs procurement for the next months must be given priority over all other measures. "I do not ignore the difficulties which exist for the execution of this new requirement, but I am convinced that with the ruthless commitment of all resources, and with the full co-operation of all those interested, the execution of the new demands can be accomplished for the fixed date. I have already communicated the new demands to the Reichskommissar Ukraine via mail. In reference to our long distance phone call of to-day I will send you the text of the Fuehrer's decree at the beginning of next week."
http://fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/resource/ ... OCSLA3.htm
The hordes of displaced persons in Germany today reflect the extent to which the Nazi conspirators' labor program succeeded. The best available Allied and German data reveal that as of January 1945 approximately 4,795,000 foreign civilian workers had been put to work for the German war effort in the old Reich, among them slave laborers of more than 14 different nationalities. An affidavit executed by Edward L. Deuss, an economic analyst, contains the following statistical summation:
Only a small proportion of the foreign workers brought to Germany were volunteers. At the 1 March 1944 meeting of the Central Planning Board, Sauckel made clear the vast scale of slavery. He stated: "*** Out of five million foreign workers who arrived in Germany, not even 200,000 came voluntarily."
http://fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/resource/ ... OCSLA6.htm

ljadw
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Re: A Comparison of American and German economies in WW2

#54

Post by ljadw » 05 Nov 2012, 11:21

Hm:saying that every depended on forced labour,is misleading .At its maximum,foreign labour was some 16 % of the total workforce of the third reich:in 1944:7.1 million against 29 million of Germans .
You also are underestimating the number of non forced foreign labour,which was the greatest part till the summer of 1942.

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bf109 emil
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Re: A Comparison of American and German economies in WW2

#55

Post by bf109 emil » 06 Nov 2012, 05:47

You also are underestimating the number of non forced foreign labour,which was the greatest part till the summer of 1942.
did these non forced foreign workers come from conquered and occupied territories or of there own free will, rushing to Germany to suddenly become employed...or was there country decimated with no hope for work, leaving little choice?

perhaps a better statistic would be to find the number of foreign workers prior to Sept. 1 1939 vs conscripted labor from occupied countries used in German mines, factories, fields, afterwards.

sixten992
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Re: Total military expenditures

#56

Post by sixten992 » 07 Dec 2014, 05:55

RichTO90 wrote:
Guaporense wrote:
RichTO90 wrote:The actual
Didn't you notice they are the same figures?
Um, no, they are not.
Guaporense wrote: ------------------------------------- Germany ------------ USA
Fighters -------------------------- 28,926 --------------- 38,873
------ single-engine ------------- 25,580 --------------- 34,140
------ twin-engine --------------- 3,066 ------------------ 4,733
Bombers ------------------------- 6,468 ----------------- 35,003
------ tactical -------------------- 5,950 ----------------- 18,958
------ strategic ------------------- 518 ------------------- 16,045
RichTO90 wrote: Combat Aircraft Germany/USA
4-engine Bombers 518/16,331
2-engine bombers 5,041/18,672
1-engine bombers 909/8,614
2-engine fighters 3,066/4,733
1-engine Fighters 25,860/34,140
The division between “tactical” and “strategic” bombers is your own invention, which obscures rather than enlightens. Neither side used such a convention. Nevertheless, let’s arrange my figures into your categories and see if they are “the same”.

German
You have 518 “strategic bombers”
I have 518 “4-engine bombers”
You have 5,950 “tactical bombers”
I have 5,950 “1-engine and 2-engine bombers”
Spot on you!

American
You have 16,045 “strategic bombers”
I have 16,331 “4-engine bombers”
You missed the Navy 4-engine patrol bombers
You have 18,958 “tactical bombers”
I have 27,286 “1-engine and 2-engine bombers”
You missed the Navy 2-engine patrol bombers and 1-engine scout, dive, and torpedo bombers

So getting German figures correct, but American figures off by as much as one-third, equals the “same figures”? How strange.

Sources?

Here we have aero engine production:

By year it appears:

1940 - 15,000
1941 - 23,000
1942 - 40,000
1943 - 54,000
1944 - 54,000

total: 186,000
Damn, I forgot Junkers! Got me. Mind you, your numbers are still incorrect.

Junkers/BMW/DB

1940 – 7,080/232/6,219/13,531
1941 – 12,375/1,445/7,341/21,161
1942 – 18,581/6,169/10,301/35,051
1943 – 16,804/14,673/19,678/51,155
1944 – 15,174/14,699/26,268/56,141
1945 – 15,129/UNK/UNK/UNK

Total 1940-1944 was 177,039
It's true that aero engine production was a binding constraint on the German aircraft industry, while the US produced a huge number of engines, more than they used.
I see, so the Germans producing insufficient engines to requirement was a “binding constraint”, but the U.S. producing sufficient numbers was “more than they used”? What an odd worldview you have. Mind you, since the corrected figures for 1940-1944 show the German ratio of required versus produced was 1.61:1 does that mean they also produced “more than they used”?

Apologies BTW, the ratio I posted:

Total Engines Required 37,055/154,788
Total Engines Produced 42,092/232,422
Ratio Engines/Airframes 1.14/1.50

Was just for 1944; corrected to include Jumo production it should be:

Total Engines Required 37,055/154,788
Total Engines Produced 56,141/232,422
Ratio Engines/Airframes 1.52/1.50

So another nice theory shot to hell, which means of course that the low German readiness rates were just because they had crap mechanics and crap material for them to work with. :lol:
Everybody lives in his/her "fantasyland". That's because each individual mind cannot grasp the whole reality. If the reality in our mind is different than mine that doesn't mean that you have the right to impose it with pathetic ad-hominem attacks. That's a Nazi type of attitude coming from a pro-American chauvinism perspective, that doesn't fit with perspectives from people from other parts of the world.
You still don’t get it do you? Wrong is wrong. Mistakes are mistakes, whether you make them or I do. The difference seems to be that I’m willing to admit when my figures are wrong, but you prefer to disappear for a year or so and then return to post the same incorrect figures again.
Attacking me from getting the page number wrong by 14-15 pages, because I cited it from memory, is infantile.
Did you “cite” the numbers from memory as well? For example:
Guaporense wrote:
RichTO90 wrote:For example, "Aircraft Bombs" in total produced were 5,924,000 short tons or 5,374,163 metric tons.
2% discrepancy, not that relevant.
Is it irrelevant? Why? Do you actually know what your German figures include as “bombs”? Do you know what the American total includes? The American figure is very precise, the German figure is potentially very imprecise. To take your favorite year, 1944 for example, the Germans produced the following types of “bombs” compared to the Americans:

GP Bombs
German
SC50 – 30,510
SC250 – 239,000
SC500 – 32,300
SC100 – 176,000
SC1800 – 132,000
American
100-lb (45KG) – 296,000
150-lb (68 KG) – 188,000
250-lb (113 KG) – 207,000 (1944 was the lowest production year, in 1944 it was 770,000 and the first 8 months of 1945 was 846,000)
500-lb (227 KG) – 2,539,000
1,000-lb (454 KG) – 398,000
2,000-lb (907 KG) – 23,000
4,000-lb (1814 KG) – 22,272

Fragmentation Bombs
SD1 – 66,879,000
SD50 – 177,000
SD70 – 270,000
SD250 – 84,400
SD500 – 2,035
American
4-lb (2 KG) – 2,226,000
20-lb (9 KG) – 19,732, 000
23-lb (10 KG) – 5,024,000
90-lb (41 KG) – 1,071,000
220/260-lb (100/118 KG) – 968,000

Armor Piercing Bombs
German
PC1000 – 82
PC1400 – 47
PC1400FX – 763
US
1,000-lb (454 KG) – 70,180
1,600-lb (726 KG) – 1,744

Incendiary Bombs
German
1 KG – 6,298,000
US
100-lb and 100-lb cluster – 190,000
500-lb and 500-lb cluster- 992,000
1,000-lb cluster – 8,000

Depth Bombs
German
None
US
350-lb (159 KG) – 70,702
650/700-lb – 3,425

Aerial Torpedoes
German – 6,577
US – 6,970

Naval Mines
German – 843
US – 18,392

You’re welcome to do your weight calculations.
Therefore the navy consumed a very small quantity of aircraft bombs, ca. 100,000 metric tons. Aircraft carriers couldn't carry that much ammunition.
There is no “therefore” about it; you are making an assumption, which again is incorrect. Who procured the items doesn’t necessarily define who consumed them. The USN utilized War Department procured bombs, while the AAF in turn utilized Navy Department procured bombs. And Navy Department aircraft, which included quite a number of “tactical” and “strategic” bombers, did not all fly off of aircraft carriers to drop their ordnance.
Therefore the tables should not include 20mm. Also, I didn't count navy and aircraft ammunition for Germany as well.
I see, so when the data doesn’t fit your preconception, you ditch the data before your ditch your preconception. Nice.
artillery, AA, tank and anti-tank projectiles…the US, 2.7 million
Uh, no, again not, for “ground artillery” including heavy field, light field, tank, and antitank ammunition, 37mm and greater, U.S. production from 1 July 1940 to 31 December 1944 was 2,982,545 short tons, so 2,705,719 metric tons, not including antiaircraft ammunition, 37mm and greater, which was another 176,983 short tons or 160,556 metric tons.
Rounds "over 118mm" procured for the Navy?

16-inch - 123,984
14-inch - 149,175
12-inch - 29,754
8-inch - 381,508
6-inch - 1,070,185
5-inch (Surface Fire) - 354,516
5-inch (AA and DP) - 12,456,000
That would weight ca. 0.55 million tons.
Um, no, afraid not. Ammunition for naval surface fire totaled 424,260 short tons, while antiaircraft was 738,366 short tons. So 1,054,716 metric tons.
And considering only the 1940-1944 production, the surface fire ammunition was only 261,000 metric tons. That's 12% of the difference between German and American army ammunition production between 1940 to 1944. I don't have data on 55 inch AA production from 1940 to 1944, to allow a complete comparison.
Again, no, the total was 260,835 actually.
I would also need to consider the large quantities of naval ammunition produced by Germany, a total of 18 million rounds of naval ammunition over 75 mm from 1940 to 1944, using the same average weight as for ground ammunition over 75 mm (4.57 million tons of projectiles from 302 million rounds), that yields a projectile weight of 272,000 metric tons. That's greater than the total American production of surface fire naval ammunition over the same period, though it surely included some AA ammunition. Yep, Germany wasted a great deal of resources making naval ammunition.
Really? I’d love to see what they produced “over 75mm in 1940, because otherwise 1941-1944 they produced:

8.8cm
1941 – 1,392,000
1942 – 10,104,000
1943 – 564,000
1944 – 84,000

10.5cm
1941 – 996,000
1942 – 2,280,000
1943 – 744,000
1944 – 600,000

Production of larger calibers was so minor they didn’t make it into the production reports. Just where did your figures come from?
There are a lot of ammunition production figures for 1940 in Fritz Hahn's "Waffen and Gehimewaffen ..." Also I have a question for you regarding the aerial bomb production, what is the source for German output figures?

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Re: A Comparison of American and German economies in WW2

#57

Post by Guaporense » 19 Dec 2014, 06:21

bf109 emil wrote:Is there statistics to show what level of GNP or production by Germany was from German population as well as raw material from German land and not occupied territories and forced labor/slaves?
Well, 45% of all coal, iron and steel production was from annexed and occupied territories, and 15% of the labor force in Germany consisted of foreigners, so that's 8% of the 55% inside pre-war Germany, leaving around 47% of total output into pre-war Germany and 53% on occupied/annexed territories (including Austria and Czechoslovakia). If the coal, iron and steel figures are representative of total industrial production (I suspect they underestimate the contribution of annexed and occupied territories because Germany was a net exporter of coal, iron and steel to the rest of continental Europe).

Germany consisted of around 14% of world's industrial production in 1939, with annexed and occupied territories they managed to double that fraction to around 27-29%, which helps to explain why they lasted so long in the war. Germany with the resources of it's 1937 territories boundaries, would not have been able to field and supply the armies they deployed in 1942-1944.
i.e. almost every industry, factory, raw materials depended and relied upon forced/slave labor...what % of German production would have been lost and material shortages had Germany not had these forced workers and raw materials gained through it's brutal policies?? Something the American economy did not rely upon as did Germany.
Free labor is way more efficient than slave labor. German policies were counterproductive, if they used free markets to allocate labor across the occupied territories output would have been much higher. How they could have done that? Simple, tax all territories, either German or occupied, use the money to purchase stuff, stuff get's made because there is demand and entrepreneurs will demand factors of production to produce output, labor and capital will thus be allocated into these sectors. Thanks to market prices the allocation of resources would be the most efficient possible.

Historically what happened is that Germany drafted their labor force into the Wehrmacht, as a result factories were undermanned: German factories were working 93% of the time on single shifts, in the US and UK most of them were working on double shifts, in the USSR, many were working on 3 shifts. Resources were poorly allocated thanks to these stupid industrial policies and frozen prices, as result there was a great. Instead of raising taxes to 55% of GNP (which would be obviously unpopular), Germany froze prices (which made prices unable to guide resource allocation), and used public debt to finance military expenditures and monetary emission and used direct quotas to allocate resources (like X number of shoes per person per year) instead of simply letting prices adjust to allocate resources efficiently.

In an efficient allocation of resources, the labor force inside all occupied territories would be more efficiently allocated to the munition factories (labor shortages would drive wages upward attracting laborers) and they wouldn't work on single shifts but multiple shifts like the allied factories did. The labor force under German control was around 110 million laborers, compared to 64 million for the US and 22 million for the UK, the stock of machine tools (which are the tools used to produce munitions) was 3 times higher than in the UK and slightly larger than in the US even in 1943 in Germany alone (counting directly annexed territories though) but not counting the machine stock of occupied territories. One could argue that you couldn't draft Frenchmen into the army but they would be perfectly willing to work on munition factories if the wages were higher than in other sectors of the economy.

Though essentially, even if munitions production were higher than historically it wouldn't make that much difference if the size of the army couldn't be increased from historical levels. Doesn't matter how many shells you have if you don't have the manpower at the front to oppose the allies on multiple fronts and you were essentially limited to German labor in that regard. Though I might imagine that in a perfectly efficient allocation of resources over 90% of the labor force outside of the armed forces would be foreigners and women and all men would be in the army.

The Allies should thank the stupid policies of the German government (such as exterminating the civilian population of occupied territories), that reduced the efficiency of utilization of resources in occupied territories. The Allies were also inefficient though (they froze prices as well, reducing the efficiency of allocation of resources), but to a smaller degree than Germany was. Germany's problem was their incapacity to effectively integrate the occupied territories into an unified economic system: the occupied territories were larger than Germany in population and GNP before the war.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

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Re: A Comparison of American and German economies in WW2

#58

Post by Guaporense » 19 Dec 2014, 06:33

mescal wrote:
Guaporense wrote:US ammunition production peaked in 1944, the same year as Germany.
I don't have the data for the US production, and I'm not so sure it's completely true for Germany either - probably depends on what "ammunition" is, exactly.
And it's to be noted that in 1944 the US were still investing (that is, thinking post-war), while Speer reoriented all the German economy towards immediate production (that is, they payed for their 1944 guns with the investments which would have enabled production in 1945).
Therefore, comparing USA and Germany in 1944 is irrelevant - they basically had two completely different logic guiding their ammunition production.
Of course. It's irrelevant to compare anything because they are always with different logic. :D Same with comparing production of bombers or ships.

According to production plans, production of all military munitions was planned to increase in Germany in 1945, aircraft was supposed to increase to 80,000 units. Your little theory that Speer was reorienting everything to present day output needs to be supported and is contradicted into the actual plans for munitions production.

US munitions production peaked in late 1943, after that date they started drafting a great number of men into the army. As result decrease in labor input reduced munitions production. Production of ships and tanks peaked in 1943, by 1944 production of ammunition and other items increased. Though monthly production of ammunition and bombs peaked in early 1945.
Finally, I do not have the exact amount of investment in the Navy for 1944. But the Navy budget in 1944 was lower than in 1943 & 1945 :
USN_budget.jpg
Total military expenditures peaked in 1944, in 1943 and 1945 were around 12% lower in nominal terms.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

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Re: A Comparison of American and German economies in WW2

#59

Post by RichTO90 » 20 Dec 2014, 02:55

Guaporense wrote:Of course. It's irrelevant to compare anything because they are always with different logic. :D Same with comparing production of bombers or ships.

According to production plans, production of all military munitions was planned to increase in Germany in 1945, aircraft was supposed to increase to 80,000 units. Your little theory that Speer was reorienting everything to present day output needs to be supported and is contradicted into the actual plans for munitions production.
Ah, yes, back to the plans for Strength Through Joy in 1945... :roll:
US munitions production peaked in late 1943, after that date they started drafting a great number of men into the army. As result decrease in labor input reduced munitions production. Production of ships and tanks peaked in 1943, by 1944 production of ammunition and other items increased. Though monthly production of ammunition and bombs peaked in early 1945.
Back after so long away and already starting to make things up again I see. No, the U.S. did not suddenly start "drafting a great number of men into the army in 1943". No, it did not result in a decrease in "labor input" that "reduced munitions production".
Total military expenditures peaked in 1944, in 1943 and 1945 were around 12% lower in nominal terms.
Military expenditures peaked during 1944, but the highest in terms of percentage was for fiscal 1945, i.e., 1 July 1944 to 30 June 1945.

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Re: A Comparison of American and German economies in WW2

#60

Post by Guaporense » 25 Dec 2014, 19:55

ljadw wrote:4)the fact that there was no need for the US to be that mobilized as Germany
Actually in terms of proportion of labor force employed and utilization of factory capacity the US, UK and Russia were mobilized to a much greater degree than Germany was. After defeating France, Germany controlled more potential resources than any other country: the territories they controlled during most of the war produced 2/3 of all nobel prize winners in the previous decades, about 30% of the world's industrial production and same fraction of GDP (they were larger than the US's fraction of world GDP in the 1950's according to Madison's estimates, using nominal exchange rates the US was a larger fraction though, around 50% of world GDP in 1950). Arguments have been made that it's not the same occupying a foreign territory and having your own national territory but that is mostly due to a governments incapacity of utilizing the resources they conquered. Germany controlled the bulk of Europe at a time when Europe was much more important to the world as a whole than it is now (and even now Europe still corresponds to more than 1/4 of world's GDP).

A government is only an institution that controls a physical territory and extracts resources of that territory to maintain it's monopoly on the legitimate use of force there. Essentially, there is no difference in principle between a occupied territory and the national territory besides ethnicity.

For examples:

1. Machine tool using industries: In 1943, Germany had 5 million workers employed in machine tool using industries which had 2.3 million machines, while the UK had 4.2 million workers in the machine tools using industries and 740,000 machines, or 5.6 workers per machine. As a result in the UK nearly all these industries and other industries involved in munitions production operated on two or three shifts, in Germany nearly all industries operated in single shifts: in 1942, 92% in all industries involved in armament production operated in single shifts. If they utilized their installed industrial capital to the same degree they would have 12-14 million workers in machine tool using industries and Germany had much greater labor supply than the UK if you consider the labor in all occupied territories. Germany output of munitions/armament was 40% of what it would have been given same utilization of factory capacity as the UK.

2. Steel: in 1937, the territories Germany controlled in June 1940 produced 38 million tons of steel, the US produced 50 million tons of steel. Installed capacity was respectively 47 million and 62 million. By 1942, Germany's territories produced 31 million tons of steel, the US produced 76 million tons of steel. US invested heavily in installed capacity while Germany invested nothing and did not utilize even 2/3 of the installed capacity of controlled territories. Germany would have a supply of around 60-65 million tons of steel (about the same as the US considering the US exported a significant fraction of it's steel output to UK, Canada and the USSR).

3. Labor force utilization: In 1943 Germany employed 6.5 million workers in armament related industries (80% of which were the machine tool using industries), the UK employed 5 million and the US employed 12-13 million. The respective labor force sizes were around 110 million for Germany and occupied territories, 22-23 million for the UK, 64 million for the US (though the labor force inside Germany and the armed forces itself was 45 million). The aircraft industry in Germany employed 750,000 workers in late 1943, the US aircraft industry employed 3 times as much: 2.1 million. Even though Germany controlled a much greater labor force. Germany managed to incorporate a little of the labor force of occupied territories and it increased the total labor force available by 20%: from 38 million in 1939 to 45 million in 1943. Still they failed to harness more than a small fraction of the human and physical capital installed in occupied Europe.

And in Germany itself they used a smaller proportion of the labor force inside the country in the military than the UK did: in 1943, the UK employed 9.5 million people out of 23 million strong labor force in the armed forces and war related industries, Germany's case was 16 million out of 45 million. Though the difference can be explained by agriculture: Germany had 11 million agricultural workers, the UK had less than 2 million (as they imported half of their food needs and large quantities of agricultural inputs), the proportion of the labor force outside of agriculture employed for the war effort was similar: 9.5/21 and 16/34, 45% in both cases. More people were employed in the army in Germany's case while more people were employed in naval and aircraft production the UK's case, proportionally, as the type of war they were fighting was different. In the US the labor force outside of agriculture was 54 million, of which 22 million were employed in the armed forces or in war related industries in 1943.

German output of ground ammunition was larger than the US's but given that ammunition accounted for several times larger proportion of expenditures on munitions in Germany's case, the difference was smaller than it should have been. Still even if German output of munitions were 2.5 times larger than it was historically it would't have made much difference because the armed forces couldn't utilize this extra supply, though having plentiful ammunition and aircraft would have made things slightly easier on the eastern front I don't think it would have made that huge difference. And the soldiers from allied or conscripted from occupied territories were almost useless so increasing the size of the armed forces from historical levels doesn't appear to be easy to do.

Overall it appears that the US, UK and the USSR utilized to a much greater degree the industrial capacity of their territories. The USSR managed to really extract stuff out of virtually nothing but they used foreign sources for raw materials, motor vehicles and equipment. Though I suspect the type of war Germany fought was such that increasing that utilization wouldn't have made that great a difference anyway: manpower at the front was Germany's binding constraint before anything else. Though I guess having more foreigners in war related industries would have enabled greater conscription of ethnic Germans into the armed forces.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

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