Читать книгу The Definite National Purpose - William Henry Moore - Страница 6

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It is quite common to say that the depression came about for the lack of a plan. The Socialists put the blame on economic liberalism and derisively called it the anarchy of industry. Each one for himself and the devil for us all. That is the idea. Then the Socialists suggest that we substitute order for chaos, and quietly pass into an era in which everything will be in its place and nobody will be out of a place. It is an enticing suggestion with a sweetly reasonable slogan: “It is better to plan than not to plan.”

But has it been so? At the peril of being called a Conservative I shall have to turn over the pages of history to show why I am a Liberal, for I cannot forget that economic liberalism came about because planned industry failed. From Joseph to Colbert industry was planned. True, industry was then not so complicated; it was simpler, and ought to have been the easier to plan. People were then not so numerous, and ought to have been the more easily brought into regimentation. There were then no Socialist bureaucrats, but possibly the modern bureaucrats are no more capable than the intendants who mismanaged affairs in the old days.

The differences what they are, it should be helpful to have the light of history thrown upon the social and economic consequences of planning.

It will be recalled that Joseph was the first economist to tackle the persistent problem of economic crisis. Although he was not in the government service when he devised his scheme, he entered it shortly afterwards and worked his scheme out through the agencies of the State. For years he had taken corn from the people, and when, in the day of famine, the people appealed to the State for food, Pharoah directed them to Joseph. Joseph opened his warehouses and sold corn. After a while, he gathered in all the money there was in Egypt, and the people still cried:

“Give us bread for why should we die in thy presence; for the money faileth.”

“Give me your cattle,” said Joseph, “and I will give you bread.”

When Joseph had taken all the peoples’ cattle, their horses, asses and flocks, the people were still hungry and pleaded:

“There is not ought left in the sight of my lord, but our bodies and our lands.”

And Joseph took them both. Their lands and their bodies. Perhaps I may interject: Joseph is generally regarded as having been a good man; not infrequently his virtues are extolled, that we should imitate them, particularly his kindliness. Pharoah, I take it, was simply the State. The peoples’ disaster came about not through the hardness of the men who planned, but, as an inescapable consequence of State planning. The land became Pharoah’s. As for the people, whose labour and lands and animals had produced the corn, they were removed to the cities, from one end of the borders of Egypt even to the other end.

The story of planned industry begins with unfreedom. Follow it on down the ages; through feudalism, when lords planned for villeins, and both ate sour food from dirt floors, into the period of the craft guilds, when industry was meticulously planned by guildsmen, and books were crowded with statutes, one repealing the other, in a frantic effort to fit people into industry, and industry into the wants of people. European wars tell us that foreign trade was planned and conducted by States down into the 17th century.

Whatever it may mean now, in the past industry planned by the few brought with it unfreedom, stagnation and poverty. And all the while, our forefathers were squirming and struggling for freedom of the market place. Say it should not be; it is the way of human nature.

The climax came in the days of Colbert. Under Louis XIV, planned industry reached its peak, and within two years after Colbert’s death, one of his old administrators, who had toiled in the service of State intervention, fell upon the great truth: “le plus grand secret est de laisser toute liberte dans le commerce.”

Later on, in the 18th century, a school of French philosophers developed that thought into the doctrine of laisser faire. Adam Smith took up the strange doctrine, which was really not, as some would have it, that industry should be left unplanned, but rather that industry is better planned by the millions than by the few.

By natural development of thought we came into economic liberalism. Canadians came inherently into that school, since their French forefathers were first to think it out, and their English forefathers were first to work it out. Until late in the 18th century, the British of the Isles had lagged industrially behind Europe, but with a courageous application of economic liberalism, they forged ahead and stayed ahead, until they turned back; or, should I say, until the British of the Isles had reached their maximum industrial allowance in the world’s development.

Of course, the State never really withdrew from the economic field. The policy of economic liberalism, at best, was a relaxation of the State’s grip. The State released its hold largely over prices, and prices behaved surprisingly well. It largely ceased to pass regulations as to the quality of goods, and curiously enough, quality did not generally suffer; although, in course of time, goods were made for all pockets. The State did not quite stop intervening as to wages, but it reduced the number of “shalls” and “shall nots” and more men went to work. The rise of real wages was a feature of the new period.

Men became free to invent under the new regime, and were given property over their inventions. Under the old regime, men were forbidden to dye with indigo, and a man who invented a weaving machine at Danzig was quietly smothered by the magistrates. Usually the guardians of public welfare did the thing midst hue and cry. Once the State removed its heel, iron became plentiful and cheap, and iron implements sank deeply into soil, which, until then, had been merely scratched by stones sharpened from the fields. Under the old regime whole parishes famished for want of food. The commons were enclosed and the size of the fleece was enlarged. The fence became an emblem. Under economic liberalism, new worlds were opened up with new pasture lands, new fruits, new textiles, new minerals, new vegetable oils—a thousand things unknown in the stagnant days when the few planned for the many.

It is usual to say that the profit motive came in with capitalism. It probably is better said that both profit and capital became conspicuous by their presence under economic liberalism. It may be that is why we fell into the way of speaking of the capitalistic order. The individual’s possession of capital with profit incentive to production is the target of the Socialists’ attack. “Production for service” they say; “Service for profit” is the reply. No good purpose would be served by reviewing the details of the controversy; it will never be settled, so long as individualists think of men as they are, and Socialists think of them as something they call “humanity;” but which is extremely difficult to locate in either field or factory or anywhere else.

“But profit leads to greed” you insist. It may lead to greed; but the individual’s disposition to greed can be changed into one for charity; that is one of the very reasons why the existence of the Church is essential to Society. The world is not filled with greed. After all there is charity. Sometimes I wonder where you live, you who so persistently cry greed against capitalism. Do you actually feel that everybody who takes your money, the butcher, grocer, doctor and all the rest of those who serve you, or those with whom you come in daily contact, are all impregnated with greed; if you feel that way my advice is to move out of the neighbourhood.

Economic liberalism has in competition an effective check upon greed. Profit the motive power; competition the safety valve. That is the scheme of economic liberalism.

Now that I have mentioned competition, you are surely not going to interject: “dog eat dog.” Very well, if you insist, we shall pause. Phrases of that sort are catching. I know men and women who rarely get beyond them. Frankly, if the dogs are not satisfied with biscuits, I prefer that they eat each other, rather than take a bite out of me. And that is precisely what is done when producers fix prices with, or without State intervention, they nibble at us all. Since the war the packs have increased; and now we have depression. Mind you, I have not called price-fixing a dog’s trick; it was you who raised the cry. But this I will say, going back to our old metaphor: when the safety valve is clogged, the boilers usually burst, and strangest of all strange things in this economic world, the capitalists have been stupidly clogging the safety valve and providing for their own exit.

“Profits are periodically added to capital funds, with the result that the wealth of the country is held in very few hands.” Now you have raised an issue. And again economic liberalism, when working, has a check. Roughly speaking the monies distributed in the act of production (wages, interest, rents etc.) furnish the fund to buy back what is produced; when only a few people share the proceeds of production only a few people can buy the products, and only a few products can be sold; it follows that profits shrink in proportion. The thing works its own end. Show me ten millionaires and I will show you nine who have had special privilege. Privilege may not always be the cause of inequality of possession but it is always subject to suspicion. However, the matter of the distribution of national wealth is so important it ought to be laid aside for separate consideration.

Meantime I would have you consider the equalising effects of economic liberalism. Under the new era, the venturesome peasants of the Old World became landed proprietors in the New World, and the common people who stayed at home had enough money in their pockets to hire football players; while millions of common people in America paid their way through baseball turnstiles. About one out of every three or four houses in the United States had a garage, and the many went to the movies and had telephones and radios and all sorts of comforts. The poor had more comforts when people planned for themselves than the rich had when the State did the planning. Before the days of economic liberalism most people lived in hovels. (Of course there are still distressing numbers of paupers in the world, more than in Adam Smith’s time, because there are more people).

Nothing fails like success. With wealth spread all around them, the people forgot whence it came. Collectively we learn little from history. In our group-moods we say: great strong people that we are, what do we care for Joseph or for that matter, Moses and all the rest of them? History books were made for children and not for grown-up people. So we reasoned, if we reasoned at all, as we turned back to a planning of industry by the few for the many.

You may have thought the ship of State, which sailed on this tack with Liberals at the wheel and then on that tack with Conservatives at the wheel was not getting anywhere in particular. Apparently there was seldom a chart on board; catching the breeze is the main thing in politics. “Which way blows the wind?” cries the skilful skipper.

For years the look-outs answered that it blew to the Left. For the past 20 or 30 years the State has been heading towards planned industry. When the Great War came we were all in socialism. The hurricane blew steadily to the Left for four years, and when the war was over, several of the nations were left piled high on the Leftist Reef. And others, including our own, were nearer in than most people realised.

We had forgotten that industry is more safely planned by the many than by the few. The coffee planters of Brazil complained of prices and the State set its hand to several plans. The rubber planters of the British East Indies complained of prices and the Stevenson plan was evolved. The Australian dairy men complained that butter was cheap and the Patterson plan became notorious. The cane sugar countries, for half a century, have been planning to off-set the plans of the beet sugar countries and just now the sugar industry is gasping under the Chadbourne plan. They have had armed revolt in Cuba. In every instance the State either made the plan or backed it.

But suppose we come home for an illustration. The pools of the prairies began planning for the orderly marketing of wheat and the Federal and Provincial governments lent their resources.

“Which way blows the wind?” cried the skipper.

“To the Left.” answered the unnautical, political look-outs.

Our governments encouraged the farmers to grow wheat. Australia pushed back the desert by irrigation for the purpose. The statesmen of importing countries were not disposed to have their own growers ruined by an inflow of subsidised wheat, and by milling regulations, quotas and State monopolies sought to protect their own growers. Then wheat came skidding down. With one accord we shrieked “economic nationalism”. The senior statesmen thought of world conference and with their experts decided that they should plan again, but this time, they would plan for less wheat, instead of more—and while they planned, their plans were upset by hot weather and some grass-hoppers.

The great captains of industry took up the cry: “It is better to plan than not to plan,” and with their own experts divided us into zones and decided what we should have and the prices we should pay for what we had.

I would have you remember just this: within recent years the select few have been again intensively planning for the people; the supermen of politics and the supermen of industry have planned nationally and internationally and when the planners appeared to have us on the Peak of Prosperity, we were tumbled to the foot of the Valley of Depression.