CH. 23

NOTES ON MERCANTILISM, ETC. 369

in consumption of commodities. . . . Every increase insaving and in capital requires, in order to be effectual, a corre-sponding increase in immediately future consumption. 1 . . .And when we say future consumption, we do not refer to afuture of ten, twenty, or fifty years hence, but to a future thatis but little removed from the present. . . . If increased thriftor caution induces people to save more in the present, theymust consent to consume more in the future. 2 . . . Nomore capital can economically exist at any point in the pro-ductive process than is required to furnish commodities forthe current rate of consumption. 3 ... It is clear that mythrift in no wise affects the total economic thrift of the com-munity, but only determines whether a particular portion ofthe total thrift shall have been exercised by myself or bysomebody else. We shall show how the thrift of one partof the community has power to force another part to livebeyond their income. 4 . . . Most modern economists denythat consumption could by any possibility be insufficient.Can we find any economic force at work which might incitea community to this excess, and if there be any such forcesare there not efficient checks provided by the mechanism ofcommerce? It will be shown, firstly, that in every highlyorganised industrial society there is constantly at work a forcewhich naturally operates to induce excess of thrift; secondly,that the checks alleged to be provided by the mechanism ofcommerce are either wholly inoperative or are inadequate toprevent grave commercial evil. 5 . . . The brief answerwhich Ricardo gave to the contentions of Malthus andChalmers seems to have been accepted as sufficient by mostlater economists. “Productions are always bought by pro-ductions or by services; money is only the medium by whichthe exchange is effected. Hence the increased productionbeing always accompanied by a correspondingly increasedability to get and consume, there is no possibility of Over-production” (Ricardo, Prin. of Pol. Econ. p. 362).®

Hobson and Mummery were aware that interestwas nothing whatever except payment for the use ofmoney . 7 They also knew well enough that theiropponents would claim that there would be “such a fall

1 Op. cit. p. 27. 2 Op. cit. pp. 50, 51. 3 Op. cit. p. 69.

4 Op. cit. p. 113. 6 Op. cit. p. 100. 6 Op. cit. p. 101.

7 Op. cit. p. 79.

1 B