THE END OF LAISSEZ-FAIRE

to be sought in the deliberate control of thecurrency and of credit by a central institution,and partly in the collection and disseminationon a great scale of data relating to the businesssituation, including the full publicity, by lawif necessary, of all business facts which it isuseful to know. These measures would in-volve Society in exercising directive intelligencethrough some appropriate organ of actionover many of the inner intricacies of privatebusiness, yet it would leave private initiativeand enterprise unhindered. Even if thesemeasures prove insufficient, nevertheless theywill furnish us with better knowledge thanwe have now for taking the next step.

My second example relates to Savingsand Investment. I believe that some co-ordinated act of intelligent judgment isrequired as to the scale on which it is desirablethat the community as a whole should save,the scale on which these savings should goabroad in the form of foreign investments, andwhether the present organisation of the in-vestment market distributes savings along the48