International trade

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1758394757

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-136209

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Taussig, Frank William http://d-nb.info/gnd/120199459

Title:: International trade

Place of publication:: New York, NY

Publisher:: Macmillan

Year of publication:: 1927

Scope:: XXI, 425 Seiten; graph. Darst.

Digitisation:: 2021

Collection:: Economics Books

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Chapter

Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Part II. Problems of verification

Collection:: Economics Books

242 INTERNATIONAL TRADE expect. But just how is this result brought about? Is it in fact brought about in the way that theory lays down — by an initial flow of specie, subsequent movements of prices, and only in the end by the appropriate flow of merchandise? How far can we trace the sequence of events in detail, and so subject our deductive analysis to a rigorous test? Here the phenomena again are baffling. The movement of specie is rarely considerable — considerable, that is, in comparison with the volume (in money terms) of the merchandise movements. When it does take place on a large scale, the explanation usually is to be found in other directions than are indicated by the general theory of international trade. Heavy and rapid transfers of specie from one country to another are, it is clear, usually the result of financial disturbances, of crop vicissitudes, of causes that exhaust their effects in a few months or at most in a year or two. And as regards the broad continuing movements of specie — those that are moderate in any one year, but are cumulative — the same sort of statement appears justified: they too seem explicable in the main on grounds other than are considered in our theorizing. The steady inflow of gold into Great Britain from 1850 to 1873, the equally steady inflow from 1896 to 1914 — these are obviously but one phase of the world’s increased gold production. The growing supply was distributed among the different countries largely thru Great Britain, that country absorbing a share only. We may indeed reason on general principles that during such a period as that from 1850 to 1890, the general conditions of her international trade were such as would have tended in any event to turn the flow of specie her way. The actual inflow of specie, we may reason, simply was made greater by these general condi- tions than it would otherwise have been. Similarly we may argue that the occasional diminution of the inflow, its sporadic cessation or even reversal, are also explicable on general grounds ; they would have been more marked had not the world supply of gold been in process of enlargement. But all this clearly is to explain the facts in the light of a theory deemed sound, not to test the sound- ness of the theory by the facts. What we find is simply trickles

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