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

286 INTERNATIONAL TRADE NUE a) Taw lating medium consisted of inconvertible paper, and the entire structure of credit and money rested on inconvertible paper. The gold produced at the domestic mines continued to be exported, as it had been in 1850-60. And it was now solely and simply an arti- cle of export — a commodity exported precisely as any other metal would be. When it left the country, it did not deplete the mone- tary supply; it was not in circulation, and could not be. The movement of prices was necessarily controlled by quite other forces than the greater or less abundance of specie, the inflow or out- flow of metallic money. A conclusion of importance follows: namely, that one striking phenomenon of this period (1865-79) which we have found to be in accord with theoretical analysis, is— in a way at least — not at all in accord with it. This is the change in the relation between imports and exports which set in after 1873. True, a reversal of the kind — an excess of exports replacing an excess of imports — is what we should look for. But obviously it could not come about thru the mechanism contemplated in the Ricardian theory. Our expectation might be to find steps of some such sort as this: first, an abrupt stoppage (after the crisis of 1873) of loans made to the American borrowers; then a flow of specie out of the United States, to fill the gaps made in the balance of payments as the loans ceased ; a fall in American prices because of the outflow of gold ; and thereupon, at last, an increase in merchandise exports. But no such chain of events could possibly have appeared in the United States after 1873. The country’s currency was not on a gold basis. No gold could flow out of its circulating medium be- cause none (virtually none) was in it. The changes in imports and exports which we should expect did indeed take place. Prices did fall abruptly after 1873 — prices in terms of paper money. Ex- ports rose, imports declined. But the immediate and direct links of connection in all these changes were with the phenomena of the business cycle, perhaps also with those of paper money ; not with those of the international movement of specie. The general outcome was such as the ruling theory of international trade would predict; but the machinery by which it was brought

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