SEMAINE D'ÉTUDE SUR LE ROLE DE L’ANALYSE ECONOMETRIQUE ETC. 
9 
errors, whereas, in most cases where government policy is involved 
‘he impact may well compound the effects of the previous error. 
German agricultural policy today is an example of such a re- 
sponse, Farm prices have been too high in the past and are too 
high now. The high prices are impeding certain adjustments that 
could well occur within the German economy in transferring labour 
out of agriculture. However, since income growth in agriculture 
was not quite as rapid as in the rest of the economy, the solution 
adopted two or three years ago was to increase farm prices even 
further. The basic problem is that there are too many people 
engaged in German agriculture. So the error that was made by not 
crying to make the adjustment through helping to transfer resources 
out of agriculture has resulted in a compounding of the difficulties 
VIALINVAUL 
As I see it, that example does not show the government should 
not interfere. It illustrates a rather different point, namely that it 
is sometimes a difficult affair to determine first what a wise policy 
should be, then to enforce it consistently, and also to know how to 
revise it when necessar:- 
ALLAIS 
I have only two very brief points. The first one is that I would 
like to stress the interest of the work done by Professor JoHNsON 
in recent years about agriculture in Soviet Russia. This work is 
very useful and I had in the past the occasion to use it and I think 
that is a type of study which should be multiplied. My second point 
is, I think, quite important, in view of the discussion we must have 
for the final statement. I must say that I agree completely with 
what Prof. JOHNSON said on page 3 of his paper, namely, that it 
appeared to him that it was necessary to paraphrase the intro- 
“16] Johnson - pag. 5I