EVIDENCE  OF  COMMISSION

6l
sense  that  their  addition  to  supply  drives  prices  below
the  margin  of  profitable  production  will  suffice  to  “  congest”
a  trade.  If  fixed  expenses  are  very  heavy,  production
may  be  carried  on  for  some  time  at  a  loss,  but  always
at  a  slackened  pace,  while  it  is  only  a  question  of  time
when  the  weaker  businesses  are  driven  to  suspend  operations ­
  and  the  stronger  to  a  close  restriction  of  their
output,  sometimes  accompanied  by  a  trade  dispute  which
checks  for  a  time  the  whole  volume  of  production.  In
no  trade  can  actual  over-production  of  goods  continue
for  any  long  period,  though  the  liability  to  overproduce ­
  may  manifest  itself  in  actual  gluts  from  time  to
time  over  a  long  period  of  years.  The  true  signification
of  over-production  as  used  to  designate  the  immediate
cause  of  depression  is  the  continued  existence  of  a  general
excess  of  producing-power  in  the  forms  of  capital  and
labour  beyond  what  is  economically  required  to  supply
the  current  or  prospective  rate  of  consumption  of  the
community.
§  6.  Authorities  Admit  a  General  Excess.—
Evidence  of  Commission.
But  if  what  is  signified  is  a  long  continued  existence
of  a  general  excess  of  producing-power  beyond  what  is
economically  required  to  supply  the  current  rate  of  consumption, ­
  such  excess  is  plainly  attested  by  modern
industry.  Moreover,  it  was  admitted  in  unmistakable
language  by  the  same  Majority  Report  of  the  Commission
on  the  Depression  of  Trade  in  1885,  which  rejected  with
scorn  the  notion  of  “  a  general  over-production.”  In  its
general  summary  this  Report  says,  “  That  owing  to  the
nature  of  the  times  the  demand  for  our  commodities  does