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POLITICAL  ECONOMY

miracle  ;  but  the  monopolist  would  be  exceedingly ­
  foolish  to  take  this  for  granted.  Many
established  industries  will  sell  for  years
beneath  their  full  cost  of  production  rather
than  shut  down,  because  shutting  down
involves  the  destruction  in  bulk  of  their  fixed
plant.  They  will  continue  to  sell  so  long  as
the  price  is  well  above  the  specific  cost  of
production,  that  is  the  cost  of  production
apart  from  standing  charges  which  would  not
be  saved  by  the  cessation  of  activities.  And
as  regards  other  industries,  not  of  this  kind,
in  which  output  instantly  and  adequately
contracts  as  soon  as  prices  become  in  any
degree  unremunerative,  we  find  that  the
possibility  of  such  an  immediate  curtailment
of  production  implies  the  possibility  of  an
equally  immediate  increase  of  output  as  soon
as  a  recovery  in  price  renders  it  profitable.
Tersely  put,  it  is  probably  the  case  that
competitors  who  are  easily  routed  are  easily
rallied  by  a  hardening  of  the  market,  and  that
those  who  are  not  easily  routed  can  only  be
defeated  eventually  after  a  lengthy  and
exhausting  campaign.  Dumping  of  this  order
is  far  more  likely  in  the  case  of  articles  which
are  unique  and  for  which  there  is  no  perfect
substitute.  It  might,  for  instance,  pay  the
patentee  of  a  new  breakfast  food  to  sell