Page:The Economics of Unemployment.djvu/105

We cannot, as could the United States, Russia, or France, maintain our economic civilisation out of our own national resources, with such slight external commerce as would always be available. We must continue to work for a world-market and to buy and sell in that market more largely than ever as a condition of economic survival and progress. Now in this world-market at any given time there can only be one price for any supply of goods or services. If our manufactures or trades hold a practical monopoly in certain export lines, no difficulty connected with labour standards need arise. But where, as is commonly the case, our goods compete directly or indirectly with similar goods produced in other countries whose powers of production are expanding, we are liable to be ousted from these markets by manufacturers in other countries whose lower costs of production enable them to quote lower prices. This displacement will occur chiefly at periods of trade depression when restricted markets favour buyers. So far, therefore, as lower wages are consistent with efficient or genuinely cheap production, each recurring period of depression must be reflected in a higher rate of unemployment in the high-waged countries than in the low-waged. Since England is the high-waged country most dependent upon foreign markets, she is most exposed to this damage.

She has a double interest in an international policy for raising the standards of labour. By assisting to secure minimum standards of wages, hours, and other conditions for labour in backward industrial countries, she adopts the only effective means of safeguarding