Galloway 



DISADVANTAGES OF SPECIALIZATION 



The grower who specializes in cotton finds himself out of work until the market catches 

 up with the cotton in stores and warehouses and factories. In the meantime, he cannot 

 eat his cotton 



Advantages of Specialization^ In our society such surplus production 

 enables some people to give all their time to making music, or painting pic- 

 tures, or dreaming up poetry and plays and amusements for the rest of us. It 

 enables more and more men and women to follow their hobbies, and in many 

 cases to make careers of their hobbies — as in the arts or scientific research or 

 play-acting or professional athletics or doing stunts of all kinds. That is to 

 say, specialization has made possible more specialization. We do not all have 

 to dig and saw wood and fetch water, because our potatoes and fuel and water 

 can be supplied by relatively few but highly expert specialists. As a result, 

 all of us have more time to play, and some of us can enrich the playing of all. 



Disadvantages of Specialization In the individual organism, as in 

 social life, excessive specialization may bring its disadvantages. When an earth- 

 worm is cut in half, the less specialized segments near the middle produce new 

 growth and replace the differentiated head and tail. Among vertebrates serious 

 injury to the more highly specialized organs, such as the heart, the liver, 



iSee No. 1, p. 538. 

 531 



