490 



NATURE 



{Sept. 22, 1887 



30 "6 to 39 '8 lbs. per head, or 30 per cent. ; in the second period 

 from 39 '8 to 627 lbs., or 58 per cent. ; and in the third period 

 from 627 to 74'3 lbs., or 19 per cent. only. In the last ten 

 years in both cases the rate of increase is less than in the twenty 

 years before. 



These facts, I need hardly say, would be strengthened by a 

 reference to the consumption of spirits and beer, the decline in 

 the former being especially notorious. In tobacco again in the 

 last ten years there has been no increase of the consumption per 

 head ; which contrasts with a rapid increase in the period just 

 before — viz. from about i'3i lb. per head in 1865 to i*46 lb. 

 per head in 1875. 



No doubt the observation here applies that the utmost pro- 

 sperity would obviously be consistent with a slower rate of in- 

 crease per head from period to period in the consumption of 

 these articles, and with, in the end, a cessation of the rate of 

 increase altogether. The consumption of some articles may 

 attain a comparatively stationary state, the increased resources of 

 the community being devoted to new articles. But here, again, 

 we have to observe the necessity for explanation. The indica- 

 tions are no longer so sure and obvious in all directions as they 

 were. 



It is difficult, indeed, to resist the impression made when we 

 put all the fac's together, leaving out of sight for a moment those 

 of values only. We are able to affirm positively — (a) That the 

 production of coal, iron, and other staple articles has been at a 

 less rate in the last ten years than formerly ; {h) that this has 

 taken place when agricultural production has been notoriously 

 stationary, and when the production of other articles such as 

 copper, lead, &c., has positively diminished ; (r) that there has 

 been a similar falling-off" in the rate of advance in the great 

 textile industries ; (d) that the receipts from railway traffic and 

 the figures of shipping in the foreign trade show a corresponding 

 slackening in the rate of increase in the business movement ; and 

 {e) that the figures as to consumption of leading articles, such as 

 tea, sugar, spirits, and tobacco, in showing a similar decline in the 

 rate of increase, and, in some cases, a diminution, are at least 

 not in contradiction with the other facts stated, although it 

 may be allowed that there was no antecedent reason to expect 

 an indefinite continuance of a former rate of increase. 



From these facts, however we may qualify them — and many 

 qualifications have already been suggested, while others could be 

 added — it seems tolerably safe to draw the conclusion that there 

 has probably been a falling-off in the rate of material increase 

 generally. The income-tax assessment figures, though they 

 could not be taken by themselves in such a question, are, at 

 least, not in contradiction, and there is nothing the other way 

 when we deal with these main figures only. I should not put 

 the conclusion, however, as more than highly probable. Some 

 general explanation of the facts may be possible on the hypo- 

 thesis that there is no real decline in the rate of growth gener- 

 ally at all ; that the usual signs for various reasons have become 

 more difficult to read ; that owing to the advance already made 

 the real growth of the country and, to some extent, of other 

 countries, has taken anew direction ; and that the utmost caution 

 must be used in forming final conclusions on the subject. But 

 the conclusion of a check having occurred to the former rate of 

 growth may be assumed meanwhile for the purposes of discus- 

 sion. The attempted explanation of the causes of change, on 

 the hypothesis that there is a real change, may help to throw 

 light on the question of the reality of the change itself. 



Various explanations are suggested, then, not only for a de- 

 cline in the rate of our progress, but for actual retrogression. 

 Let us look at the principal of these explanations in their order, 

 and see whether they can account for the facts : either for actual 

 retrogression, or for a decline in the general rate of material 

 growth equal to what some of the particular facts above cited, if 

 they were significant of a general change in the rate of growth, 

 imply — a decline, say, from a rate of growth amounting to 40 

 per cent, in ten years to one of 20 per cent, only in the same 

 period. 



One of the most common explanations, then, as we all know, 

 is foreign competition. The explanation has been discredited 

 because of the exaggeration of the alleged evil to be explained ; 

 but it may possibly be a good enough explanation of the actual 

 facts when they are looked at in a proper way. In this light, 

 then, the assertion as to foreign competition would be found to 

 mean that foreigners are taking away from us some business we 

 should otherwise have had, and that, consequently, although 

 our business on the whole increases from year to year, it does 



not increase so fast as when foreign competition was less. Those 

 who talk most about foreign competition have actually in their 

 mind the unfair element in that competition, the stimulus which 

 the Governments of some foreign countries give or attempt to 

 give to particular industries by means, on the one hand, of high 

 tariffs keeping out the goods we should otherwise send to such 

 countries, and giving their home industry of the same kind a 

 monopoly which sometimes enables them to produce a surplus 

 they can sell ruinously cheap abroad ; and by means, on the 

 other hand, of direct bounties which enable certain industries to 

 compete in the home market of the United Kingdom itself, as 

 well as in foreign markets. But there is a natural foreign 

 competition as well as a stimulated foreign competition to be 

 considered, and it may be the more formidable of the two. 



Dealing first with the stimulated competition, the most obvious 

 criticism on this alleged explanation of the recent decline in the 

 rate of increase of our material progress is that the stimulus 

 given by foreign Governments in recent years has not been in- 

 creasing, or at any rate not materially increasing, so as to account 

 for the change in question. People forget very quickly ; other- 

 wise it would not be lost sight of that after i860, as far as 

 European nations are concerned, there was a great reduction of 

 tariff duties — a change, therefore, in the contrary direction to 

 that stimulus which is alleged to have lately caused a change in 

 the rate of our own development. Since about five or six year; 

 ago the movement on the Continent seems again to have been 

 in the direction of higher ta'-iffs. France, Italy, Austria, Ger- 

 many, and Russia have all shown protectionist leanings of a 

 more or less pronounced kind. Some of our colonies, especially 

 Canada, have moved in the same direction. But, on the whole, 

 these causes as yet have been too newly in operation to affect 

 our industry on a large scale. As a matter of fact, with one 

 exception to be presently noticed, the period from i860 to 1880 

 was one in which the effect of the operation of foreign Govern- 

 ments in regard to their tariffs could not be to stimulate addi- 

 tional competition of an injurious kind with us in the way above 

 described, but to take away, if anything, from the stimulus pre- 

 viously given. The changes quite lately brought into operation, 

 if big enough, and if really having the effects supposed, might 

 stimulate foreign competition in the way described in the period 

 now commencing ; but, as an explanation of the past facts, 

 it is impossible to urge that foreign competition had recently 

 been more stimulated by additions to tariffs than before, and 

 that in consequence of this stimulus our own rate of advance 

 had been checked. 



The one exception to notice is the United States. Imme- 

 diately after i860 the civil war in that country broke out, and 

 that war brought with it the adoption of a very high tariff. 

 Curiously enough, however, that tariff operated most against us 

 in the very years, that is, the years before 1875, in which oui 

 rate of advance was greater to all appearance than it has lately 

 been. In 1883 there was a great revision of the tariff, having 

 for its general result a slight lowering and not an enhancement 

 of the tariff, and it is with this reduction, that is, with a diminu- 

 tion of the alleged adverse stimulus, that the diminution in oui 

 own rate of advance has occurred. 



Of course the explanation may be that, although Govern- 

 ments have not themselves been active till quite lately in adding 

 to their tariffs, yet circumstances have occurred to make the 

 former tariffs more injurious in recent years than they were down 

 to 1875. For instance, it may be said that, owing to the fall of 

 prices in recent years, the burden of specific duties has become 

 higher than it was. The duty is nominally unchanged, but by 

 the fall of prices its proportion to the value of the article has 

 become higher. This is no doubt the case to a large extent. 

 On the other hand, ad valorem duties have been lowered in pre- 

 cisely the same way. The fall of prices has brought with it 

 a reduction of duty ;"and especially on articles of English manu- 

 facture, where the raw material is obtained from abroad, the 

 reduction of duty, being applicable to the whole price, must 

 certainly have had for effect to render more effective than before 

 the competiti jn of the English manufacturer. Whether on the 

 whole the reduction of ad valorem duties consequent on the fall 

 of prices has been sufficient throughout the range of our foreign 

 trade to compensate the virtual increase of the weight of specific 

 duties from the same cause seems to be a nice question. This 

 being the case, it must be very difficult indeed to show tliat on 

 the whole the weight of foreign tariffs, apart from the action of 

 foreign Governments, has been increased in recent years so as 

 to affect our own growth injuriously. 



II 



