286 THE RELIEF OF THE UNEMPLOYED 



proportion of them would be out of work at the same 

 time ; the people who remained in employment would 

 keep up the demand for goods of domestic utility, and 

 the persons thrown out of work might find some em- 

 ployment in the non-agricultural industries. 



This argument is true as far as it goes, but it must 

 be borne in mind that ' diversity of occupation ' does 

 not profess to be a radical cure for unemployment. 

 Diversity of occupation would not diminish the irre- 

 gularity of employment ; it would only spread the 

 evil more evenly over a number of years. In one 

 year agriculturists would be out of work, in the next 

 the workers in the textile industry ; the coal trade 

 would be interrupted in the following year, and the 

 iron and steel trade in the year after. There is no 

 ground whatever for supposing that employment is 

 more constant in any of these industries than in agri- 

 culture. The experience of Europe is quite the other 

 way. Employment in the modern manufacturing in- 

 dustries is eminently precarious. The result of 

 adopting the industrial organization of Europe would 

 be that India would suffer from a constant succession 

 of small 'famines' in place of the irregular recurrence 

 of great ' famines.' This would be a clear economic 

 gain, for these minor 'famines' would not involve the 

 bulk of the population ; whereas the suspension of 

 agriculture at the present day dislocates the industry 

 of an entire province. 



It is not, however, clear that the individual worker 

 would gain in like degree. Figures do not exist to 

 enable us to make an exact comparison between the 

 amount of unemployment in England and India, but 

 the returns which are quoted below are sufficient to 

 show that unemployment is a very serious and chronic 

 evil in England. In some branches of the iron industry 

 the number of men thrown out of employment in a 

 generation is not less than four times the total number 

 of men employed in those industries in one year; 



