Page:Confessions of an Economic Heretic.djvu/71

 Contact with this problem in its early shape brought into clear sight the connection between Imperialism and Protectionism which Chamberlain developed in his later career. Both these “isms” received strong support from the “forced” export policy which comes from over-saving and the urgent need for foreign markets to supplement the deficiency of the home market. This deficiency, due to insufficient income of the working classes, was seen to be directly responsible for the “slump” in each trade cycle. In a general time of “unemployment” for our capital and labour, a tariff that will keep out foreign competing goods from our market has an arguable case. If we have idle plant and labour in the motor-car industry, a tariff which will induce purchasers of cars to buy English-made cars, instead of American or French, will increase the total volume of employment in this country, provided the increased price of motor cars is not so high as to cause an equivalent loss of purchasing power for other commodities. A fall in exports will naturally follow any such reduction of imports, but the English-made cars will, through ordinary monetary operations, exchange against other English goods somewhat larger in amount than those which would have gone out in export payment. The net result would be a larger volume of production and employment in this country, at the expense of production and employment in other countries suffering from unemployment. It is a selfish and indeed a