Page:Stabilizing the dollar, Fisher, 1920.djvu/135

. 2] of the high cost of living is mentioned. The fact that such proposals are mostly concerned with economy and efficiency in the production, distribution, and consumption of goods shows that little thought is ordinarily given to the other side of the market, i.e. to the monetary aspect of the question.

There are really two problems included under "the high cost of living": (1) the problem of the size of our incomes; and (2) the problem of how much each dollar of our incomes will buy. The first of these is more properly "the problem of income"; the second alone is strictly the problem of "the high cost of living."

One trouble with most of the proposals above mentioned is that, though they are concerned with the first problem rather than the second, they are expected to solve the second problem too. Disappointment follows their application, and unless a genuine solution of this second problem, i.e. an effective means of stabilizing the price level, is found, a bewildered and infuriated public is apt to keep on trying every sort of alleged remedy, good, bad, and indifferent, often with disastrous results. The plan which I shall propose has reference solely to the solution of this second problem,—the problem of the purchasing power of the dollar.

The real culprit being the dollar, the real remedy is to fix the purchasing power of the dollar. Our dollar is now simply a fixed weight of gold—a unit of weight, masquerading as a unit of value. A twentieth of an ounce of gold is no more truly a unit of