Page:The Economic Journal Volume 1.djvu/358

 886 n rcooc ouxu able increase in the production of wool which has taken place since 1870 has been exclusively in the Far West. But population s thickening m these reguons, and wool-growing s not like further to increase even in them. Indeed there are already signs that it is beginning to slacken; and the outlook is that the United States will rely on the importation of wool even more in the future than in the past. Under these circumstances the restiveness of the woolien manufacturers under the duty upon wool becomes greater and greater, and it has become a serious question for them whether it is not worth their while to throw over the duty on wool and submit to the reduction of the duties upon their goods, rather than to continue to pay the heavy duty upon their raw material. The National Association of Woolien Manufactures, in which a large proportion of the woolien manufacturers of the country are organized, has protested against the recent additions to the duty on wool, even while requesting an increase of the duties upon their goods. Within the ranks of the wooHen manu- facturers themselves there is a strong and growing minority who would accept the complete abolition of the wool duties, and take their chances on the consequent reduction of those on woollens. The other side of the present system of duties on wool and woollens ppers in the duties upon woolien goods. The general scheme of the duties upon woolien goods is to impose, in the first place,  specific duty of so much per pound or per yrd, whose object is merely to compensate the mnufcturer for the duties upon rw wool and to place him in the sme position s if he got the wool free of duty. Over nd bove this there is n ad valor duty, which 1one is supposed to protect him. In 1867, when the compound system ws first systematically pplied, this net pro- tective duty ws expected to be 5 per cent. The ctul ad valorem rte ws put t 35 per cent., the extr 10 per cent. ffording compensation for certain internal txes, nd certain duties upon dyes nd other chemicals. These internal txes, nd most of the other charges, hve since disappeared. Nevertheless the ad valorem duty on woollens not only hs retained the d- ditionl 10 per cent., but hs even been pushed to  higher rte. The first steps toward  higher net protection were already tken in the Act of 1883; nd in the McKinley Act there is hrdly  trae of the nominal moderation of the original scheme. The situation will be most esily explained by presenting the duties under the Act of 1883 nd under the McKinley Act, on ' woolien cloths,' which include most goods for men's wer, nd form