T H E T A B L E T , A p r i l 4th, 1953.

THE TABLET

A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER AND REVIEW

PRO ECCLESIA DEI, PRO REGINA ET PATRIA

VOL. 201, No. 5889

LONDON, APRIL 4th, 1953

NINEPENCE

FOUNDED IN 1 8 4 0

PUBLISHED AS A NEWSPAPER

THE ITALIAN STATE Some Divergences between Italian Catholics

THE ARMIES OF MOSCOW I I : The Strength of the Satellites. By K. M . Smogorzewski

A TALK WITH MARSHAL TITO A Discussion on the Future of the Church. By William Teeling, M .P .

NO AMERICAN SOCIALISM The Retreat of Mr. Norman Thomas. By John Fitzsimons

FROM THE NOTE-BOOKS OF G.K.C. Some Hitherto Unprinted Extracts from Chesterton’s Note-book of 1893

DOCTOR INSCRUTABILIS Rabelais after Four Hundred Years. By D . B . Wyndham Lewis THE THREE DAYS’ SPACE EASTER

By A . Hadshar

A Poem by Violet Clifton

A LARGER SHARE

T HE United Nations World Economic Report gives the statistical detail for a number o f trends with which we have all been generally familiar. I t shows how th e increase o f production, which had been fast and continuous up till the middle o f 1951, has subsequently tailed off, how Government expenditure everywhere has increased, mainly due to rearm ament, and how th a t increased expenditure has been generally paid for, no t by decreased consumption, but by decreased investment. The first and broad lesson which these figures teach us is th a t most o f these tendencies are apparently fairly impartially found in all countries.

Party politicians who claim that everything good o r bad is the result o f Government action need to be rem inded o f this. But it is also true th a t Government policies are o f very great im portance in e ith er aggravating o r alleviating conditions in each particular country ; and Britain, in particular, would be in a much worse plight today but for the change o f Government eighteen months ago.

The decline in British production was steeper than th a t of any o ther country except Denmark. We dropped back to the 1950 level, whereas the general average is 9.6 per cent above the 1950 level. British wages, though they increased by 19 per cent between 1950 and the th ird quarter o f 1952, increased less than those o f any other countries except the United States and Belgium. In this country alone did the cost o f living increase more in 1952 th an in 1951.

an in te rruption o f the flow o f in ternational trad e has more deleterious effects on us than on other nations. The Economic Survey

A parallel docum ent is the British Government’s Economic Survey fo r 1953. This, like its predecessor last year, is a much less ambitious affair th an the surveys th a t the L abour Government used to produce, so confidently full o f predictions th a t events belied a few months later, so th a t the whole series o f them remains as an eloquent exhibition o f the lim ita tions o f economic planning. The Conservatives are wiser to avoid prediction, but, equally, these documents can only be valuable if some practical guidance about what ought to be done, what th e fu tu re will require, can be drawn from them.

The encouraging feature o f the Economic Survey is th a t there has been a large increase in savings, principally o f companies, to some £800 million from £160 million, so th a t we may hope to make up some o f the ground lost in capital investment. For it is on th a t investm ent th a t our long-term prospects depend. The grim feature o f the Survey is, o f course, in the section devoted to the balance o f overseas payments, from which the moral emerges th a t Britain has to secure a larger share of the in te rnational trade th a t exists, not merely her p ro po r tional share o f a growing volume of trade. Both the Germans and th e Japanese have exactly the same objective, to increase their share o f existing markets. We all want a larger share o f the same sized cake.

O f these exceptions the last is little more than verbal. The rise in the cost o f living was due to the reduction o f subsidies, and it is a mere method o f com putation which counts prices in the cost o f living and does not count taxes. The slowing down in th e increase o f wages is to be accounted for by the fact th a t prior to this period this country was living more spectacularly beyond its income than any o ther country. Had we allowed wage increases a t the world rate, we could certainly never have stopped the drain on our reserves. The decline in p roduction springs from the fact th a t we are more dependent on im ports th an any other country, and therefore

The Chancellor has no more anxious duty than to find ways o f helping the British exporter. The present tax stru c tu re is such th a t there is very little advantage in being successful, and consequently very little inducement to take risks, and most trade in foreign markets is accompanied by all sorts of risks, political and economic. If British industry is to com pete it has to be flexible, which means, in practice, able to change from one line to another. In fact such changing is full o f difficulties and expense, while the superstructure o f taxation makes British industry like a man ru nning a race with a heavy pack on his back.

These tru th s are clearly recognized in responsible T rade