On Tuesday, at the Royal Statistical Society, Sir Robert Giffen
read a paper on " The Excess of Imports." Sir Robert Giffen's handling of the subject, as was to be expected, was of a most masterly kind, and it is to be hoped that he has finally laid this the chief delusion of the half. instructed man,—a delusion which represents the country as bleeding to death because the things we take in at our ports seem more valuable than those we send out. Sir Robert Giffen showed : (1) that the excess of imports is not a new but a very old feature ; (2) that the figures are neces- sarily unfit for drawing deductions because imports have the cost of carriage to add to them whereas exports have not ; (3) that the statistics do not include the value (a) of our shipping industry (i.e., carrying trade) ; (b) of the commissions we earn in trading with different countries ; (c) of the profits paid to us for work done, as in India; (d) of the interest received from profits made in and loans lent to foreign countries. At present, Sir Robert puts the earnings of our ships at over 270,000,000, commissions at £18,000,000, and interest and profits probably at about £90,000,000. The general result of a most able and useful paper is that we are not losing ground (though we are occasionally dropping badly paid industries in order the better to work those which are more profitable), but are indeed doing excellent business. But though it was most useful to show this statistically, one can understand the plain man paraphrasing Yorick when "my father" told him that he could read the duty of obeying parents in the Institute of Justinian. "I can read it as well," said Yorick, "in my Catechism." So the plain man may say as to the proving of our prosperity by recondite researches, "I can prove it as well from the Income-tax returns."
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