Australian experiments in rationalization. and Safeguarding are discussed very sympathetically
in Economic Control by N. Skene Smith of the London School of Economics (P. S. King, 15s.). The author has tried to measure the results of Australia's formidable and intricate mass of social legislation so as to show how far the State can usefully control the economic machinery of trade and industry. Some readers who know Australia will say that Mr. Skene Smith is too ready to accept the official view and that he underrates the difficulties created by the incessant labour disputes and the very heavy taxation. On the other hand, orthodox Free Traders will be shocked at his reasoned defence of the high Australian tariff and his complacent acceptance of the fact, for instance, that Queensland sugar costs the consumer a penny a pound more than he would pay if foreign sugar were permitted to enter'. Dr: Hugh Dalton, in a commendatory preface, takes no exception to Mr. Skene Smith's views on the tariff. Some day, perhaps, our Labour party may adopt this form of" economic control," to the dangers of which the author is by no means blind. It may be noted that, according to Mr. Skene Smith, real wages in Sydney in 1927 were nearly 50 per cent. higher than in London. But the unemployment figure for Australia in that year was 7 per cent., which, before the War, we should have regarded as high for England.
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