Economics for Everyman
Economic Problems of Today. By W. A. Lewis. (Longmans. 4s. 6d.)
MR. LEWIS has succeeded brilliantly in a field where failure is lamentably frequent. He has written a book which, within a small compass, and in simple and pleasant language, gives to the reader starting from scratch a true perspective of the economic problem. There is not a technical phrase in it from beginning to end ; there is hardly a generalisation which is not illustrated from recent and familiar events. Perhaps most valuable of all, there is imparted a sense—which once acquired should be very hard to forget—of the continuity and unity of the problem in all different circumstances and all different regimes ; in war as in peace, in Soviet Russia as in capitalist Great Britain.
Every regime has to tackle the question of distributing resources between different potential uses ; of judging how far this alloca- tion shall be a matter of central civic decision, how far of indi- vidual choice ; of providing incentives to induct people to implement these decisions and choices ; of maximising economic efficiency and minimising economic shocks. The solutions offered differ. What works in peace will not necessarily work in war. What suits one set of social assumptions does not suit another.
But the fundamental questions remain the same, and no regime can evade them. It would be very hard to speak too highly of Mr. Lewis's achievement, and it is to be hoped that the in- auspicious moment of its appearance will not prevent its having the. success which it deserves.
H. M. C.
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