somehow settle themselves satisfactorily, though in what way we cannot
at the moment say. It is impossible to feel this about the unemployed. That experiments will be tried in several directions is likely enough, and in our present ignorance we cannot pretend to regret it. Those who have no clear idea what they would do if they were given a free hand have no right to quarrel with those more sanguine people who are trying to work out some plan of their own. All the same, it is easier to begin an experiment than to leave it off, and the very characteristics which make a particular plan mischievous may also make it popular. There are some questions, again, about which we know what we should do if we had the power. The difficulty that the case presents is the difficulty of bringing other people round to our mind. We are not in this happy position as regards the unemployed. We can but hope that things will become clearer as the winter goes on, and still more, that the subject will not be forgotten when the winter is past. For it is this forgetfulness that is mainly to blame for the position into which the question has drifted. The same problem has presented itself for solution in other winters. Then as now, it has been said that when people are starving by thousands is not a time in which to discuss economic theories. That no doubt is true, but it is a truth of no value unless it leads to the discussion of economic theories after the relief has been given and employment has once more become general. What is wanted is more knowledge,—knowledge of the causes which bring about want of employment ; knowledge of the methods which other countries have employed in providing work ; know- ledge of the relation between these methods and the larger questions of politics. The obvious way to bring this knowledge together would be the appointment of a small Royal Commission composed of experts in business and affairs who should examine carefully selected witnesses and report the conclusions which they have drawn from their evidence. Unfortunately, Royal Commissions have fallen into very natural disfavour. There have been so many of them, and some of them have been so obviously appointed rather to shelve than to settle the matters submitted. to them, that the suggestion is likely to call forth laughter rather than assent.
It is going somewhat far back in the history of the question to say that the place where the pressure of dis- tress is greatest at this moment ought never to have come into being. West Ham is an example of all that a wise municipal system would have been most careful to avoid. A large population has grown up in a very short space of time, lodged in jerry-buildings, crowded together in un- paved and unlighted streets, having no local interests, but employed, with few exceptions, elsewhere. By rights West Ham should have been included within the Metro- politan boundary. The building regulations of the London County Council would then have been in force, the streets area, and, most important of all, the greater cost thus incurred would have helped to prevent an almost pauper population from being dumped just outside London. West Ham has now been created, with the consequences we see, and other West Hams will follow if nothing be done to prevent it. The proper way of preventing it is to make the increase of London and of the jurisdiction of the County Council automatic. As soon as the population in any district adjoining London has reached a certain figure, or a certain amount of land has been laid out for building, the area should be taken over by the County Council, and remain, till it becomes large enough for in- corporation, in a position bearing some resemblance to that of Territories in the United States. In this way the manufacture of slums would be checked, and the immi- gration from the country into London, which is encouraged by the constant provision of fresh houses at lower rents, would be checked with it. Few things are less satisfactory than the lodgment of London workmen outside the municipal area within which their work is done.
The Times of yesterday week contained an interesting article on the causes of the shortage of employment. The writer's sympathies are all with the capitalist. He seems to think that were the settlement of all questions con: nected with employment left to the employers, we should quickly see the end of our present trouble. So convinced is he of this that he passes over with the barest mention such "contributory causes" as our present Fiscal condi- tions and alien immigration. Restriction of output, opposition to machinery, the limiting of apprentices, Trade-Union regulations, want of confidence on the part of the employers in the Board of Trade,—all these things taken together are, in his opinion, the first cause of the existing trouble. A second cause is the discouragement inflicted on private enterprise by municipal competition. A third is the growth of the rates, which is in part due to this same municipal competition. There is an element of truth in all these statements, but, unfortunately, they are all coloured by the writer's pro- found belief in the wisdom and benevolence of the employing class. That the employers are sometimes wiser than the Trade-Unions is, of course, quite true. Although the interests of Capital and Labour are in the long run identical, it is never safe to assume that men of any class will necessarily see this. The identity is only dis- covered after many efforts, and many failures, to reach the end by the seemingly shorter method of each class thinking only of its own interests. It would be as true, and no truer, to say that the Trade-Unions are some- times wiser than the employers. If a successful lock-out occasionally proves the one statement, a successful strike occasionally proves the other. No doubt much money has been spent and much illwill generated by conflicts between employers and workmen. But in the end. some approach to a modus vivendi has been made. Even the writer in the Times admits that "labour leaders are now showing a much more reasonable attitude than was formerly the case." What would have happened if the employers had had their own way we can guess from what occasionally happens in countries where Labour, being less organised, has to resort to spasmodic outbreaks. Is the feeling between employers and workmen better in America or in Germany than it is in England ? Is the Socialist propaganda less active, or are the aspirations of the workmen less impracticable, in those countries than they are here ? Very possibly Capital may for the moment find more profitable employment there than at home ; but in the long run, when the great and growing bitterness between classes is taken into account, the capitalist will run less risks in England than abroad.
The second point, the alleged discouragement of private enterprise by municipal competition, can hardly be adequately considered in connection with the shortage of employment. A nation which takes the distribution of its correspondence out of private hands and entrusts it to a Department of the Government can hardly pass any general censure on municipal enterprise. In one respect, at all events, municipal trading has an advantage over private trading. A municipal authority can regulate its orders and determine when they shall be executed, whereas a private trader must suit his orders to the demands of his customers. A graver question is the growth of the rates, which does tend probably to prevent the starting of new undertakings, and the consequent employment of more workmen. We have heard a great deal of Imperial extravagance; but until quite lately local extravagance has almost escaped notice. Yet the figures, which we take from Sir Robert Giffen's paper in the Contemporary Review, are large enough to deserve at least a passing attention. Forty years ago the Imperial revenue was £70,000,000; to-day it is £140,000,000. The amount raised is just as large again as it was in the earlier year. But forty years ago the aggregate of local revenue was only £30,000,000. To-day it is £105,000,000,—not much short of four times what it then was. Sir Robert Giffen does not think that this expenditure is necessarily ex- cessive, since it only amounts to about an eighth part of the aggregate income of the people ; nor does he deny that many of the things done by local authorities are in themselves desirable. But if we are coming to bad times, and these bad times coincide with an increase of inter- national dangers, it may well be that local expenditure is the only direction in which economy is possible. It would be an additional reason for practising this economy, and consequently some consolation for being obliged to practise it, if it should turn out on examination that in keeping down rates we are dealing with one at least of the causes which have brought about the present want of employ- ment. It certainly is one of the causes which have created the present urgent difficulty as to housing our increasing population.
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