Domestic Postwar Problems

The problems of postwar economic planning in the United States are so comprehensive in scope, and the space available for treating them is so definitely limited, that only a few points can even be touched upon. Misunderstandings will be almost inevitable, and the author can only hope that the interested reader will refer to his previous publications in which some of the basic problems have been dealt with in detail. The primary problem of postwar economic planning, national as well as international, is monetary. Monetary stability, or at any rate the lack of pronounced monetary instability, is the conditio sine qua non of rational economic policy. A moderate inflation, as Mr. Keynes has emphasized so strongly, may benefit the active elements of the com? munity, entrepreneurs in particular, at the expense of the less active ones, such as bondholders. But there is no doubt that any accelerated inflation will destroy the basis of calculation which production needs in order to ensure that the social returns outweigh the social expenses. The line between such moderate inflation and excessive and de? structive inflations is hard to draw, and most of us will agree that the best thing to do is to avoid both. The techniques by which this can be done have, by this time, been thoroughly investigated and tested; if, during the present war, they are applied with so much hesitation, it is due to political difficulties rather than to uncertainty as to the nature of the economic remedy. Deflation1 is admittedly of a much greater immediate danger to economic life than inflation. The fact that it is so largely tends to transfer purchasing power from the active to the passive ele? ments in society not only discourages the former, but soon leads to such a rapid decline in economic activity that collapse appears imminent. The rigidity of money costs, which in Europe developed immediately after the first world war, and which extended to the United

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