Vermont farmer. [volume] (Newport, Orleans County, Vt.) 1870-1877, 1874-04-10

Such a condition Of things will always OK.
list when the standard Of value is sound, and
such condition is essential TO restrict the
gross profits of exchange aud, by couso.
quence, the number Of exchanges to the ac-
tual wants of trade. II the community be
10 the saving vein, as is always the case un.
der an honest currency; if individual pur.
chasers part slowly with their money, look
ing after every penny to see that it brings
its worth, the pressure on the trading class
will be steady aud constant, and merchants
mark up their goods at the peril Of having
them left on their hands. IL others offer on
lower terms, these are at once sought out
and patronized. A community in this mood
will put up with no nonsense in prices. On
y sterA and determined effort, originating
in aud justified by an actual advance in cost,
will be sufficient to raise the price of any ar.
ticle against the determined resistance of
tho whole community, or to keep up the
price thus advanced one day after the sub
stantial reason therefor has ceased.
II, on the other hand, the economical sense
of the community is deceived by false stan.
dard Of value if, by the introduction of
credit into the currency, every one is made
to feel full and flush it they leok into their
purses aud count their money by hundreds
when its real value, its purchasing power, is
only in tifties it they are under this econom-
ical illusion, which may become as com.
plete as any optical illusion which it is
possible to produce, then prices will work
their way up, little by little, under the ac-
quisitive and progressive force of the trad
ing class. One dealer puts up the price of
an article small per cent. His customers
feel too indifferent to inquire strictly for the
reason, or to seek lower terms elsewhere.
The imposition passes unrebuked, and sosn
the whole trade are abreast of their more adj
veuturous comrade. Even those dealers who
seek to enlarge their business and work into
public patronage through reasonable prices,
fail to be appreciated aud rewarded. They
find that people do not care enough for q
little saving to 20 much out of their way for
it, or to leave the more accessible or more
fashionable localities, and they too soon give
in to the plan of large profits and small
sales, which has become the great fact in
American retail trade. 10 such condition,
the effect of competition to bring down pri.
ces becomes reduced to minimum, while
the power of individual or associated ac-
quisitivoness TO advance prices rises to a
maximum. Aud il this weakening OF the
economical sense Of the consuming classes al.
lows prices to be pushed up unduly by the
trading classes whose acquisitiveness is rem
dered only the more active and aggressive
by the very causes which diminish the power
Of resistance in the general community,
much more is it effective in maintaining pri.
ces once established, long after even the show
OF reason for the advance has ceased. 1t is
only when the trading classes are followed
sharply up by the economical sense of a
community actually alive to the necessity
Of saving all that may be saved, aud intelli.
gent as to the proper relations Of prices, that
they will, in popular phase, be as quick and
ready to "hear a fall as to " hear a
rise. "
1t is, in my opinion, nothing but the per-
version of the economical sense Of the conn.
try which has rendered it possible for the
trading class to multiply SO rapidly within
the last ten years, far beyond the rate Of in.
crease in any other department Of indus
try.
have not, however, intended in these re.
marks to thrust my views on the philosophy
Of the currency upon the association, but
merely to suggest probable explanation o.
the striking statistical fact noted, an expla-
nation, which, in the hurried course of this
discussion, might fail to arise in the mind,
Of some who are present.-Frdneis A. Walk
er, Superintendent Of the Census, an the
Journal of The American Social Science As.
socidtion.