Workmen's advocate., 1890-11-22

necessaries of life to lower prices under natural conditions which would nevit- ably produce the contrary effect if their acticn was not interfered with by the operations of the stock gambling fra. ternity is we must say, even more preju. dicial to the working class than a gen. eral rise of prices would be. For it production, and therefore of employ ment earnings and purchasing power, than would otherwise be the case.
 Although the aggregate volume of business is reported as being still cup to the average, there are evidences of diminishing output and increasing idle ness in various industries, while the trunk lines are showing for October a decrease of per cent. in gross receipts suggestive of d corresponding reduction in the quantity of products available for international and even domestic ex- changes.
 It seems to be fact, however that the Pacific coast crop has been under calculated, and that, as previously esti- mated in the columns of the WORKMEN'S $ ADVOCATE, the surplus of wheat avail. able for export will be 15, ,O00 GOO bush els; and as the cotton crop will yield over 5000, 1000 bales, nearly three quar- ters of which must find a market in Europe, it is seen at glance that we are in no danger of having the interna- tionaI "baIancc of trade" largely turned against us, even if our plntocracy should consume next year, here or abroad, it's usual quantity of foreign luxures.
 But there is d serious danger in sight, resulting from the present financial conditions of England, viewed in con necton with the investment of British syndicates in this country. Should these conditions remain for any length of time what they now are or grow worse, the capitalists engaged in those syndiCates would surely endeavor to sell their American stocks on the American market; and if they were to any extent compromised in failures, the American industries that have passed under their control might be compelled to suspend operations. Of course, our own capi- talists would welcome such an oppor- tunity of e-purchasing at very low prices the properties which they have previously sold to their foreign cousins at inflated figures; but in the meantime American labor would suffer in enforced idleness, and it's loss of wages during the suspension might even surpass the profit made by its own eXplolters at the expense of the exploiters of British labor.
 lt is certain, at any rate, that an end has been put for some time to the in vestments of British capital in this country. The great banking firm of the Bariugs, second only to the Roth childs in financial st9nding and power, Is thoroughly crippled by the state of affairs in the Argentine Republic, and the general disaster which would have followed the suspension of that mighty house was only aYerted by the inter ference of the Rothschilds themselves in conjunction with the Bank of Eng land In spite of the timely rescue, the general feeling in London and through out Europe is, in the words of a cable gram, that "it is still too early to con clude that all is right" A number of minor firms are known to be under a heavy strain, and confidence will not be restored until the actual condition of