Abstract
DURING recent years, men in all walks of life have begun to question the present structure of society with its apparently inevitable liability to periodic maladjustments, and in an endeavour to suggest a remedy of present ills, all kinds of proposals have been put forward. The very multiplicity of these plans for economic betterment, however, is bewildering and confusing, even to those who have the time to examine them in some detail. For this reason alone the recent publication by the Engineers' Study Group on Economics of a chart analysing in convenient form the salient features of fourteen different proposals for economic reform should serve a useful purpose. In addition to this chart, the Group, which was formed by a number of engineers and men of science somewhat more than a year ago, has recently prepared a valuable interim report which examines twenty-four separate sets of proposals, analysing them under three headings, namely, (a) monetary, (6) industrial planning and (c) a combination of industrial planning and monetary. The real division of opinion which this classification is intended to emphasise is that existing between those who think that prosperity can be reached by alterations, radical or otherwise, in the monetary system, and those who believe that some control of industrial production is required. The division is also of importance in respect of immediate practical possibilities. Few if any of the monetary proposals would require elaborate preliminaries, and most of them could be brought into full operation in a comparatively short time. It is otherwise with the schemes which involve planning, as these would almost invariably take time to put into practice.
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Systems of Economic Reform. Nature 135, 884–885 (1935). https://doi.org/10.1038/135884a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/135884a0