George Macesich, “Sources of Monetary Disturbances in the United States, 1834–1945,” Journal of Economic History, September 1960, pp. 407–434.

p. 410. Last line of Section II should read “deflation” instead of “inflation.”

p. 416. Last line on page should read “… hence they do not conform …”

p. 424. Roman numeral IV should appear over second paragraph.

One of the main points at issue between economists from advanced and those from underdeveloped countries is the role of foreign trade in economic development. The former see in the expansion of foreign trade the main motive power of development, while the latter pin their hopes on other sectors, notably manufacturing. The answer would seem to be that foreign trade is a necessary but not a sufficient condition of development. Economic growth of underdeveloped countries can be achieved most smoothly if they can build up a substantial export trade that is sufficiently closely linked to the rest of the economy to exert upon it some form of multiplier effect so that a rise in exports leads to a more general and diffused expansion. In other words, over a long period of development, foreign trade is the engine that provides the motive power, but this engine cannot move the economy unless it is provided with adequate transmission lines. Or, to change the metaphor, other branches of the economy can be vivified and developed by grafting on to them some of the capital created and the skills generated in foreign trade.

The economic historian is well aware of the philanthropic origins of savings banks. Both in Western Europe and the United States they were initially established by public spirited individuals as a depository for the funds of small savers. It is not so widely appreciated that such banks were encouraged officially as a part of social policy in England during the nineteenth century. In an age in which self-help and individual thrift were conceived as the only solutions for lower-class poverty and distress, a means of spreading such virtues was sure not to go unnoticed. Brought forward in those critical years at the end of the Napoleonic wars, “here was the first constructive and practical proposal for counteracting the growing pauperization of the community, restoring independence to the masses, stopping the growth of the poor rate, and giving the ordinary man and woman some interest in the financial stability of the country.”

Given the present state of the study of Chinese economic history, this survey ought either to be limited to a single paragraph—or else it should comprise a monograph of several hundred pages. Thirty pages of selected titles may leave the reader with a false impression that these are the cream of a very large crop; on the other hand, within this space I can barely adumbrate the thousands of potential sources—printed and in manuscript, ephemeral and lasting—that will eventually have to be digested before the economic history of China will be definitively written.

The character and revolutionary potential of Russian factory labor in the early phases of industrialization have been a source of controversy for over two generations. While no longer a matter of the utmost consequence, the problems of analysis and the conclusions involved in this debate have retained their significance not only for the study of the Russian revolutions but also for our contemporary experience with labor in underdeveloped countries. The following pages, dealing with the crucial years around 1900, intend to apply a modern approach to an ancient subject, starting with the question of the relationship between peasants and workers in the Russian factories and advancing to the problem of the “exploitation” of the workers by the “capitalists.”

Professor Bolino makes a number of comments on our article, “Sequential Growth, the Labor Safety-Valve Doctrine and the Development of American Unionism,” in this journal, September 1959, which certainly call for some rejoinder on our part.