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The Economic Situation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 March 2020

Extract

It is increasingly clear that the United Kingdom economy is moving into a difficult period. The levelling out of production has continued: output and demand ceased to expand during the summer. An abnormally large part of output seems still to have been going into stock accumulation. When this stops, as is likely, output may well fall for a time. Even apart from this possibility, demand cannot be expected to regain its former expansiveness for some time. The Government's freedom to redress the internal balance of the economy is hampered in the short term by the weak balance of payments position, largely arising from our poor export performance. Nor is the world situation likely to make things easier for Britain: world markets are expanding much more slowly than last year.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © 1960 National Institute of Economic and Social Research

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References

Notes

note (1) page 6 See Appendix table 4.

note (1) page 8 See ‘Price stability and the policy of deflation’, National Institute Economic Review, no. 3, May 1959.

note (1) page 9 Unadjusted, to match the reduction in borrowing for which no seasonal adjustment can be made. Seasonally adjusted, at current prices (table 4), the reduction was £13 million.

note (1) page 10 Public Investment in Great Britain, Cmnd. 1203, HMSO, November 1960.

note (1) page 11 See National Institute Economic Review, no. 11, September 1960, chart 3, page 7. The new public investment programme probably implies a small rise in public sector expenditure, which was then shown as stable.

note (1) page 16 That is, total identified capital minus special Government transactions with Germany, repayment of the Export-Import Bank loan and subscription to the IMF.

note (1) page 22 The demand for certain consumer durables is analysed more fully in the article on page 24: this suggests that the relaxation of hire purchase controls would probably produce only a moderate increase in demand, since their imposition in itself appears to have reduced demand only moderately.