Balance of Trade(翻译稿).docVIP

Balance of Trade Mises Daily: Wednesday, September 05, 2012 by Frederic Bastiat Our adversaries have adopted tactics that are rather embarrassing. Do we establish our doctrine? They admit it with the greatest possible respect. Do we attack their principle? They abandon it with the best grace in the world. They demand only one thing — that our doctrine, which they hold to be true, should remain relegated to books, and that their principle, which they acknowledge to be vicious, should reign paramount in practical legislation. Resign to them the management of tariffs, and they will give up all dispute with you in the domain of theory. Assuredly, said Mr. Gauthier de Rumilly, on a recent occasion, no one wishes to resuscitate the antiquated theories of the balance of trade. Very right, Mr. Gauthier, but please remember that it is not enough to give a passing slap to error, and immediately afterwards and for two hours at a time, reason as if that error were truth. Let me speak of Mr. Lestiboudois. Here we have a consistent reasoner, a logical disputant. There is nothing in his conclusions that is not to be found in his premises. He asks nothing in practice but what he justifies in theory. His principle may be false; that is open to question. But at any rate, he has a principle. He believes, and he proclaims it aloud, that if France gives 10, in order to receive 15, she loses 5; and it follows, of course, that he supports laws that are in keeping with this view of the subject. The important thing to attend to, he says, is that the amount of our importations goes on augmenting, and exceeds the amount of our exportations — that is to say, France every year purchases more foreign products, and sells less of her own. Figures prove this. What do we see? In 1842 imports exceeded exports by 200 million. These facts appear to prove in the clearest manner that national industry is not sufficiently protected, that we depend upon foreign labor for our supplies, that the competitio