ailed in some
directions, unemployment has been rather below than above the average."

[Footnote 1: Mr. J.M. Keynes (_Economic Journal,_ Sept. 1914) estimates the
aggregate value of outstanding bills in London at L350,000,000.]

[Footnote 2: In addition to these various financial measures, the State has
lent Belgium L10,000,000 and the Union of South Africa L7,000,000, whilst
it has also guaranteed L5,000,000 of the new Egyptian cotton loan.]

But this is by no means the only example of State action. The Government
has established temporarily a State-aided system of marine insurance, by
undertaking 80 per cent of the war risk, in order to encourage overseas
trade. It has given substantial aid to the joint-stock banks "for the sole
purpose that they might be fit to aid in every way possible the country's
trade and finance."[1] It made arrangements for the direct purchase of
forage and vegetables, etc., from farmers.[2] It took over the control of
the railways. When, owing to panic, there was a rush for the purchase of
food-stuffs, which was used to force up prices unduly, the Government
intervened to prevent exorbitant charges. Particularly interesting is the
action of the State regarding sugar, two-thirds of our supply of which
comes from Germany and Austria. In the days immediately following the
declaration of war wholesale prices were trebled. The Government,
therefore, decided to take upon itself the task of ensuring an adequate
supply of sugar, and a Royal Commission was appointed. The leading refiners
were approached and an arrangement was made with the whole body of refiners
that they should stand aside from the market for raw sugars, leaving it
free for the operations of the Government. The Royal Commission pledged the
refiners to buy their sugar from the Commission, _i.e._ from the State;
sugar was to be offered to them at a fixed price, and the refiners were to
sell the refined product to the dealers also at a fixed price sufficient to
yield the refiners a fair profit on manufacture. As a result of the corner,
a big rise in the price of sugar, which is not only an important domestic
commodity but the raw material of several industries, was averted. This
merits the description given of it in _The Nation_--"a really dashing
experiment in State Socialism." [3] On the other hand, it has done nothing
to increase the world's supply of sugar, but has merely commandeered a
part of the existing stock. The aid of the Sta