DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.22140#0403
HOME TRADE AND DOMESTIC COMPETITION. 387
at cutting prices, but in such a way as to secure the largest custom.
It is the competition for custom, not by cheapness. To this all the
fashions of modern social life lend themselves. The habit of
bargaining has totally passed away from retail trade. The shop-
keeper fixes prices, and strives to get custom. Of course if his
goods are not perishable, and his sales are rapid, he can afford to
make his gross profits moderate. But as long as demand remains
the same, the multiplicity of dealers makes him to a great extent
independent of market fluctuations, and relieves him from the
inclination of giving his customers the benefit of a reduction. The
farmer complains that he is constrained to sell his cattle and sheep
at ruinously low prices, but the householder cannot trace the
depression in his butcher's bill. Cotton, wool, and silk are cheap
beyond experience, and the rivalry of manufacturers reduces the
cost of production in even a greater ratio. But the depression is
not exhibited in the draper's scale of prices or in the tailor's
charges. And the same sort of thing is witnessed in those
articles where the substitution of machinery for manual labour
has greatly cheapened the cost of production. The working tailor
and the seamstress earn a miserable pittance, but the charge to the
consumer remains unchanged. There is, in short, it is alleged, an
understanding among dealers, which ensures some profit to all,
and the consumer has no appreciable advantage in lowered prices.
The habit of buying everything at shops, and nothing from the
producer, is peculiar to this country, where marketing by private
families is practically obsolete. It survives, as every one may see,
in continental cities ; if, for example, any one were to visit the
Brussels market in any one day through its successive changes of
merchandise. It is a good deal assisted in this country by the
practice of producers who might, and to a small extent do, sell, by
demanding and expecting shopkeepers' prices for what they bring
round. Now no one can be expected to give as much for that
which comes to him at a fixed price as he has to give for what he
purchases at a shop at his own time and discretion. The same
result is assisted by the fact that there is no understanding or
association at all among producers, especially of agricultural pro-
ducts. In Switzerland the dairy farmers send their milk to a
■central association, where it is turned into butter and cheese, the
at cutting prices, but in such a way as to secure the largest custom.
It is the competition for custom, not by cheapness. To this all the
fashions of modern social life lend themselves. The habit of
bargaining has totally passed away from retail trade. The shop-
keeper fixes prices, and strives to get custom. Of course if his
goods are not perishable, and his sales are rapid, he can afford to
make his gross profits moderate. But as long as demand remains
the same, the multiplicity of dealers makes him to a great extent
independent of market fluctuations, and relieves him from the
inclination of giving his customers the benefit of a reduction. The
farmer complains that he is constrained to sell his cattle and sheep
at ruinously low prices, but the householder cannot trace the
depression in his butcher's bill. Cotton, wool, and silk are cheap
beyond experience, and the rivalry of manufacturers reduces the
cost of production in even a greater ratio. But the depression is
not exhibited in the draper's scale of prices or in the tailor's
charges. And the same sort of thing is witnessed in those
articles where the substitution of machinery for manual labour
has greatly cheapened the cost of production. The working tailor
and the seamstress earn a miserable pittance, but the charge to the
consumer remains unchanged. There is, in short, it is alleged, an
understanding among dealers, which ensures some profit to all,
and the consumer has no appreciable advantage in lowered prices.
The habit of buying everything at shops, and nothing from the
producer, is peculiar to this country, where marketing by private
families is practically obsolete. It survives, as every one may see,
in continental cities ; if, for example, any one were to visit the
Brussels market in any one day through its successive changes of
merchandise. It is a good deal assisted in this country by the
practice of producers who might, and to a small extent do, sell, by
demanding and expecting shopkeepers' prices for what they bring
round. Now no one can be expected to give as much for that
which comes to him at a fixed price as he has to give for what he
purchases at a shop at his own time and discretion. The same
result is assisted by the fact that there is no understanding or
association at all among producers, especially of agricultural pro-
ducts. In Switzerland the dairy farmers send their milk to a
■central association, where it is turned into butter and cheese, the