Teoria della Trasformazione dei Capitali. Di CAMILLO SUPINO. Torino, Fratelli Bocca Editori, 1891.126 pp. In the preface to this treatise, the author tells us that, while many economic theories are based upon the possibility of capital's passing from one form of industry to another, yet few writers who appeal to the principle "concern themselves with explaining how the movement takes place." A few ideas respecting it are found in the principal economic treatises; "but," he continues, "no one, that I know, has devoted a special study to the various methods of the transformation of capital, to the causes which determine it, and to the obstacles which impede it." To fill up this gap in economic science is the object of the present work, the author believing that such an investigation has practical and scientific importance, and great utility for both economics and finance. But, notwithstanding this practical importance, his work is wholly theoretical. In the execution of his task Signor Supino has given us a wellarranged and systematic treatment of the leading phenomena in the movement of capital, which is always "tending," in obedience to the law of self-interest, towards the more productive employments. His explanations of the principles involved and their working are always lucid, and his style is always clear. If there is little or nothing new in the way of facts or principles, the author is entitled at least to the credit of having skillfully grouped them about a central thought, thus bringing scattered truths together in a connected whole. The various classes of phenomena are treated in separate chapters, and each group is analyzed with more or less detail; but it is not pretended that the analysis is exhaustive or the treatment complete. Chapter I traces the transformation of wealth into capital, and shows how this is facilitated by the use of money. Then in the three following chapters are treated respectively: The transformation of capital through the agency of monetary capital, or the movement of "momentarily disposable capital"; the transformation of capital employed in industries, or fixed capital whose placement is influenced by prices and profits; the transformation of capital employed in investments, as lands, houses and public values, or fixed and movable capital whose transformation is effected only through purchase and sale. Then follows a chapter on the causes of the transformation, which are principally, though not wholly, technical or economic; and finally, the last chapter treats of the obstacles which impede the transformation. These are either inherent in the employments, as differences in risks, attractiveness and aim; or external influences — obstacles of a moral, economic or juridical nature. On some minor points, which do not affect the general argument, exceptions might justly be made. For instance, the statement that "the custom existing in certain countries, of giving long credits, retards the circulation of capital" (page 58) is hardly true without qualification. No doubt it retards the flow of money. But does it of capital? Possibly the statement is due to the author's strong inclination to regard money as capital. At any rate, he says, it is "latent capital" (page 24). Again, counteracting influences are overlooked in the statement that the existence of any given railroad is an obstacle to the building of another running in the same direction. This may be true of the European railroad system, as it may be the dictum of the highest economic interest of the public; but the parallel roads in this country have demonstrated that a speculative mania will defy the public interest for a selfish gain, and convert the "obstacle' " into an incentive. Still, as a "tendency," or indeed as a rule, the statement may be conceded. A more questionable position, though supported by the high authority of Pantaleoni, is the distinction made between cultivated land and building sites in cities. The latter are regarded as capital- a part of the cost of the buildings, but their value does not depend on fertility, and hence is not subject to the law of diminishing returns. Having a monopoly value, their rent is a monopoly rent. On the other hand, cultivated land is not capital, because not a product, does depend on fertility, and so is subject to the above law. And further, it yields differential rents (page 64). It is difficult to see the ground of these distinctions. If the cost of a building site is part of the total cost of a building, and any increased income is but "the normal interest of the increased value of the capital"; and if the proof of this is found in the fact that in selling the owner capitalizes this increased income (page 68); the same is true of the increased income from cultivated land near a city. Both alike will capitalize the increased returns; but for all that, to the owners these returns are alike differential returns, or rents, due to monopolistic advantages, and are not the normal returns to capital in the strict sense. If in the one case increased returns are to be considered as only the normal interest of the increased value of capital, the same must be true in the other case, and then the whole phenomenon of rent at once disappears. To a purchaser the whole return is, no doubt, normal interest on capital invested; but any increase, economically considered, is a rent due to a differential advantage of a monopolistic character, as is the case with all rents, including the quasi-rents of capital, labor and the entrepreneur. But since the monopolies differ in character, they may be greater or less hindrances to the movement of capital. COLUMBIA COLLEGE. STEPHEN F. WESTON. People's Banks. A record of Social and Economic Success. By HENRY W. WOLFF. London, Longmans, Green & Co., 1893. -xvi, 261 pp. That amiable weakness of the French people for impracticable ideas, has, we are constrained to admit, stamped itself upon their practice of coöperation. So when Mr. Wolff seeks to chronicle "a record of social and economic success" in that same illusive form of masquerading socialism on which an emperor has smiled, he has had to abandon Gallic soil, as the home of mere theories — as beautiful, but as finely spun as Venetian glass. His book, accordingly, is a study of German and Italian methods for the accomplishment of those startling results in credit coöperation, the statistics of which, for the continent, reach in dollars to ten figures annually. While no one has satisfactorily defined the word to which Robert Owen gave currency, it is universally recognized that there are three forms of the practice of coöperation, viz., for distribution, for credit and for production. But it would be easy to demonstrate that neither the English "wholesales" nor the "people's banks" involve real coöperation; though there is no doubt that both are useful and astonishing aids to civilization. Coöperation for production, then, is the only form which can satisfy a scientific definition, and it is now many years since cautious economists have pronounced that form, on which they founded such high hopes, to be a lamentable failure. But the point at which the French began Schulze-Delitzsch hoped to attain only after a long series of successful experiments, and him the Italians have followed, more tedesco. To this fact only can the pæan of Mr. Wolff's book owe its reason. There are two plans of campaign which have influenced the growth of the people's banks that of Schulze and Luzzatti, which may be characterized in M. Léon Say's phrase as seeking the "démocratisation du crédit"; and that of Raiffeisen and Wollemborg, which is essentially in a line. with that naïve and priestly attempt (so deliciously French) to "moraliser les affaires"—the Catholic Banks of the R. P. de Besse. Mr. Wolff has carefully studied both these schemes and his work is consequently valuable in the literature on this subject. While he vaunts the "generally accepted superiority of the Raiffeisen system in conclusions into which we cannot follow him, yet he deserves only praise for his recognition of the leadership the Italians have taken in the conduct of these "poor man's banks." In Lombardy history finds the origin of the modern business methods of the world, and there to-day has been perfected a system of banking, racy of the soil, of inestimable value to a usury ridden people, and in its triumph asserted to be "la réalization de l'idéal coopératif." But, it may be said, as there is nothing ideal about it, so is there nothing coöperative. FAIRFAX HARRISON. Profit-Sharing and the Labor Question. By T. W. BUSHILL. London, Methuen & Co.; New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1893. 12mo, 262 pp. Mr. T. W. Bushil is a manufacturing stationer of Coventry, England, whose firm employs some two hundred work-people, with whom it has for five years practised a system of profit-sharing. This volume is a contribution of extreme value to the literature of its subject because of its very practical character. Mr. N. O. Nelson of St. Louis is the only other English-speaking profit-sharer who has hitherto made known to the public with any fullness his method, its operation and the results of the system. Mr. Bushill has given us here a much fuller treatment of the general matter, and a far more detailed statement of the practical workings of the system in use in his establishment. The book originated in the testimony given before the royal commission on labor. The substance of this testimony is given in the first chapter in a condensed form; in chapter ii follows the cross-examination; four annual addresses to the employees and extracts from correspondence close the first division of the book. Mr. Bushill then proceeds to discuss the profit-sharing system as a whole, its principle, its present standing (including a list of seventyfive English firms giving a bonus to the workmen) and its relation to other systems. The estimate of profit-sharing, on page 146, is moderate but confident: I do not regard it as an "end," but as the "next thing." It is the best immediate means known to me for elevating the lot of the workers. .. As compared with schemes for municipalising labour and so on, it is modest and commonplace, but it has the advantage of being immediately practicable. This judgment is confirmed by the work-people themselves in the "ballot opinions" which were given by Mr. Bushill's employees, every precaution being taken to secure the independence of the replies to the three questions submitted to them. These "ballot opinions" are of extreme interest, giving as they do a kind of testimony from the workman's side which has hitherto been lacking. In several additional chapters Mr. Bushill expresses in reference to various labor questions the sagacious views of a philanthropic employer who has the great advantage of knowing his own business thoroughly and of sympathizing with the desire of the workman to "get on" in the world. An appendix contains the rules of the firm and much other matter of use to the employer contemplating the introduction of the system. Mr. Bushill has provided an invaluable supplement to the works of previous writers on profit-sharing, and has greatly strengthened the argument for its extension by this practical, judicious and comprehensive little volume. NICHOLAS P. GILMAN. The Repudiation of State Debts. A Study in the Financial New This book consists of three parts. The first chapter treats of the constitutional and legal aspects of repudiation. It is, in the main, a brief review of the leading judicial decisions on the constitutional right of the states, under the eleventh amendment, to refuse to answer to a civil suit in the federal courts. In addition, the author shows that, with four or five possible exceptions, the states have not provided any other tribunal before which the justice of claims against their treasuries may be tried. Then follow five chapters descriptive of the cases of repudiation since 1841 in the twelve states named in the title. Under the term repudiation, the author includes "cases of the 'scaling' of debts and of refusal to pay bonds which are not valid obligations of the states, either from a moral or legal standpoint." This definition he construes broadly enough to cover cases of refunding, as, for example, |