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production in affluent America today, whether it is satisfying spontaneous
or created wants, is in general much less urgent, and would be so con–
sidered by the bulk of the population, than was marginal production
one hundred years ago.
But are there no further arguments for the preoccupation with
production, other than those mentioned by Galbraith? In Britain, of
course, there are, simply because our level of affluence is lower. But
this in no way contradicts Galbraith's argument, since the case for or
against the production objective in the u.s. has nothing to do with
conditions in Britain.
But what of the impoverished peoples of Asia, Africa and South
America? Clearly they themselves are right to be preoccupied with higher
output, battling as they still are with the age old problems of privation,
hunger and insecurity. But does their wretched condition not affect the
argument about production in the U.S.? Galbraith does not discuss
this point explicitly; but his answer would, I think, be this. The U.S.
should indeed sustain a generous program of foreign aid. But in practice
the limitation on foreign aid is not the level of American production,
but a complex of electoral and political attitudes; therefore additional
production would not lead to more foreign aid.
Now this, though certainly true at the present time, is not a suf–
ficient answer ; for Galbraith himself makes many proposals for altering
these underlying factors-he does not accept existing limitations as
im–
mutable. Let us suppose that he is successful, and the limitations are
removed. Would there then not be a case for seeking the maximum
rate of economic growth, and transferring the additional output to the
underdeveloped areas? On any economic welfare grounds, the answer
is
unquestionably yes. Marginal output would then consist not of longer
tail fins on longer cars, but of wheat for India, steel for Indonesia, ma–
chinery for Ghana. The case for maximum production would
be
pre–
cisely as strong as it was one hundred years ago, and for precisely the
same reasons-to combat poverty and privation. Galbraith's argument
thus rests wholly on the supposition that the American problem
is,
for
whatever reason, to be treated in isolation. American marginal output
is
indeed of merely trivial importance to Americans; but to less affluent
Asia or Africa it must seem, could it only be transferred there, of des–
perate significance.
However, it may be that in practice the effective limitation on
foreign aid will continue to be not the size of the national product, but
other, noneconomic factors, and that the choice facing the u .S. can
therefore be discussed in terms which abstract from the problems of
