Trade and Payments *

My assignment is Trade and Payments, which were covered in the original Brookings study in two chapters, on the Balance of Payments by Cooper and on British Trade Performance by Krause. Both these chapters have two features in common, a strong analytical under-pinning and a bold determination to put numbers down wherever possible. Cooper includes in his summary a table showing alternative methods for improving the United Kingdom balance of payments by £100 millions, which is reproduced here. (Table 1). Table 1 Alternative methods for improving the United Kingdom balance of payments by £100 million: A Summary<xref ref-type="fn" rid="fn3_2"> ¹ </xref> https://www.niso.org/standards/z39-96/ns/oasis-exchange/table">

Course of action

Size of policy change

Rise in target unemployment rate

0·34 percentage points

Imposition of import surcharge on manufactures ^(b)

4 per cent

Reduction in overseas military expenditures

£143 million

Across-the-board reduction in private capital outflow ^(c)

£110 million

Across-the-board reduction in foreign sid ^(c)

£159 million

Currency devaluation ^(b)

1·41 per cent

^(a) per year, in terms of transactions levels of 1966. ‘Medium-term’ effects, after a period of adjustment. ^(d) Assuming other currencies devalued are limited to those devalued in November 1967.