THE PRESENT PROBLEM IN INDIAN CURRENCY 681
above its present value will mean to every merchant and every manufacturer not only that his product will fetch
76% less, but that he will have to give 76% more to the investing class from whom he borrowed and to the earning class whom he employed. The burden thus imposed upon the active and working elements of society would be intolerable. I must however guard against a possible misunderstanding. No one should imagine that because I am against lower prices I am for higher prices. All I insist upon is that we must not complain against high prices once that level is established. For things having adjusted themselves they are our normal level. A pre-war level would be abnormal and must therefore be rejected.
We must therefore choose between 1s. 3 [7] / 8 d. and 1s. 6d. As for choosing one or the other of the two we should be guided by what is fair and just. We want that enterprise be helped against accumulation and we probably wish that the rich should go richer. But I am sure none of us wants that the instinct of having, which is the foundation of capital, should be discounted or that poor should go poorer. But this would exactly be the result of a swing towards 1 s. 6d. On the other hand, though we want capital to grow and the poor to fare better yet none of us wants that industry be set at naught. And yet this would be the result of keeping to 1s. 6d.
I for myself would choose 1s. 6d. as the ratio at which we should stabilize if we can and for the following reasons. (I) It will conserve the position of the investing and the earning classes ; (2) It does not jeopardize our trade and prosperity by putting any extra burden upon the business class ; and (3) being the most recent in point of time, it is likely to give greater justice to the greatest number of monetary contracts most of which must be recent in time.
Fortunately for us we are not dependent upon other countries for the stabilisation of our price level, as we must necessarily be for the stabilization of our exchange. In exchange stabilization we could not even if we would. But in the stabilisation of our prices we could if we would. It would indeed be better if we can stabilize our prices as well as our exchange. But because .other countries cannot, stabilise their price levels there is no reason why we