In order to maintain the demand for labour
at a uniform level, the government is to provide public works. The
population is to be rehoused in suitable dwellings, both in rural
districts and town slums; new and more adequate schools and training
colleges are to be inaugurated; land is to be reclaimed and afforested,
and gradually brought under common ownership; railways and canals are to
be reorganized and nationalized, mines and electric power systems. One
of the significant proposals under this head is that which demands the
retention of the centralization of the purchase of raw materials brought
about by the war.
In order to accomplish these objects there must be a "Revolution in
National Finance." The present method of raising funds is denounced; and
it is pointed out that only one quarter of the colossal expenditure made
necessary by the war has been raised by taxation, and that the three
quarters borrowed at onerous rates is sure to be a burden on the nation's
future. The capital needed, when peace comes, to ensure a happy and
contented democracy must be procured without encroaching on the minimum
standard of life, and without hampering production. Indirect taxation
must therefore be concentrated on those luxuries of which it is desirable
that the consumption be discouraged. The steadily rising unearned
increment of urban and mineral land ought, by appropriate direct
taxation, to be brought into the public exchequer; "the definite
teachings of economic science are no longer to be disregarded.
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