almost [pg 396] every, country produces within itself. After exporting the things in which it can employ itself most advantageously, and importing those in which it is under the greatest disadvantage, there are many lying between, of which the relative cost of production in that and in other countries differs so little that the cost of carriage would absorb more than the whole saving in cost of production which would be obtained by importing one and exporting another. This is the case with numerous commodities of common consumption, including the coarser qualities of many articles of food and manufacture, of which the finer kinds are the subject of extensive international traffic.
§ 3. —As illustrated by trade in cloth and linen between England and Germany.
“Suppose that ten yards of broadcloth cost in England as much labor as fifteen yards of linen, and in Germany as much as twenty.” This supposition then being made, it would be the interest of England to import linen from Germany, and of Germany to import cloth from England. “When each country produced both commodities for itself, ten yards of cloth exchanged for fifteen yards of linen in England, and for twenty in Germany. They will now exchange for the same number of yards of linen in both. For what number? If for fifteen yards, England will be just as she was, and Germany will gain all. If for twenty yards, Germany will be as before, and England will derive the whole of the benefit. If for any number intermediate between fifteen and twenty, the advantage will be shared between the two countries. If, for example, ten yards of cloth exchange for eighteen of linen, England will gain an advantage of three yards on every fifteen, Germany will save two out of every twenty. The problem is, what are the causes which determine the proportion in which the cloth of England and the linen of Germany will exchange for each other? Let us suppose, then, that by the effect of what Adam Smith [pg 397] calls the higgling of the market, ten