cost (that is, the quantity of the country's labor which must be expended to obtain it), [pg 407] we must add (5) to these four conditions of cheapness a fifth condition, namely, “whose productive industry is the most efficient.” This last, however, does not at all affect the value of money, estimated in commodities; it affects the general abundance and facility with which all things, money and commodities together, can be obtained.273
From the preceding considerations, it appears that those are greatly in error who contend that the value of money, in countries where it is an imported commodity, must be entirely regulated by its value in the countries which produce it; and can not be raised or lowered in any permanent manner unless some change has taken place in the cost of production at the mines. On the contrary, any circumstance which disturbs the equation of international demand with respect to a particular country not only may, but must, affect the value of money