the so-called classical economists-Adam Smith (1 723-90), David Ricardo (1772-1823), and John Stuart Mill (1806-73).
In An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
(1776), Smith, reacting to the high tariffs and other restrictions of 18th-century mercantilism, advo- cated laissez faire-the doctrine that governments should end ail re-straints on trade and prices. The re- sult, he argued, would benefit both individuals and, in the aggregate, the public. Ricardo, in Principles...
. "An' yet," replied his friend Mr. Dooley, " 'tis not more than two months ago since ye learned whether they were islands or canned goods." Today, the Commonwealth's 3.3 million Spanish-speaking inhabitants are U.S. citizens who do not vote in U.S. elections or pay federal taxes. Operation Boot- strap-the promising drive for economic growth launched in the 1950s-stalled during the '70s. Unemployment now hovers around 20 percent; only massive subsidies from Washington prevented...
's mountainous interior.
When the Spanish-American War broke out in 1898, Finley Peter Dunne's comic Mr. Hennessey urged prompt acquisition of Cuba and Puerto Rico. "An' yet," replied his friend Mr. Dooley, " 'tis not more than two months ago since ye learned whether they were islands or canned goods." Today, the Commonwealth's 3.3 million Spanish-speaking inhabitants are U.S. citizens who do not vote in U.S. elections or pay federal taxes. Operation Boot- strap-the promising...
is an anomaly with no true counterpart anywhere in the world. The island's economy is hostage to this circumstance. It is a victim, too, of nature. Puerto Rico has virtually no natural resources. It is self-sufficient only in people, of whom it has long been a net exporter. For other resources it must rely on the outside world, primarily the United States, its chief trading partner for nearly 100 years.
Like Taiwan and South Korea, Puerto Rico faced a postwar challenge. It had to devise an economic...
There are perhaps 2 million Puerto Ricans-island-born or, increasingly, mainland-born children of migrants-now living in the continental United States. They account for less than 1 percent of the total U.S. population and for less than one- quarter of all citizens of Hispanic origin living on the mainland.
Yet their presence is keenly felt. and large, they are clus- tered in a handful of cities: New York and its environs (the main point of entry for the 800,000 Puerto Ricans-one-third of the...
Once, after World War 11, policymakers and economists saw the massive Puerto Rican migration to the United States as a partial and temporary solution to the island's poverty and un- employment (as well as a cheap source of labor in the fields and factories of the U.S. mainland). The migrants, too, often saw their sojourn as temporary, hoping to return someday to Puerto Rico and buy a house and a small plot of land, a parcela.
For many of the migrants, this hope foundered on reality. Instead,...
historian Adalberto Lopez-in
Puerto Rico and Puerto Ricans: Studies in History and Society
(Wiley, 1974), edited Lopez and James Petras-provide a useful overview.
Lopez notes that as a result of war- fare with the Spaniards and of smallpox epidemics, the island's population declined drastically from an estimated 30,000 after the Spanish arrived to a few thousand by 1520. Labor shortages led to the im- portation of black African slaves.
Life for the slaves in Puerto Rico was "short, nasty...
public agencies and private institutions
"The 1971-1974 Controls Program and the Price Level: An Econometric Post-Mortem."
National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc., 1050 Massachusetts Ave., Cam- bridge, Mass. 02138. 37 pp. Authors: Alan S. Blinder and William J. Newton
If the "New Economic Policy" fol-lowed the Nixon administration from 1971 to 1974 is any indication, mandatory wage-price controls alone cannot significantly curb inflation, say Princeton economists Blinder a...
One hundred years ago, 50 million paign literature (one for each eligible
Americans approached a presiden-voter).
tial election with an eager anticipa- The year 1880 was a time for op- tion that our more jaded age can timism and enthusiasm. Memories of scarcely hope to match: a bitter Civil War were beginning to %* In tiny Warren, Ohio (popula- fade; a deep economic depression, tion: 4,428), 40,000 people turned out which had begun in 1873 and stirred in late September to hear New the nation's...
J. D. Salinger:
Writing As Religion
J. D. Salinger's last book, Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction, was published in 1963. His last New Yorker short story appeared in 1965. Since then, he has published nothing, even as his most famous book, The Catcher in the Rye (1951), continues to sell some 400,000 copies a year. The author of a recent article in the New York Times Magazine as-serted that Salinger "retreated to a New England fortress when he could no...