, either in America or in Europe, under-consumed or
over-saved: their excessive saving could find no better form to take
than American railways, which, _ex hypothesi_, were not wanted for
use. A number of persons who might have made and consumed three
hundred million pounds' worth more of corn, clothing, coals, etc.,
than they actually did consume, refused to do so, and instead of doing
so made a number of railway lines, locomotives, etc., which no one
could consume and which were not wanted to assist production. What
occurred was a waste of saving power through an attempt to make an
excessive number of forms of capital.

Even if, some years later, many of these forms obtained a use and a
value, none the less they represent an excess or waste of "saving" to
an extent measured by the normal rate of interest over that period of
time which elapsed before they fructified into use. In a word, what
had happened was not over-consumption, but under-consumption.

M. Guyot appears to think that in the community as a whole too much
saving can be put into the form of "fixed" capital and too little into
circulating capital, and that such a condition of affairs will bring
depression. "Fixed capital," he says, "cannot be utilised if there is
no available circulating capital. Ships and railways are useless if
there are no commodities for them to convey; a factory cannot be
worked unless there are consumers ready to buy its products. If, then,
circulating capital has been so far exhausted as to take a long time
replacing, fixed capital must meanwhile remain unproductive, and the
crisis is so much the longer and more severe."[173]

To this there are two sufficient answers. The prevalence of low prices
for goods of various kinds as well as for plant in a time of
depression, the general glut of goods which forms one phase of the
depression proves that the crisis does not arise from storing too much
saving in plant and too little in goods. Where there exists
simultaneously a larger quantity of plant, raw material, finished
goods, and labour than the industrial society can find use for, no
assertion of maladjustment, either as between trade and trade, country
and country, fixed and circulating capital, will afford any
explanation. Secondly, M. Guyot gives away his entire position by
admitting "a factory cannot be worked unless there are consumers ready
to buy its products." A "consumer" here can logically only mean one
who buys finished g