many is about ten times[146] what it was
before the war. The value of the mark in terms of gold is about
one-eighth of its former value. As world-prices in terms of gold are
more than double what they were, it follows that mark-prices inside
Germany ought to be from sixteen to twenty times their pre-war level if
they are to be in adjustment and proper conformity with prices outside
Germany.[147] But this is not the case. In spite of a very great rise in
German prices, they probably do not yet average much more than five
times their former level, so far as staple commodities are concerned;
and it is impossible that they should rise further except with a
simultaneous and not less violent adjustment of the level of money
wages. The existing maladjustment hinders in two ways (apart from other
obstacles) that revival of the import trade which is the essential
preliminary of the economic reconstruction of the country. In the first
place, imported commodities are beyond the purchasing power of the great
mass of the population,[148] and the flood of imports which might have
been expected to succeed the raising of the blockade was not in fact
commercially possible.[149] In the second place, it is a hazardous
enterprise for a merchant or a manufacturer to purchase with a foreign
credit material for which, when he has imported it or manufactured it,
he will receive mark currency of a quite uncertain and possibly
unrealizable value. This latter obstacle to the revival of trade is one
which easily escapes notice and deserves a little attention. It is
impossible at the present time to say what the mark will be worth in
terms of foreign currency three or six months or a year hence, and the
exchange market can quote no reliable figure. It may be the case,
therefore, that a German merchant, careful of his future credit and
reputation, who is actually offered a short period credit in terms of
sterling or dollars, may be reluctant and doubtful whether to accept it.
He will owe sterling or dollars, but he will sell his product for marks,
and his power, when the time comes, to turn these marks into the
currency in which he has to repay his debt is entirely problematic.
Business loses its genuine character and becomes no better than a
speculation in the exchanges, the fluctuations in which entirely
obliterate the normal profits of commerce.

There are therefore three separate obstacles to the revival of trade: a
maladjustment between interna