For example, if we had gone into a store to buy underwear in the early part of the war, we would have found that the price had greatly increased, and we might have been told, if the salesman were well informed, that the high price was due to the manufacture of airplanes! The explanation is that the wire stays used in the manufacture of airplanes are made of steel wire from which machine knitting needles are also made. In the early part of the war all of the available wire of this kind was taken for airplanes, thus limiting the supply of knitting needles and consequently of knit goods.
The manufacture of airplanes is also said to have affected the price of fish! The nets used for catching certain deep-sea fish, such as cod, must be made of linen, which is invisible in water. The linen which had been used for this purpose suddenly came into great demand for the manufacture of airplane wings. Since airplanes were necessary, linen fishing nets were sacrificed and the price of deep-sea fish went up. This, of course, created a demand for other kinds of fish, and the price of the latter also went up.
CONFLICTS DUE TO INTERDEPENDENCE
When people are so closely dependent upon one another conflicts are likely to occur. Sometimes they are due to selfish disregard by some persons of the rights and interests of others; but more often they are due simply to failure to see what the real results of a particular act may be and how it may affect other people. It was not dreamed that the building of airplanes would affect the price of underwear and fish, and it was only after careful investigation that the relation between these things was discovered. A family that is careless in the disposal of refuse from the household and stables may unconsciously poison the wells of neighbors half a mile away. Sometimes men oppose public improvements, such as better roads, or a new schoolhouse, because they see only the direct costs of the improvements, and fail to see the more important losses to themselves and to the community if the improvements are not made.
DANGER OF HASTY JUDGMENTS
One thing we may learn from such facts as these is the danger of forming hasty judgments about things that happen, or conditions that exist, or proposals that are made, in our community life. Even those conditions or events that are apparently most simple may be related to other conditions and events that are not at first apparent. Wise judgment and wise action are dependent upon the most complete knowledge obtainable.
We shall see, as we proceed with our study, how this fact of interdependence appears in every phase of our community life.
From observation in your own community, give illustrations to show how people, in attempting to satisfy their own wants, may interfere with the efforts of others to satisfy theirs. The following are given as suggestions:
An employer and those whom he employs.
A man who owns a house or farm and the tenant to whom he rents it.