DISCUSSION.

The article presents authors' comments on three research papers on international trade and balance of payment by the U.S. by economists Hal B. Lary, J. Herbert Furth and Edward M. Bernstein. Lary has succeeded in putting many diverse elements of the U.S. balance of payments into a comprehensive and yet manageable form. In his analysis of the U.S. trade account, Lary says that the main influences that are perhaps amenable to economic analysis are income effects and price effects. Another interesting suggestion of Lary is that a faster rate of growth would make a positive contribution to the U.S. balance of payments. In another paper Furth suggests that payments deficit needs amendment if it is to be applicable to a reserve currency country like the U.S. He says that if the net cash decline involves a gold loss rather than an increase of foreigners' dollar balances, it may need more rapid correction than would otherwise be necessary. The paper by Bernstein says that the adequacy of reserves in the particular case of the U.S. cannot be tested in any simple or usual way. Two criteria have to be used relating to the state of the balance of payments and to the holdings of dollars by foreign countries.