Section Cclxii (_a_).

TEMPORARY EMIGRATION.

Besides definitive emigration, temporary emigration deserves special consideration. If the wages of labor are much lower in one locality than in another which is easily accessible,[262a-1] the workmen of the former place resolve much more readily on periodical migrations thither than on permanent settlements in the place. It is especially the difficult work of harvesting, where farmers are pressed for time,[262a-2] and that of house-building,[262a-3] which are undertaken by these birds of passage; and mountainous regions, with their limited agriculture, their late crops and their longing look into the far-off which is found united with a deep-rooted attachment to home, are the places whence they come.[262a-4] When their home is distinguished in certain branches of labor, they are wont to carry these with them abroad, and in such case their sojourn away from home is generally longer.[262a-5] The shorter and the more vagabond-like their migration, the less apt is it to be an economic blessing to the wanderers themselves.[262a-6] There must necessarily result, as a consequence, a species of equalization between the rates of wages in the country receiving and the country furnishing them.[262a-7] This may be a great national misfortune for the latter, inasmuch as its working class may thus be forced to a lower standard of life, and all their providence and self-control in the founding of a family be made fruitless by the arrival of less capable foreigners.[262a-8] The hatred existing among the members of a higher class for parvenus from a lower corresponds in this respect to the mutual hatred of two countries for the natives of the other, (v. Mangoldt.) Considered from the point of view of the country furnishing these migratory classes, temporary emigration has this advantage over definitive emigration, that the persons leaving the country always maintain their economic connection with their home.[262a-9] The most striking example of this is afforded by those merchants, ship-owners, etc. who are, so to speak, pioneers in foreign markets for Switzerland and Bremen. Only there is always danger of a crisis when the usual flow is suddenly checked.[262a-10]