William James Ashley

“ By diminishing their population, no relief would be afforded, for production would diminish in as great or even in a greater proportion.. The remedy for the evils under which Poland and Ireland suffer, which are similar to those experienced in the South Seas, is to stimulate exertion, to create new wants and to implant new tastes, for these countries must accumulate a much larger amount of capital, before the diminished rate of production will render the progress of capital necessarily less rapid than the progress of population. ”

“ In rich countries, where all the fertile land is already cultivated, the latter remedy is neither very practicable nor very desirable, because its effects would be, if pushed very far, to render all classes equally poor. But in poor countries, where there are abundant means of production in store, from fertile land not yet brought into cultivation, it is the only safe and effacious means of removing the evil, particularly as its effect would be to elevate all classes of the people. ”

“ He recognises that there are differences in the 'standard of living' as between different nations and different ages. He thinks it desirable that this standard should be raised; but he believes that in 'rich' and 'long-settled' countries the only way to bring this about is 'a reduction of people.' And, although the standard of comfort in England was comparatively high, as compared, for instance, with that of Ireland, and included 'moderate comforts' and 'conveniences,' yet he constantly implies that these comforts are but little above the physical minimum. ”

“ In those countries where there is abundance of fertile land, but where from the ignorance, indolence, and barbarism of the inhabitants, they are exposed to all the evils of want and famine, and where it has been said that population presses against the means of subsistence, a very different remedy should be applied from that which is necessary in long-settled countries, where from the diminishing rate of the supply of raw produce all the evils of a crowded population are experienced. ”

“ If wages are already at the lowest point to which they can be reduced; that is just sufficient to keep up the number of labourers and no more; a state of wages which seems to have been contemplated by Mr. Ricardo throughout his disquisitions on Political Economy, and which the tendency of population to increase faster than capital undoubtedly leads us to regard as the natural state no tax can fall upon the labourer. ”

“ One-tenth of the fruits of 100 days' labour is thus expended every year; which is the same thing in the view of cost and value, as saying that 10 days' labour have been expended. The owner is to be paid for the 100 days' labour which the machine cost him, at the rate of so much per annum, that is by an annuity for ten years, equivalent to the original value of the machine. ”

“ The facility with which the wants of the Irish are supplied, permits that people to pass a great part of their time in idleness: if the population were diminished, the evil would increase, because wages would rise, and therefore the labourer would be enabled, in exchange for a still less portion of his labour, to obtain all that his moderate wants require. ”

“ I mean such food, clothing, and general accommodation as the climate and custom of the country have rendered essential to the preservation of the life, health, and decent appearance of the lowest classes of the people. ”

“ There is a widely spread belief that it has needed to be reconstructed by the present generation of economists. The purpose of the present note is to show cause for not accepting this opinion; and for holding, on the contrary, that the foundations of the theory as they were left by Ricardo remain intact. His argument is chiefly directed against the supposition that the Jevonsian or Austrian doctrine of utility is inconsistent with that of cost of production,—as laid down, for instance, by J. S. Mill in one of his two expositions of it, [9] and as stated and criticised by Profeshor Sidgwick. ”

“ To be made happier they need only to be stimulated to exertion; with such exertion, no increase in the population can be too great as the powers of production are still greater. In the other case, the population increases faster than the funds required for its support. ”

“ Give to the Irish labourer a taste for the comforts and enjoyments which habit has made essential to the English labourer, and he would be then content to devote a further portion of his time to industry, that he might be enabled to obtain them. ”

“ They have no place of refuge from calamity; they cannot seek safety in a lower station; they are already so low that they can fall no lower. On any deficiency of the chief article of their subsistence, there are few substitutes of which they can avail themselves, and dearth to them is attended with almost all the evils of famine. ”

“ Wages would fall if they were regulated only by the supply and demand of labourers; but we must not forget that wages are also regulated by the prices of the commodities o whick they are expended. As population increases, these essaries will be constantly rising in price... If then the money wages of labour should fall, whilst every commodity on which the wages of labour were expended rose, the labouter would be doubly affected, and would be so. totally deprived of subsistence. ”

“ The one remedy, in brief, for poor countries, is greater industry. This is probably, on the whole, what Ricardo intended to say. Even if the phrase 'all countries' suggests a wider application, the impression from the whole argument, it may fairly be urged, is very different from that given by Professor Marshall's language about 'not allowing their wages to fall.'
Looking at Ricardo's chapter on wages as a whole, and his subsequent teaching as to the incidence of taxation, it does not seem difficult to get at his meaning. ”

“ Wages invariably rise with the rise in raw produce. [35] Taxes on wages will raise wages. [36]
Diminish the cost of subsistence of men, by diminishing the natural price of the food and clothing by which life is sustained, and wages will ultimately fall. [37] The champions of Ricardo have, of course, one final refuge in the phrase 'nature and habit.' They may observe that the standard of living might be very high, indeed luxurious ”

“ Fuel, for example, and warm clothing are necessary articles in this country; but they are not so in Africa.... The use of linen is now considered as necessary by all classes of people, and shoes and stockings, in England at least, ahnost equally so. Houses with glazed windows and a chimney are become necessaries; for if our poor were deprived of such accommodation it would very materially increase mortality amongst them. ”

“ J'ai expliqué au travailleurs que l'entretien nècessaire usuel et conforme aux habitudes du peuple n'était nullement un point fixe du salaire de travail; mais que ce dernier était compris dans une gravitation constante autour de ce point central; qu'il peut très bien monter pour un temps par suite de la hausse de la demande, mais que par l'accroissement des mariages et du nombre des travailleurs, il retombe toujours à ce point central de l'entretien nécessaire en usage chez le peuple (my italics) . ”

“ From the effect of the principle of population on the increase of mankind, wages of the lovest kind never continue much above that rate which nature and habit demand for the support of the labourers. This class is never able to bear any considerable portion of taxation ”

“ However useful a given kind of raw material, or a machine, or other means of production may be, though it may cost £150 or, say, 500 days' labour, yet it cannot under any circumstances add to the value of the product more than £150. ”

“ Marcet's Conversations on Political Economy we have an exposition more detailed than usual of what was understood under 'necessaries' by intelligent popularisers of Ricardo's teaching:—
Mrs. B.... As the capitalist will always keep wages as low as he can, the labourer and his family can seldom command more than the necessaries of life. Caroline. By the necessaries of life, do you mean such things only as are indispensably necessary for its support? ”

“ Ricardo's use of the phrase in other passages: 'The comparative value of the fish and the game would be entirely regulated by the quantity of labour realised in each.' [16] ]
Apropos of his argument as to different qualities of labour, he quotes from Adam Smith: ' There may be more labour in an hour's hard work than in two hours' easy business ”

“ In making labour the foundation af the value of commodities, and the comparative quantity of labour which is necessary to their production the rule which determines the respective quantities of goods which shall be given in exchange for each other, we must not be supposed to deny the accidental deviations.... (2) As to the sense in which Ricardo was understood by his disciples ”

“ Even with the very lowest standard of living in a country like England something more than food is necessary—shelter and clothing; and an increase in the cost of either shelter or clothing would, therefore, according to Ricardo's theory, send up the rate of wages, just as much as an increase in the cost of food. But Ricardo, as we have seen, very naturally regarded food as so much the larger element that the others could be neglected, and accordingly laid down that wages varied with the cost of food. As to this Professor Marshall has a somewhat obscure note on p. 554. He remarks that—
Prof. ”