Productive capacity

“ In looking back upon all the various circumstances which we have exhibited as necessary for carrying industry to the greatest point of productiveness, we think that we must have established satisfactorily that the two great elements which concur in rendering labour in the highest degree beneficial, are, 1st, the accumulated results of past labour, [Pg 379] and 2nd, the contrivances by which manual labour is assisted,—those contrivances being derived from the accumulations of knowledge. Capital and skill, therefore, are essential to the productive power of labour. ”

“ When the rapid growth of the country required greater productiveness, and the enlargement of territory made necessary a change in the distribution of the products of labor, the factory system was introduced, whereby capital, or unproductive labor, was joined with productive labor to accomplish greater results than had heretofore been attained by individual labor. ”

“ Efficiency experts maintain that the average employee in our industrial and commercial institutions is only from twenty-five to thirty-five per cent, efficient. Sixty-five to seventy-five per cent, loss in productive power on the part of the forty million workers in this country constitutes an almost incalculable sum. ”

“ If invention and improvement still go on, the efficiency of labour will be still further increased, and the amount of labour and capital necessary to produce a given result will be further diminished. The same causes will lead to the utilization of this new gain in productive power for the production of more wealth; the margin of cultivation will be again extended, and rent will increase, both in proportion and amount. ”

“ Indeed, labor division does not stop at the gates of factories. The segmentation of life and labor, increased mediation, and expectations of high efficiency make mass production possible. Almost everything people need to feed themselves, in order to maintain their physical and mental productive powers with a minimum of investment, is provided in favor of productive cycles. In the pragmatic framework of the industrial age, this meant the reproduction of the productive forces of the worker in a context of permanency. ”

“ Whether, in any particular case, the lowering of the margin of production lags behind or exceeds the increase in productive power, will depend, I conceive, upon what may be called the area of productiveness that can be utilized before cultivation is forced to the next lowest point. ”

“ Material must be bought and sold, wages and salaries must be paid, employes must be selected and fitted into the respective processes according to their equipment in knowledge and skill, and the highest productive energy must be evoked from each employe by the proper play upon his motives. Altogether the problem is one of economizing the technical abilities of individ- uals, that is, of increasing the productive power of each group with the least sacrifices and concessions to other groups and to the associated individuals within the group. ”

“ In the first class will be placed those economies which arise from increased sub-division of labour and increased efficiency of productive energy, and which represent a net saving in the output of human energy in the production of a given quantity of commodities, from the standpoint of the whole productive community. ”

“ Whenever, therefore, he pays for a service voluntarily, he acknowledges its productiveness. Lastly, from a national-economical point of view, all labor is considered productive which increases the quantity of goods exposed for sale in the market ”

“ Productive activity, if we leave out of sight its special form, viz., the useful character of the labour, is nothing but the expenditure of human labour-power. Tailoring and weaving, though qualitatively different productive activities, are each a productive expenditure of human brains, nerves, and muscles, and in this sense are human labour. ”

“ Where the increased productivity of labour is largely due to the improved machinery or methods of production which are stimulated by high wages without a corresponding intensification of the labour itself, the gain to labour is clear. But the possibility that short hours and high wages may stimulate an injurious compression of the output of productive effort is one which must not be overlooked in considering the influence of new industrial methods upon labour. ”

“ Notwithstanding the enormous increase of productive power by the universal introduction of labor-saving machinery and the discovery of new agents for the increase of wealth, the task of the laborer is scarcely lightened, the hours of toil are but little shortened, and few producers are lifted from poverty into comfort and pecuniary independence. ”

“ The typical industries, which set the pace for productive work, for competitive gains, and through the standard rates of gain ultimately also for competitive consumption, are industries carried on on a large scale; that is to say they are such as to require a large material equipment, a wide recourse to technological insight and proficiency, and a large draught on the material resources of the community. ”

“ Increased efficiency of capital.—The efficiency of capital in production is greatly increased by minute division of labor. The shop room required for each man is reduced to the minimum space for himself and his material. His tools, while the most perfect possible, are the fewest possible.
The machinery and motive power are used to their utmost capacity constantly, and the economy of larger engines and machines is well known. ”

“ No part of the annual produce, however, which had been originally destined to replace a capital, is ever directed towards maintaining unproductive hands, till after it has put into motion its full complement of productive labour, or all that it could put into motion in the way in which it was employed. ”

“ In other words, there must be a large accumulation of capital, both fixed in the implements and buildings, and circulating, that is employed in maintaining the laborers and their families during the time which elapses before the productive operations are completed and the products come in. ”

“ The improvement in the productive powers of useful labour depends, first, upon the improvement in the ability of the workman; and, secondly, upon that of the machinery with which he works. But the labour of artificers and manufacturers, as it is capable of being more subdivided, and the labour of each workman reduced to a greater simplicity of operation, than that of farmers and country labourers ”

“ Suppose that the proportion of the annual produce applied to the first purpose amounts to half; then one-half the productive labourers of the country are all that are employed in the operations on which the permanent wealth of the country depends. The other half are occupied from year to year and from generation to generation in producing things which are consumed and disappear without return ”

“ When the productive efficiency of these and of other subsidiary classes of capital goods is subjected to further analysis, it is not unusual to trace it back to the productive labor of the workmen, the labor of the individual workman being the ultimate productive factor in the commonly accepted systems of theory. The current theories of production, as also those of distribution, are drawn in individualistic terms, particularly when these theories are based on hedonistic premises, as they commonly are. ”

“ All that is claimed for cooperation in production is that it makes the workman more active and industrious - in other words, that it increases the efficiency of labour. Thus its effect is in the same direction as the steam engine, the cotton gin, the reaping machine - in short, all the things in which material progress consists - and it can produce only the same result, the increase of rent. ”

“ It must fix the height of production of each individual social productive plant according to the basis calculated upon the existing productive power (laborers and means of production) and of the existing needs, and see to it that each productive plant has not only the necessary laborers but also the necessary means of production and that the necessary products are delivered to the consumers. ”

“ The difference between the form and value of productive effort becomes, in the study of business organization, a most essential question. The significance of leadership and control of industry is found in this fact that economic goods may be united to produce results having either a less or a greater value than the materials that are used. ”

“ It may be added, that any increase in the productive power of capital (or, more properly speaking, of labour) by improvements in the arts of life, or otherwise, tends to increase the employment for labour; since, when there is a greater produce altogether, it is always probable that some portion of the increase will be saved and converted into capital; especially when the increased returns to productive industry hold out an additional temptation to the conversion of funds from an unproductive destination to a productive. ”

“ The conditions which govern the need of the productive system for labor may be summarized 64 as follows: Firstly, the consumption habits of the community, by which is decided the direction in which the productive powers are employed; secondly, the state of the productive arts, which governs the manner in which the various agents of production are combined for purposes of production; thirdly, the available supply of the agents of production, other than labor. ”

“ This previous employment of labour is an indispensable condition to every productive operation, on any other than the very smallest scale. Except the labour of the hunter and fisher, there is scarcely any kind of labour to which the returns are immediate. Productive operations require to be continued a certain time, before their fruits are obtained. ”

“ But they contradict themselves almost in the next sentence, because they admit that efficiency of labour, which is another word for character, "is one of the factors of productivity, and the greater the national product the larger the number of persons it will maintain." ”

“ Capital does not limit industry, the only limit to industry being the access to natural material. But capital may limit the form of industry and the productiveness of industry, by limiting the use of tools and the division of labour. ”

“ The productive powers of labour are generally greatest where there is an abundance of fertile land.’ If, in the first sentence, the productive powers of labour mean the smallness of that aliquot part of any produce that goes to those whose manual labor produced it, the sentence is nearly identical, because the remaining aliquot part is the fund whence capital can, if the owner pleases, be accumulated. ”

“ The Test of Final Productivity.—There are now at work ten units of capital and ten of labor, and we cannot go through the process of building up the working force from the beginning. How, then, do we measure the true product of a single unit of labor? By withdrawing that unit, letting the industry go on by the aid of all the capital and one unit of labor the less. ”

“ This means increase in prosperity and diminution in poverty, not only for their men but for the whole community immediately around them. As one of the elements incident to this great gain in output, each workman has been systematically trained to his highest state of efficiency, and has been taught to do a higher class of work than he was able to do under the old types of management ”

“ Who can say to what infinite powers the wealth-producing capacity of labor may not be raised by social adjustments which will give to the producers of wealth their fair proportion of its advantages and enjoyments! With present processes the gain would be simply incalculable, but just as wages are high, so do the invention and utilization of improved processes and machinery go on with greater rapidity and ease. ”

“ Other aspects of labor to which increasing attention is given by economists are the circumstances which determine the worker's industrial efficiency. It is now recognized that the food, clothing, housing, etc., of the working classes are important, not merely because they affect the happiness of those classes, but because upon them depends the amount and quality of the work that can be performed. The standard of living influences wages not merely through the control which it may exercise over the rate at which population increases, but also because it determines the standard of efficiency. ”

“ By permitting the division of labour and thus, on the one hand, increasing the efficiency of the human factor by the utilization of special capabilities, the acquisition of skill and the reduction of waste; and on the other hand, calling in the powers of the natural factor at their highest, by taking advantage of the diversities of soil, climate and situation, so as to obtain each particular species of wealth where nature is most favourable to its production. ”

“ Before such a conclusion is warranted, we must grasp more clearly the nature of the causal relation between high standard of living and efficiency. How far are we entitled to regard high wages and other good conditions of employment as the cause, how far as the effect of efficiency of labour? The evidence adduced simply proves that a b c, certain phenomena relating to efficiency—as size of product, speed of workmanship, quantity of machines tended—vary directly with d e f, certain other phenomena relating to wages, hours of labour, and other conditions of employment. ”

“ This is the simple law for a progressive efficiency of human labour, valid for all societies of economic progress, independently of their historical forms, a formula which only states that living labour is increasingly able to convert more means of production into objects for use in an ever shorter time. ”

“ It is sufficient here to remark, that the efficiency of industry may be expected to be great, in proportion as the fruits of industry are insured to the person exerting it: and that all social arrangements are conducive to useful exertion, according as they provide that the reward of every one for his labour shall be proportioned as much as possible to the benefit which it produces. ”