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Show ON THE I~H\lEDIATE CAUSES (cH. VII .. that commodities are al'\tvays exchanged for com .. modities. The gr~at mass of con1n1odities is exchan<Yed directly for labour, either productive or unp~oductive; and it is quite obvio~s that this mass of commodities, compared With the labour with 'vhich it is to be exchanged, tnay fall in value from a glut just as any one comnlodity falls in value from an excess of supply, compared either \\J'"ith labour or mone~. In the case supposed there 'vould evidently be an unusual quantity of oon1n1odities of all kinds in the market, owing to the unproductive labourers of the country having been converted, by the accumulation of capital, into productive labourers; while the number of labourers altogether being the satne, and the power and will to purchase for .consumption amQng landlords and capitalists being by supposition diminished, con1modities would ne ·cessarily fall in value, con1pared with labour, so as to lo\ver profits almost to nothing, and to check for a time further . production. Bu.t this is precise!! what is rneant by the term glut, which, in this case, is evidently general not partial. . M. Say, l\1r. Mill,* and 1\fr. Ricardo, the pnn- *Mr. Mill, in a reply to J\Ir. Spence, published in 1808, has laid ·down very broadly the do~trine that commodities are only purchased by commodities) and that one half of them must .always furnish a market for the other half. The same doctrme appears to be adopted in its fullest e:xtent by the author of an able and useful article on the Corn Laws, in the Supplement to the Encyclopredia Britannica, which has been referred to in a previous chapter. SEC. TIJ.] OF THf. PROGHESS OF "':EA IJTH. 355 cipal authors of the new doctrines on profits, appear to me to have fallen into some fundamental errors in the vie\v 'vhich they have taken of this subject. In the first place, they have considered co1nn1odities as if they \Vere so many mathematical figures, or aritlunetical characters, the relations of which were to be compared, instead of articles of consun1ption, 'vhich must of course be referred to the nu1n bers and 'vants of the consun1ers. If comtnodities were only to be con1pared and exchanged with each other, then indeed it would be true that, if they were all increased in their proper proportions to any extent, they \Vould continue to bear among. themselves the satne relative value; but, if we compare them, as 've certainly ought to do, \Vith the numbers and wants of the consu1ners, then a great increase of produce ,vith con1paratively stationary numbers and vv!th wants ~itninished by pars·in1ony, rn ust necessarily occasion a great fall of value estimated in labour, so that the sa1ne produce, though it might have cost the same quantity of labour as before '"'~ould no lono-er· . ' b command the .same quantity; and both the power of accumulation and the motive to accuintilate would be strongly checked. It is asserted tha~ effectual demand is nothing more than the offenng of one con11nodity in exchange for another. But is this all that is necess~ ry to effectual den1and ? Though each comn1odJty ma.y h~ve. cost the same quantity of labour and capital m Its production, and they may be AA2 |