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ECONOMICS 645 tical investigation, or in special studies of particular sub- or both of them. But it is obvious that if the assumpjects, it is possible, given the pecuniary means, to organize tion of perfect mobility is invalid, there is scarcely any a whole army of skilled assistants, and with ordinary care economic doctrine identified with the earlier writers which to combine the results of their separate efforts. In general may not require modification, in what degree it is imtheory the inverse rule seems to prevail. There the unity possible to say without very careful investigation. Much of conception and aim, the firm grip of all the different suggestive work on this subject of a general character lines of argument and their relation to each other, which is incorporated in recent economic books, but there is are required, can only be given by a single brain. But room for a whole series of careful monographs on a quesno one individual can do original work over the whole tion of such fundamental importance. The same may be field. He is lucky if he can throw new light on a few old said of another subject, too frequently neglected by earlier propositions. For the rest, he can only, with the utmost writers, to which due significance has been given in the caution, adopt the suggestions of other minds as quali- best recent work, namely, time in relation to value. It fications of old doctrines, never feeling quite sure that he would perhaps be too much to say that the full conis right in doing so. A complete restatement could only sideration of this point has revolutionized the theory of be undertaken by a group of men, trained in much the value, but it has certainly created what seems almost a same conditions, accustomed to think and work together, new science in close contact with the actual life of the each one engaged on a special department, but all acting modern world. under the control of one master-mind. This is largely a Some doctrines of the earlier economists, such as the question of the organization of economic studies, and it is Wages Fund Theory, have practically been abandoned in of the greatest importance that, if possible, such an effort recent times, though it may be said that they contained a should be made to present in a connected form the best certain amount of truth. Others, which were considered results of modern criticism and analysis. of fundamental importance, owe their position in modern Economics is unlike many other sciences in the fact that economics and the form in which they are stated to the its claim to recognition must be based upon its practical “ tradition of the elders.” If they could, by some happy utilit Some y> .on its relevance to the actual life of the chance, have been left for discovery by modern, economists, recent economic world, on its ability to unravel the they would without doubt have received different treatdevelop- social and economic difficulties of each genera- ment, to the great advantage of economic science. Such an( to contr ‘economiC ibute to the progress of nations. a doctrine is the so-called Law of Diminishing Returns, v r^ Theory. ? y effectiveness of modern criticism and which Mill considered “ the most important proposition in analysis, which has brought great gains in Political Economy.” “ Unless this one matter,” he says, almost all branches of economic theory, has made the “ be thoroughly understood, it is to no purpose proceeding science more difficult as a subject of ordinary study. The any further,in our inquiry.” “Were the law different, extensions, the changes or the qualifications, of old doc- nearly all the phenomena of the production and distributrines, which at any rate in the works of responsible tion of wealth would be other than they are.” On the writers are rarely made without good if not always suffi- other hand, Thorold Rogers, not to speak of earlier cient reason, have modified very considerably the whole objectors, described the law as a “ dismal and absurd science, and weakened the confidence of ordinary educated theorem.” The opinions of recent economists appear to men in its conclusions. In the case of many subjects this fluctuate between these two extremes. The law may would matter very little, but in that of economics, which apparently be “ a general rule ” or “ a tendency ” which is touches, the ordinary life of the community at so many liable to be “checked,” or a particular case of the law of points, it is of great importance, especially at a time like the conservation of energy. If we go to Mill to discover the present, when economic questions determine the policy what it is, we find that “ it is not pretended that the law of . great nations. The “ economic man ” of the earlier of diminishing return was operative from the beginning of writers, with his aversion from labour and his desire of society; and though some political economists may have the present enjoyment of costly indulgences, has been believed it to come into operation earlier than it does, it abandoned by their successors, with the result that in the begins quite early enough to support the conclusions they opinion of many good people altruistic sentiment may be founded on it.” “ It comes into operation at a certain and allowed to run wild over the whole domain of economics. not very advanced stage in the progress of agriculture.” The “ economic man ” has, on the other hand, been suc- But this very important stage in the history of a nation is ceeded by another creation almost as monstrous, if his not defined or clearly illustrated. We are told that we lineaments are to be supposed to be those of the ordinary can see “ the law at work underneath the more superficial individual—a man, that is, who regulates his life in accord- agencies on which attention fixes itself ” • it “ undergoes ance. with Gossen’s Law of Satiety, and whose main temporary suspension,” which may last indefinitely; and passion is to discover a money measure of his motives. It “ there is another agency, in habitual antagonism ” to it, is extremely important to consider how far the economic namely, “ the progress of civilization,” which may include conceptions based upon this view of the action of men in every kind of human improvement. Mill apparently is the ordinary business of life—such, for example, as the not content with the confusion between “ law ” and doctrine of marginal utility—depend for their truth and “ agency ” or “ force,” but opposes the one to the other. relevance on the fact that in economics we are dealing He is constantly speaking in terms which imply the conwith large aggregates. The earlier writers generally quering of one law by another, a habit from which his assumed perfect mobility of labour and capital. No successors have not freed themselves; and the theory of economist would deliberately make that assumption now natural processes which appears to have satisfied him, was unless he were dealing with some purely theoretical that when two forces come into operation there is a partial problem, for the solution of which it was legitimate at or complete suspension of one by the other. In modern some stage in the reasoning. Many of the questions economics “ fertility ” has no very definite meaning. It of the greatest practical importance at the present time, may mean what is ordinarily understood by the word— such as the competition between old and new methods climate, rainfall, railway rates, or anything else except of manufacturing commodities substantially the same in “indestructible powers of the soil.” To speak of “addikind and equally useful to the great body of consumers, tional labour and capital ” without reference to the kind arise largely from the immobility of capital or labour, and quality of the labour and capital, and the manner in