SECTION VII.

Circumstances which determine the Rate of Wages.-(1.) Market, or Real Wages; depend on the proportion between capital and population.-(2.) Natural or Necessary Wages; depend on the species and quantity of food and other articles required for the consumption of the labourer; different in different countries and periods.-Effect of fluctuations in the rate of Wages on the condition of the labouring classes—Advantage of a high rate of Wages-Advantage of having the labourers dependent for support on the cheapest species of foodHigh wages not a cause of idleness-Effect of the Poor Laws and of Education, on the condition of the labourers—(3.) Proportional Wages; depend partly on the amount and species of the articles consumed by the labourers, and partly on the productiveness of industry.

WE have already seen that the wages earned by the labourers engaged in different employments may really, when all things are taken into account, be considered as about equal; and, therefore, without regarding the differences that actually obtain in the amount of money, or of commodities, earned by different sets of workmen, I shall suppose all sorts of labour to be reduced to the same common standard, and shall endeavour to discover the principle that regulates the rate of wages paid for that common labour.

This inquiry will be facilitated by dividing it into three branches; the object in the first being to discover the circumstances which determine the market or actual rate of wages at any given moment; in the second, to discover the circumstances which deter

mine the natural or necessary rate of wages, or the wages required to enable the labourer to subsist and continue his race;-and in the third, to discover the circumstances which determine proportional wages, or the share of the produce of his industry, falling to the labourer.

I. CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH DETERMINE THE MARKET OR ACTUAL RATE OF WAGES.-The capacity of a country to support and employ labourers, is in no degree dependent on advantageousness of situation, richness of soil, or extent of territory. These, undoubtedly, are circumstances of very great importance, and must have a powerful influence in determining the rate at which a people advances in the career of wealth and civilization. But it is obviously not on these circumstances, but on the actual amount of the accumulated produce of previ ous labour, or of capital, devoted to the payment of wages, in the possession of a country, at any given period, that its power of supporting and employing labourers must wholly depend. A fertile soil affords the means of rapidly increasing capital; but that is all. Before this soil can be cultivated, capital must be provided for the support of the labourers employed upon it, just as it must be provided for the support of those engaged in manufactures, or in any other department of industry.

It is a necessary consequence of this principle, that the amount of subsistence falling to each labourer, or the rate of wages, must depend on the proportion

which the whole capital bears to the whole amount of the labouring population. If the amount of capital were increased, without a corresponding increase taking place in the population, a larger share of such capital would fall to each individual, or the rate of wages would be augmented: And if, on the other hand, population were increased faster than capital, a less share would be apportioned to each individual, or the rate of wages would be reduced.

To illustrate this principle, let us suppose, that the capital of a country appropriated to the payment of wages, would, if reduced to the standard of wheat, form a mass of 10,000,000 of quarters: If the number of labourers in that country were two millions, it is evident that the wages of each, reducing them all to the same common standard, would be five quarters: and it is further evident, that this rate of wages could not be increased otherwise, than by increasing the quantity of capital in a greater proportion than the number of labourers, or by diminishing the number of labourers in a greater proportion than the quantity of capital. So long as capital and population continue to march abreast, or to increase or diminish in the same proportion, so long will the rate of wages, and consequently the condition of the labourers, continue unaffected; and it is only when the proportion of capital to population varies-when it is either increased or diminished, that the rate of wages sustains a corresponding advance or diminution. The well-being and comfort of the labouring classes are, therefore,

especially dependent on the relation which their increase bears to the increase of the capital that is to feed and employ them. If they increase faster than capital, their wages will be reduced; and if they increase slower, they will be augmented. In fact, there are no means whatever by which the command of the labouring class over the necessaries and conveniences of life can be enlarged, other than by accelerating the increase of capital as compared with population, or by retarding the increase of population as compar ed with capital: and every scheme for improving the condition of the labourer, which is not bottomed on this principle, or which has not an increase of the ratio of capital to population for its object, must be completely nugatory and ineffectual.

The wages of labour are most commonly either paid or estimated in money; and it may perhaps be thought, that their amount will, in consequence, depend more on the quantity of money in circulation in a country, than on the magnitude of its capital. It is really, however, quite the same to the labourer whether the quantity of money received by him as wages is great or small. He will always receive such a quantity as will suffice to put him in possession of the portion of the national capital falling to his share. Men cannot subsist on coin or paper. Where wages are paid in money, the labourers must exchange it for necessaries and conveniences; and it is not the quantity of money they receive, but the quantity of necessaries and conveniences for which that money will exchange, that is to

be considered as really forming their wages. If the quantity of money in Great Britain were reduced a half, the rate of wages, estimated in money, would decline in the same proportion; but, unless some change had, at the same time, taken place in the amount of that portion of the capital of the country which consists of the food, clothes, and other articles that enter into the consumption of the labourer, he would continue in precisely the same situation. He would carry a smaller quantity of pieces of gold and silver to market than formerly; but he would obtain the same quantity of commodities in exchange for them.

Whatever, therefore, may be the state of money wages in a country—whether they are 1s, or 5s. a day-it is still certain, that if the amount of the national capital and the population continue the same, or increase or diminish in the same proportion, no variation will take place in the rate of wages. Wages never really rise, except when the proportion of capital to population is enlarged; and they never really fall, except when that proportion is diminished.

The effects which the different rates at which capital and population advance in different countries have on the condition of their inhabitants, may be exemplified in a very striking manner, by comparing the rate of increase and the actual state of the people of Great Britain, with the rate of increase and the actual state of the people of Ireland. It is certainly true, that there has been a considerable increase in the capital of Ireland during the last hundred years; though no one, in the least acquainted with the progress of the