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But a rise in the wages of labour would not equally affect commodities produced with machinery quickly consumed, and commodities produced with machinery slowly consumed.

David Ricardo

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David Ricardo
Age: 50 †
Born: 1772
Born: April 19
Died: 1823
Died: January 1
Economist
Philosopher
Politician
Stockbroker
London
England
Would
Wages
Affect
Produced
Equally
Labour
Commodities
Slowly
Consumed
Quickly
Machinery
Rise
Commodity

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It appears to me that one great cause of our difference in opinion on subjects which we often discuss is that you have always in mind the immediate and temporary effects of particular changes, whereas I put these effects quite aside, and fix my whole attention on the long-term effects that will result from them.
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A rise of wages from this cause will, indeed, be invariably accompanied by a rise in the price of commodities but in such cases, it will be found that labour and all commodities have not varied in regard to each other, and that the variation has been confined to money.
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A rise in wages, from an alteration in the value of money, produces a general effect on price, and for that reason it produces no real effect whatever on profits.
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The exchangeable value of all commodities rises as the difficulties of their production increase.
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LABOUR, like all other things which are purchased and sold, and which may be increased or diminished in quantity, has its natural and its market price. The natural price of labour is that price which is necessary to enable the labourers, on with another, to subsist and to perpetuate their race, without either increase or diminution.
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Every transaction in commerce is an independent transaction.
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The farmer and manufacturer can no more live without profit than the labourer without wages.
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As the revenue of the farmer is realized in raw produce, or in the value of raw produce, he is interested, as well as the landlord, in its high exchangeable value, but a low price of produce may be compensated to him by a great additional quantity.
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Again two manufacturers may employ the same amount of fixed, and the same amount of circulating capital but the durability of their fixed capitals may be very unequal.
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Profits might also increase, because improvements might take place in agriculture, or in the implements of husbandry, which would augment the produce with the same cost of production.
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Called an inquiry into the laws which determine the division of the produce.
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But a tax on luxuries would no other effect than to raise their price. It would fall wholly on the consumer, and could neither increase wages nor lower profits.
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No extension of foreign trade will immediately increase the amount of value in a country, although it will very powerfully contribute to increase the mass of commodities and therefore the sum of enjoyments.
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The wheat bought by a farmer to sow is comparatively a fixed capital to the wheat purchased by a baker to make into loaves.
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By far the greatest part of those goods which are the objects of desire, are procured by labour and they may be multiplied, not in one country alone, but in many, almost without any assignable limit, if we are disposed to bestow the labour necessary to obtain them.
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Taxation under every form presents but a choice of evils.
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Gold and silver are no doubt subject to fluctuations, from the discovery of new and more abundant mines but such discoveries are rare, and their effects, though powerful, are limited to periods of comparatively short duration.
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Profits are not made by differential cleverness, but by differential stupidity.
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Gold and silver, like other commodities, have an intrinsic value, which is not arbitrary, but is dependent on their scarcity, the quantity of labour bestowed in procuring them, and the value of the capital employed in the mines which produce them.
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Utility then is not the measure of exchangeable value, although it is absolutely essential to it.
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