The nature of capital and income

Bibliographic data

Monograph

Identifikator:: 102659555X

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-82920

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Fisher, Irving http://d-nb.info/gnd/118533541

Title:: The nature of capital and income

Place of publication:: New York

Publisher:: The Macmillan Company

Year of publication:: 1923

Scope:: XXI, 427 Seiten

Digitisation:: 2019

Collection:: Economics Books

Usage license:: Get license information via the feedback formular.

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Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Part II. Income

Collection:: Economics Books

Sec. 3] PSYCHIC INCOME 167 body, and, although credited to the medicine, should be debited to the body, just as the services of a carpenter are credited to him but debited to the house which he mends. So the services of a dentist, far from producing any immedi- ate satisfactions, have for the moment quite an opposite effect, but result later in better service of one’s own teeth. They are credited to the dentist, but debited to the body. The “consumption,” or use of food, though it is a service of the food, is a disservice of the body; for food stands in the same relation to the body as fuel to a furnace or repairs to a house. The final income consists of the subjective sat- isfaction of appetite and the other satisfactions which the intake of food enables the body to yield to the mind. These include not simply the immediate gratification of the palate, but the promotion of pleasant sensations or the avoidance of unpleasant ones later on. In other words, the consumption of food, by preserving health and main- taining life, enables the body to yield better and longer- continued income to the mind in future years, just as the repairs on a house enable it to yield shelter a long time after the repairs are made. §3 These and other illustrations will show that, if we in- clude the body as a transforming instrument, while we must credit with their respective services all these outside agencies, such as food, clothing, dwelling, furniture, orna- ments, and other articles which, as it were, bombard a man’s sensory system, we must also at the same time debit the body with these same items. In this case the only sur- viving credit items after these equal debits and credits are canceled are the resulting final satisfactions in the human mind. In other words, in order that the external world should become effective to man, the human body must be considered as the last transforming instrument. Just as there is a gradual transformation of services through the

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