Economic essays

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1753623200

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-136107

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Economic essays

Place of publication:: New York

Publisher:: Macmillan

Year of publication:: 1927

Scope:: viii, 368 S.; Ill., graph. Darst.

Digitisation:: 2021

Collection:: Economics Books

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Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: The static state and the technology of economic reform / Thomas Nixon Carver

Collection:: Economics Books

42 ECONOMIC ESSAYS IN HONOR OF JOHN BATES CLARK if such work is appreciated, not simply by the laborers them- selves but by the general public, this appreciation is a very impor- tant form of reward and will become a factor in the equilibrium. It will induce so many men of capacity to enter business as to reduce their pecuniary incomes and increase the pecuniary incomes of their employees. It may be discovered, in a given country, that one reason for the scarcity of men of high ability in business is the habit of retiring from business as soon as a competency is accumulated. Where that is the general habit, the most capable men will retire early in life, and the only men who will remain in business all their lives will be men of low capacity who can never accumu- late enough to enable them to retire. Except for the brief and brilliant careers of men of great capacity, industries in such a country will be mainly in the hands of second and third rate men, will therefore be second and third rate industries, and pay second and third rate wages. If this is discovered to be a factor in the low equilibrium wage levels the remedy is obvious. They who merely rail at business men and hold them up to the public obloquy are only making a bad matter worse. They make capable men more reluctant to enter industry, and more anxious to retire from it as soon as they can. Those highly intellectual men and women who do the railing would do infinitely more to benefit labor if they would show the business men, whom they think so stupid, how to do it, i.e., how to run an industry in such a way as to pay high wages and the other necessary expenses out of receipts. If, however, their literary aptitudes are too specialized to permit them to excell as payers of high wages, they could at least use their literary power to encourage men who have the right kind of capacity to go into business and to stay in business. If they can accomplish that result, industries will tend to be run more and more by first rate men, to become first rate industries, and to pay first rate wages. Again, if in a backward country it is found that the equilibrium wage is very low because of a lack of capital, then the obvious thing to do in that country is either to borrow capital from other countries or to start a thrift campaign in order to accelerate the rate of accumulation within the country. As between these two methods. the former is the more advantageous, for several (i isos

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