A BUGBEAR OF ECONOMICS 597 



Again I say, " to be sure," because under such conditions it is not 

 operating. And at the end of his long chapter, considering the relative 

 productiveness of different sorts of labor, he states, " that nothing 

 could prevent its (the former of the cited classes of labor) declining 

 relatively to that of the latter class except a radical change in the sys- 

 tem of industry, which would call for more than a proportional in- 

 crease in the former class." The contention of this article is that there 

 has been this radical change in the system of industry, that increases 

 are becoming more than proportional and that we are not yet even in 

 sight of the beginning of the end. I am perfectly willing to admit that 

 the law of diminishing returns has an illustrative value, but it is taught 

 in many courses and economic articles as though the world in which 

 we live were about to suffer from its " terrible reality " as it would in 

 a world of stationary civilization. At a recent large gathering of econo- 

 mists there were but two expressed exceptions to the opinion that immi- 

 gration was about to become dangerous because the additional numbers 

 would make competition too keen. They thus implied the fear that 

 this bugbear law of diminishing returns will soon deprive us of enough 

 to eat. The whole difficulty is a mistaking of unjust and unequal distri- 

 bution of wealth for an application of the law of diminishing returns. 

 I presume that Mr. Eockefeller's difficulty arises from the fact that 

 any other method of distribution than that which has been contributory 

 to his own success is inconceivable. But economists ought to be able 

 to see production and distribution at the same time and in their 

 totality. 



The law of diminishing returns is intimately related to another 

 famous and equally archaic economic law, viz., Malthus's law of popu- 

 lation. The substance of this law is that population tends to increase 

 faster than the means of subsistence. There is something in this. It 

 works in determining the number of wolves, but the last census report 

 does not show human population in America confirming it. It is 

 always a great satisfaction to find a single principle which will explain 

 a condition ; but we are becoming more and more convinced that social 

 phenomena are the product of numerous forces and are not reducible 

 to a single law. Malthus's law does not care whether a single family 

 has many or few children, but whether population is increasing or 

 decreasing. So the law of diminishing returns ought not to be limited 

 to individual production, but extended to production as a whole. It is 

 quite true that the surface of the earth is limited in extent, and that 

 the population of the earth is multiplying; but it is likewise true that 

 the sun is losing its heat, and that some time the earth will be unin- 

 habitable. Any physicist might logically teach his classes the desira- 

 bility that the human race accustom itself to the idea of being frozen 



