MICHIGAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 35 



of industry are being constantly replenished or depleted, as the case 

 may be, by accessions from or desertions to other, and not in- 

 frequentl}' quite dissimilar lines, the introduction of one who, like 

 X, is endowed with equal capacity to produce any two products 

 v.hose equitable exchange is under consideration, will not strike one 

 as abnormal, or for that matter, unusual even. Nor will it be a 

 matter of any consequence whether X's dual capacities are high or 

 low. So long as they are the same for both, and the labor cost at- 

 tendant upon surmounting one is the equivalent in gravity of that 

 attendant upon surmounting the other, they must be account- 

 ed equivalents in gravity, each of the other; and regardless of 

 their relative utilities, equitably exchangeable, the one for the 

 other, on that basis. 



Equally apparent should it be that two hindrances, however dif- 

 ferent in character, are, to all intents and purposes, equivalents in 

 gravity, whenever and wherever the products secured only by sur- 

 mounting them are freely exchangeable, the one for the other, 

 or are freely bought and sold in the open market for the same 

 money, or hindrance unit. 



This admitted, "It must follow as the night the day," that under 

 normal conditions involving equal opportunity in the production 

 and distribution of Labor's products in the open market, the rela- 

 tive utilities of such ]>roducts afford no data whatever for an in- 

 telligent determination of the equitable exchange relations be- 

 tween them. 



But for marked variations in the relative capacities of individuals 

 and groups of individuals — whether natural or acquired, it matters 

 not, — ther6 could be no rational incentive to the abandonment of the 

 direct and seemingly most advantageous method of acquiring them, 

 namely, by a direct application of productive energy — labor — for the 

 indirect and roundabout method of exchange. 



Thus, in its last analysis, the incentive to resort to an equitable 

 division of labor, by and through an exchange of labor's products, 

 is found only in the saving of labor cost that by right accrues to 

 one who, taking advantage of his opportunities, as one rightfully 

 may, exchanges in the open market the products of his toil in the 

 industry in which his labors are most effective, for the products 

 that, owing to his relatively inferior capacity, it would have cost 

 hira more to acquire by the direct method of producing them.' 



Let us bear in mind the fact that we are here considering, not the 

 simple matter of distributing a limited store of things needful, that, 

 manna-like, has fallen from Heaven over night for the benefit of 

 a chosen people, but, quite to the contrary, an equitable di- 



