50 WAGES AND E]\iriRE 



accounting- for the difference of the wages of this class of 

 labour on the two sides of the world except the one 

 put forward here. 



The principle of the dependence of other wages upon 

 those in agriculture appears to be at work regulating 

 the pay of skilled trades in countries of a lower state 

 of subsistence than that of Europe (as indeed must be 

 the case if the theory is correct). In China an artisan 

 is to be obtained for a shilling a day ; but this is not 

 due to any inferiority or to his low standard of life — 

 to which it is commonly attributed ; overseas he earns 

 the same rate of pay as the workmen of the country. 

 In China, however, the pressure of population on land 

 is so great and agricultural wages are so low that work- 

 men can be found to qualify themselves for skilled trades 

 at a remuneration just above the pittance which the 

 agricultural labourer obtains. 



It appears that town wages follow the country scale 

 everywhere. In the United States, Canada, Australia, 

 and New Zealand, with agricultural wages the highest 

 in the world, those of the trades and towns are equally 

 high ; in England, France, and Germany, with the pay 

 of agricultural labour lower, the wages of skilled and 

 town labour are all lower, while in the East, with the 

 conditions of agriculture the worst of all, the pay of the 

 skilled labour is the lowest in the world. In each case 

 the intrinsic worth of the artisan's services however are 

 the same ; he performs the same work and to the same 

 amount. But in the first case he exchanges his labour 

 with a well-paid agriculturalist and therefore requires 

 and can receive equally high pay ; in the second he 

 exchanges with an agriculturalist of moderate condition 

 and must be content with a moderate return ; while 

 in the third case he exchanges his work with that of 

 agricultural labour cultivating such poor land that 

 he cannot demand, nor can the agriculturalist give him, 



