216 ADAM SMITH. 



of labour are fivefold, arising severally from the dis- 

 agreeable nature of the employment, the expense or 

 difficulty of learning it, the inconstancy and pre- 

 cariousness of the demand, the great trust reposed in 

 the workman or the capitalist, and the improbability 

 of success in the work or investment ; each of these 

 disadvantages requires a certain increase of gain to the 

 labourer, or to the capitalist, as a compensation for the 

 disagreeableness, the education, the period of inaction, 

 the trust, the risk of loss. Of these five circumstances 

 two only affect the profits of stock the agreeableness 

 or disagreeableness of the trade, and the scarcity or 

 risk attending it. 



2. Were industry and commerce left free, these in- 

 equalities alone could affect wages and profits : but 

 the policy of states has added to these causes of in- 

 equality several others, which disturb the natural rate 

 of both wages and profits much more than the circum- 

 stances already enumerated. 



(1.) The laws requiring several years' apprentice- 

 ship to be served before trades can be set up, prevent 

 the free circulation of labour both from place to place, 

 and from one profession to another. They tend to 

 give a monopoly to both employers and capitalists, and 

 thus to lower the wages of labour, and raise the pro- 

 fits of stock. The various other restrictions imposed 

 by corporations have a like tendency. 



(2.) Institutions for encouraging one kind of indus- 

 try, and giving it a power greater than it naturally 

 would possess, have the effect of drawing more to it 

 than would naturally resort to it, and thus, from the 

 numbers who must fail, lower the wages of labour. 

 Free schools and colleges are liable to this imputation, 

 which, however, Dr. Smith admits to be much cor- 

 rected by the important benefits conferred if education 

 is thus made materially better or cheaper. 



(3.) The exclusive privileges of corporations pro- 

 duce the same effect in obstructing the free circulation 



