8 POLITICAL ECONOMY 



the ignorance of the workmen, and must deceive them to keep 

 them quiet. Let us, then, examine closely the arguments in 

 favour of the proposition dinned daily into our ears, that no com- 

 bination of workmen or of masters can alter the rate of wages. 



These arguments take two forms, different in wording, but 

 the same in essence, and are enounced as the doctrine of the 

 Wages Fund, and the Law of Demand and Supply. Mr. Mill 

 writes of the wages fund as follows : 



Wages depend, then, on the proportion between the number of 

 the labouring population and the capital or other funds devoted to 

 the purchase of labour ; we will say, for shortness, the capital. If 

 wages are higher at one time or place than at another, if the subsist- 

 ence and comfort of the class of hired labourers are more ample, it 

 is and can be for no other reason than because capital bears a greater 

 proportion to population. It is riot the absolute amount of accom- 

 modation or of production that is of importance to the labouring 

 class ; it is not the amount even of the funds destined for distribu- 

 tion among the labourers : it is the proportion between those funds 

 and the numbers among whom they are shared. The condition of 

 the class can be bettered in no other way than by altering that pro- 

 portion to their advantage ; and every scheme for their benefit which 

 does not proceed on this as a foundation, is, for all permanent pur- 

 poses, a delusion. 



Very clear and very true. When you know the number of 

 recipients and the sum to be paid them, divide the number of 

 shillings by the number of men, and you obtain the mean 

 wages. If 1,000 eggs are sold daily, and 1,000 pence are daily 

 spent on eggs, the mean price of eggs that day will be a penny 

 a piece. The price of eggs depends on the egg fund, it seems. 

 Diminish the number of men, diminish your divisor, says Mill, 

 and your quotient will be larger. Sell only 500 eggs, and the 

 price will be twopence, if the egg fund remains the same, which 

 it will not. Still, we do not deny that by restricting the num- 

 ber of eggs for sale, and of labourers applying for employment, 

 the price of eggs and rate of wages will rise though the wages 

 and egg funds will fall. But we seem now to be leaving the 

 clear and beaten path of simple division : apparently this same 

 wages fund is not a constant quantity. It may diminish, it 

 may increase. This becomes interesting to our labourers, who 

 cannot readily diminish their numbers. Cannot this same 



