ee 
TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION F. 4.67 
physival world, considers the laws of the production and distribution 6f wealth. 
But what are the facts of human nature which we may legitimately assume? At 
first sight we are inclined to take for granted that human nature is much the same all 
the world over. The late Proféssor Jevons gave clear expression to this view. ‘The 
laws of political economy,’ he says, ‘treat of the relations between human wants 
and the available material objects and human labour by which they may be 
satisfied. These laws are so simple in their foundation that they could apply, 
more or less completely, to all human beings of whom we have any knowledge. 
He adds: ‘I should not despair of tracing the action of the postulates of political 
economy among some of the more intelligent classes of animals.’'! It has seemed 
as if in the march of progress modern industrial conditions must inevitably be 
introduced in backward countries, and that they would everywhere result in 
moulding individual aims and character on the same lines. Lach individual is to 
some extent affected by his environment ; and it has been supposed that the keen 
competition and struggle for existence, which in one form or another dominates 
economic life in all parts of the globe, would make for the survival in all areas of 
men of the type with which we are familiar in business circles at home, In 
England there is on the whole a condition of free exchange, where each individual 
puts in his quota of service to the community and bargains for payment. His 
success in the management of land is rewarded by an increase of rent; his enter- 
prise in investing his capital, by larger profits ; his diligence and skill as a workman, 
by the wages he draws, The man who is self-disciplined enough to follow routine 
work habitually for the sake of reward, and whose ambitions lie in the direction of 
better paid and more responsible service, is the normal man of such a society. But 
it must be remembered that modern civilisation is also producing another class ; 
whatever the force of social environment may be, it does not, as a matter of fact, 
form each unit of the rising generation on the same type. There are men who do 
not fit readily into our modern system; they dislike the monotony and stationary 
life which steady industry imposes, though they may be able to work well and 
hard when the fit takes them. The tramp of the American continent is as much 
the product of existing industrial conditions as the ambitious leader of an organised 
body of skilled artisans. The ‘ins and outs’ of Great Britain have characteristics 
which may be described as nomadic.” Economists recognise that the fluidity of 
labour is one of the assumptions that can be fairly made in regard to modern 
society. The conditions under which labour is fluid give opportunity for the 
growth of a half-employed and migratory class, who are, as a class, a tax upon the 
well-being of society. It is the greatest of all problems in the Old World to see how 
the educative influence of society can be brought to bear so that it shall rear as 
much as possible the sort of man who is ‘capable of standing on his own feet and 
of contracting when and how to render services to those who are willing to offer 
services he wants in return.’ The question, What is to be done with those who 
cannot and will not thrive on this system? is constantly presenting itself in new 
forms. For our present purpose it may suffice to recognise that this question 
exists, and that even when the conditions of race and history and social surround- 
ings are similar they do not produce one type of individual only. Under these 
circumstances we can no longer take for granted that human aims and activities 
are becoming closely similar in all parts of the globe, even for economic purposes. 
The individual estimate of the utility and disutility of labour at any given moment 
may often be very different from that which the economist would assume to be the 
natural conclusion. It is obviously absurd to suppose of vast numbers of our 
fellow-creatures that they are in the habit of acting in accordance with what appears 
to be common-sense to the average travelling Englishman, but they need not neces- 
sarily be fools on that account. 
II. What is true of unconscious assumptions in regard to individuals per- 
sonally also holds good for the mechanism of society ; we cannot assume that it 
1 W.S. Jevons, Principles af Economics, p. 196. 
2 J.C. Pringle in Heonomic Review, xv. 60, 
® W. Bagehot, Hconomie Studies, 21. 
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