F ECONOMICS. 127 



to deduction of probabilities (loc. cit., ch. 17, s. '2); and so hope that the 

 reasoning about welfare in the sequel may be as legitimate, if only the 

 ideas are clearly distinct, as the more familiar purely economic reasoning 

 proposed to the present study. 



2, par. 1. The definition given by the (majority of the) War Cabinet 

 Committee is at s. 211 of their Report [Cmd. 135] , 1919. Professor 

 Bowley's definition is in the first column of p. 177 of (Appendices to) 

 the ' Report on Women in Industry ' [Cmd. 167] , 1919. Mrs. Fawcett 

 adopts Miss Eleanor Rathbone's definition, which is substantially 

 identical with our first definition, the one proper to the present study 

 {Economic Journal, 1918, p. 3). It is quoted in part below (14). 



2, par. 3. The isolation professed by Jevons is perhaps more easily 

 maintained in dealing with Exchange and Interest than when witli 

 respect to Population. When considering the future of a population 

 as affected by diffei'ent economic conditions it is natural to have in mind 

 a quantity of the kind which Burke, referring to the population of 

 America, described as ' so large a mass of the interests and feelings 

 of the human race.' I follow, however, classic precedent when I 

 include in the present study, though jjurporting to be purely economic, 

 some I'eference to the effect of proposed measures on the growth and 

 condition of the population (below, 20, iv., et passim). 



2, par. 3. It m.ay well be that the ' complexedness ' (above, note 

 to s. 1) of the objective aggregate, the national income (as to which see 

 Bowley, Economic Journal, March 1922), may exceed that of the 

 subjective aggregate, which will constitute the central conception of the 

 sequel dealing with welfare. 



4. As toi the relation between maximum and greatest possible 

 advantage, see Pigou, ' Economics of Welfare,' Part II., ch. ii., s. 7 

 et scq., restating the doctrine of his ' Wealth and Welfare,' which has 

 been paraphrased by the present writer in the Economic Journal for 

 June 1913, p. 215. ' 



4 (bis). As to the effect of subsidies see Pigou, 'Economics of 

 Welfare,' Part. V., ch. vii., s. 3, restating 'Wealth and Welfare,' 

 Part III., ch. viii., s. 3. A priori, if we construct Supplv-and-Demand 

 curves of the ordinary tvpe, the abscissa representing the quantity of 

 work offered, and the ordinate the corresponding rate of wage, different 

 cases are presented. If the Supply curve consists of a horizontal line 

 at a certain height, corresponding to the classical conception that any 

 amount of labour will be forthcoming at the cost fixed by the labourer's 

 necessaries, then the effect of a small or moderate bounty will be to 

 lower wages by the full amount of the supplement. A case like this 

 is supposed in sections 4 and 20. But the effect of a considerable sub- 

 sidy may well be to alter the balance between work and leisure, to 

 change the shape of the Supply curve, raising it and rendering it in- 

 elastic in such wise as to make the market better for competitors 

 that are not subsidised. Examples of both results, according to circum- 

 stances, will be found in the evidence Cfiven by !Miss Collett and others 

 before the Commission on Home Work, 1907. No. 86. It will not be 

 iiTelovnnI to quote Miss Collett's judgment about the effect of a large 

 subsidy. ' The girl who earns lOOJ. a year by her work and receives 



1022 L 



