The Nature and Purpose of Political Economy

 I. NAME AND DEFINITION

 

Verbal definition of economics

Economics, or political economy, may be defined as the study of men earning a living; or, more fully, as the study of the material world and of the activities and mutual relations of men, so far as all these are the objective conditions to gratifying desires. To define, means to mark off the limits of a subject, to tell what questions are or are not included within it. The ideas of most persons on this subject are vague, yet it would be very desirable if the student could approach this study with an exact understanding of the nature of the questions with which it deals. Until a subject has been studied, however, a definition in mere words cannot greatly aid in marking it off clearly in our thought. The essential thing for the student is to see clearly the central purpose of the study, not to decide at once all of the puzzling cases.

 

Natural sciences deal with material things

A definition that suggests clear and familiar thoughts to the student seem at first much more difficult to get in any social science than in the natural sciences. These deal with concrete, material things which we are accustomed to see, handle, and measure. If a mere child is told that botany is a study in which he may learn about flowers, trees, and plants, the answer is fairly satisfying, for he at once thinks of many things of that kind. When, in like manner zoology is defined as the study of animals, or geology as the study of rocks and the earth, the words call up memories of many familiar objects. Even so difficult and foreign-looking a word as ichthyology seems to be made clear by the statement that it is the name of the study in which one learns about fish. It is true that there may be some misunderstanding as to the way in which these subjects are studied, for botany is not in the main to teach how to cultivate plants in the garden, nor ichthyology how to catch fish or to propagate them in a pond. But the main purpose of these studies is clear at the outset from these simple definitions. Indeed, as the study is pursued, and knowledge widens to take in the manifold and various forms of life, the boundaries of the special sciences become not more but less sharp and definite.

 

Economics studies some social acts and relations

Political economy, on the other hand, as one of the social sciences, which deal with men and their relations in society, seems to be a very much more complex thought to get hold of. We are tempted to say that it deals with less familiar things; but the truth may be, as a thoughtful friend suggests, that the simple social acts and relations are more familiar to our thought than are lions, palm-trees, or even horses. Every hour in the streets or stores, one may witness thousands of acts, such as bargains, labour, payments, that are the subject-matter of economic science. Their very familiarity may cause men to overlook their deeper meaning.

Many other definitions have been given of political economy. It has been called the science of wealth, or the science of exchanges. Evidently there are various ways in which wealth may be considered or exchanges made. The particular aspects that are dealt with in political economy will be made clear by considering two other questions, the place of economics among the social sciences and the relation of economics to practical affairs.

 

II. PLACE OF ECONOMICS AMONG THE SOCIAL SCIENCES

 

Economics contrasted with the natural sciences

Political economy, as one of the social sciences, may be contrasted with the natural sciences, which deal with material things and their mutual relations, while it deals with one aspect of men's life in society, namely, the earning of a living, or the use of wealth. It is true that political economy also has to do with plants and animals and the earth—in fact, with all of those things which are the subject-matter of the natural sciences; but it has to do with them only in so far as they are related to man's welfare and affect his estimate of the value of things; only in so far as they are related to the one central subject of economic interest, the earning of a living.

 

Character of the social sciences

The social sciences deal with men and their relations with each other. The word "social" comes from the Latin socius, meaning a fellow, comrade, companion, associate. As men living together have to do with each other in a great many different ways, and enter into a great many different relations, there arise a great many different social problems. Each of the social sciences attempts to study man in some one important aspect—that is, to view these relations from someone standpoint.

Man's acts, his life, and his motives are so complex that it is not surprising that there has been less definiteness in the thought of the social sciences, and that they have advanced less rapidly toward exactness in their conclusions, than have the natural sciences. This complexity also explains the discouragement of the beginner in the early lessons in this subject. Usually the greatest difficulties appear in the first few weeks of its study. The thought is more abstract than in natural science; it requires a different, I will not say higher, kind of ability than does mathematics. But little by little the strangeness of the language and ideas disappears; the bare definitions become clothed with the facts of observation and recalled experiences; and soon the "economic" acts and relations of men in society come to be as real and as interesting to the student as are the materials in the natural world about him—often, indeed, more interesting.

 

Economics, politics, law, and ethics

Political economy is related to all the other social sciences, it being the study of certain of men's relations, while politics, law, and ethics have to do with other relations or with relations under a different aspect. Politics treats of the form and working of government and is mainly concerned with the question of power or control of the individual's actions and liberty. Law treats of the precepts and regulations in accordance with which the actions of men are limited by the state, and the contracts into which they have seen fit to enter are interpreted. Ethics treats the question of right or wrong, studies the moral aspects of men's acts and relations. The attempt just made to distinguish between the fields occupied by the various social sciences betrays at once the fundamental unity existing among them. The acts of men are closely related in their lives, but they may be looked at from different sides. The central thought in economics is the business relation, the relation of men in exchanging their services or material wealth. In pursuing economic inquiries we come into contact with political, legal, and ethical considerations, all of which must be recognized before a final practical answer can be given to any question. Nevertheless the province of economics is limited. It is because of the feebleness of our mental power that we divide and subdivide these complex questions and try to answer certain parts before we seek to answer the whole. When we attempt this final and more difficult task, we should rise to the standpoint of the social philosopher.

 

 

III. THE RELATION OF ECONOMICS TO PRACTICAL AFFAIRS

 

Economics is first a science

The ideal of political economy here set forth is that it should be a science, a search for truth, a systematized body of knowledge, arriving at a statement of the laws to which economic actions conform. It is not the advocacy of any particular policy or idea, but if it arrives at any conclusions, any truths, these cannot fail to affect the practical action of men.

Political economy, because defined as the science of wealth, has been described by some as a gospel of Mammon. It is hardly necessary to refute such a misconception. Political economy is not the science of wealth-getting for the individual. Its study is not primarily for the selfish ends and interest of the individual. (Certainly some of its lessons may be of practical value to men in active business) for many economic "principles" are but the general statement of those ideas that have been approved by the experience of business men, of statesmen, and of the masses of men. Some of its lessons must have educational value in practical business, for political economy is not dreamed out by the closet philosopher, but more and more it is the attempt to describe the interests and the action of the practical world in which men must live. Many men are working together to develop its study—those who collect statistics and facts bearing on all kinds of practical affairs, and those who search through the records of the past for illustrations of experiments and experiences that may help us in our life to-day.

 

Economic study needed in a democracy

But, in the main, the study of political economy is a social study for social ends and not a selfish study for individual advantage. The name political economy was first suggested in France when the government was monarchical and despotic in the extreme. As domestic economy indicates a set of rules or principles to guide wisely the action of the housekeeper or the owner of an estate, so political economy was first thought of as a set of rules or principles to guide the king and his counsellors in the control of the state. The term has continued to bear something of that suggestion in it, though of late the term "economics," as being broader and less likely to be confused with politics, has very generally come into use. But in the degree in which unlimited monarchy has given way to the rule of the people, the conception of political economy has been modified. In a democracy there is need for a general diffusion of knowledge. The power now rests not with the king and a few counsellors, but in the last resort with the people, and therefore the people must be acquainted with the experience of the past, must have all possible systematic knowledge to enlighten public policy and to guide legislation.

Moreover, with the growth of the modern state, with the interest increasing importance of business, and of industrial and commercial interests, as compared with changes of dynasty or the personal rivalries of rulers, economic questions have grown in relative importance. In our own country, particularly since the subjects of slavery and of States' rights ceased to absorb the attention of our people, economic questions have pushed rapidly into the foreground. Indeed, it has of late been more clearly seen that many of the older political questions, such as the American Revolution and slavery, formerly discussed almost entirely in their political and constitutional aspects, were at bottom questions of economic rivalry and of economic welfare. The remarkable increase in the attention given to this study in colleges and universities in the last twenty years is but the index of the greatly increased interest and attention felt in it by citizens generally.

To sum up, it may be said that in the study of political economy we are seeking the reason, connection, and relations in the great multitude of acts arising out of the dependence of desires on the world of things and men.

Economic Motives

I. MATERIAL WANTS, THE PRIMARY ECONOMIC MOTIVES

 

Feeling urges to economic actions

A logical explanation of industry must begin with a discussion of the nature of wants, for the purpose of industry is to gratify wants. An economic want may be defined as a feeling of incompleteness, because of the lack of a part of the outer world or of some change in it. Often the question asked when one first sees a moving trolley car or automobile or bicycle is: What makes it go? The first question to ask in the part of the study of economic society here undertaken is: What is its motive force? Without an answer to that question one cannot hope to understand the ceaseless and varied activities of men occupied in the making of a living. The question merits long and careful study, but the general answer is so simple that it seems almost self-evident: The motive force in economics is found in the feelings of men. It is men's desire to make use of men and things about them which calls forth all the manifold phenomena studied in economics.

 

Animal species shaped by their environment

Wants among animals depend on the environment; that is to say, the utmost that creatures of a lower order than man can do is to take things as they find them. The imagination and intelligence of animals are not developed enough to lead them to desire much beyond that which is ordinarily to be obtained. And so the environment shapes and affects the animal. The fish is fitted to live in the water and thrives there, and we must believe, enjoys living there. The horse and the cow like best the food of the fields, and so each species of animal, in order to survive in the severe struggle for existence, has been forced to fit itself to the conditions in which it lives. After the animal has been thus fitted, its desire is for those things normally to be found in its surroundings. So different animals desire or want different things, but always it is the environment that determines the want, and not the want that determines the environment.

Simple wants of primitive men

In simpler human societies, wants are mostly confined to physical necessities; that is, in the earlier stages of society, man's wants are very much like those of the animals. Man bends his energies to securing the things necessary to survival. He feels the pangs of hunger and he strives to secure food. He feels the need of companionship, for it is only through association and mutual help that men, so weak as compared with many kinds of animals, are able to resist the enemies which beset them. He needs clothing to protect him against the harsher climates of the lands to which he moves. For the same purpose, to protect himself against the cold and rain, he needs a shelter, a cave, a wigwam, or a hut; for a house is but a larger dress.

 

Manifold wants in civilized society

In human society, wants develop and transform the world. In the rudest societies of which there is any record, savages are found with wants developed in a great number of directions beyond the wants of any animals. Man is not a passive victim of circumstances; his wants are not determined solely by his environment; his desires soar beyond the things about him. As men become more the masters of circumstances, their desires anticipate mere physical wants; they seek a more varied food of finer flavour and more delicately prepared. Dress is not limited by physical comfort, for one of the earliest of the aesthetic wants to develop is the love of personal ornament. The rude hut or communal lodge to protect against rain and cold becomes a home. Out of the earlier rude companionship develop the noblest sentiments of friendship and family life. Seeking to gratify the senses and the love of action, men develop aesthetic tastes, the love of the beautiful in sound, in form, in taste, in colour, in motion. And finally, as the imagination and intellect develop, there grow up the various forms of intellectual pleasures—the love of reading, of study, of travel, and of thought.

The various wants of man are sometimes classified as necessities, comforts, and luxuries, but all economists take care to emphasize that these terms have only relative meanings which, in the rapidly changing conditions of modern life, are changing constantly. The comforts of one generation, or of one country, become the necessities in another; and luxuries becoming comforts, are looked upon finally as necessities. And as the desires grow, they more and more alter the world. Man has changed the face of the earth; he has affected its climate, its fertility, its beauty, because, either for better or for worse, his desires have impressed themselves upon the world about him.

 

Wants must precede wealth

In human society the growth of wants is necessary to progress. From the earliest times teachers of morals have argued for simplicity of life and against the development of refinements. We do not now raise the moral question, but there is no doubt that the economic effect of developing wants is in the main to impel to greater effort. They are the mainspring of economic progress.

Wants grow refined as wealth advances

It is a suggestive fact that civilized man, equipped with all of the inventions and the advantages of science, spends more hours of effort in gaining a livelihood than does the savage with his almost unaided hands. Activity is dependent not on bare physical necessity, but on developed wants—in the economic sense of the term. Such social institutions as property and inheritance owe their origin and their justification to their average effect on the motives to activity. If society is to develop, if progress is to continue, human wants—not of the grosser sort, but ever more refined—must continue to emerge and urge men to action.

 

 

II. DESIRES FOR NON-MATERIAL ENDS, AS SECONDARY ECONOMIC MOTIVES

 

The real man in economics

The spiritual nature of man must not be ignored in economic reasoning. There has been much and just criticism of the earlier writers and of their conclusions because so little account was taken by them of any but the motive of self-interest in economic affairs. Generally it was assumed that men knew their own interest, and sought in a very unsympathetic way those things which would gratify their material wants. Thus man in economic reasoning was made an abstraction, differing from real men in his lack of manifold spiritual and social elements.

 

Desires for the non-material may become economic motives

The main classes of non-material wants that are secondarily economic are fear of temporal punishment; sentiments of moral and religious duty; pride, honour, and fear of disgrace; and pleasure in work for itself, for social approval, or for a social result. The first is best illustrated by slavery, where the slave is not impelled to seek wealth for his own welfare, but is driven by punishment to perform the task. The object is to create within the mind of the slave a motive that will take the place of the ordinary economic motive. The feeling of religious or moral duty leads men to act often in direct opposition to the usual economic motive. The taboo is faithfully observed by the members of a savage tribe who suffer as a result the severest hardships. A religious injunction prevents the use of food that would save from starvation. Pride, either of family or of calling; the soldier's honour leading him to sacrifice not only his future but his life; the love of social approval, holding men to the most disagreeable tasks—these illustrate how strongly social sentiments oppose the narrower motive of immediate self-interest as generally thought of. Pleasure in work for work's sake, and pride in the result, may act as motives quite as strong in some cases as desire for the product that can be used. And even where this does not change the kind of work done, it comes in to influence the interest and earnestness with which the work is performed.

 

Economists must overlook no influence on value

Whatever motive in man's complex nature makes him desire things more or less, becomes for the time, and in so far, an economic motive. These various social and spiritual motives sometimes work positively, in the direction of magnifying man's desire for things; sometimes negatively, to diminish it. If we are to understand economic action, we must take men as they are. A religious motive that leads men to refrain from the eating of meat or to eat fish in preference on certain days, is a fact which the economist has but to accept, for it is sure to affect the value of meat and fish at that place and time. Moral convictions, whatever be their origin, whether due to the teaching of parents, to unconscious influences, or to native temperament, may be quite as effective as the pangs of hunger in determining what men desire. Therefore, while these various motives are primarily social or moral or religious, they may be said to be secondarily economic motives, and they may become in certain cases the most important influences of which the economist must take account.

Wealth and Welfare

I. THE RELATION OF MEN AND MATERIAL THINGS TO ECONOMIC WELFARE

 

Man is the center of economic reasoning

The gratifying of economic wants depends on things outside of the man who feels the wants. Man is to himself the center of the world. He groups things and estimates things with reference to their bearing on his desires, be these what are called selfish or unselfish. If we were discussing the economics of an inferior species of animals, things would be grouped in a very different way. But economics being the study of man's welfare, everything must be judged from his standpoint, and things are or are not of economic importance according as they have relation to his wants and satisfactions. Things needful for any of the lower animals are spoken of as "ministering to welfare" in the economic sense only in case these animals are useful to men. Examples are the mulberry-tree on which the silkworm feeds, the flower visited by the honey-bee. In the same view some men are seen to minister to the welfare of other men and therefore bear the same relation for the moment to the welfare of the others as do material things. In any case we study man's welfare as affected by the world which surrounds him.

 

Physical nature is an unchangeable fact

Material things and natural forces differ in kind and nature. This is an axiom which we must take as a basis for reasoning in economics. Things have certain physical qualities quite apart from any action or influence of man. They are operated on by mechanical laws; the force of gravitation causes them to fall at a certain rate under given conditions. They differ in specific gravity, reflect the rays of light, absorb or transmit heat. All these things are for man ultimate physical facts, but unless he knows these facts he cannot take full advantage of the favourable qualities of things or weigh properly their importance to his welfare. Things differ in a multitude of ways in their chemical qualities. Nitre, charcoal, and saltpetre, combined in certain proportions, give certain reactions; different combinations give various results. Solids combine to form gases, and liquids unite to form solids, and these qualities and reactions of material things are for man ultimate truths of chemistry. Likewise many things have certain physiological effects. Sunshine acts on living bodies, whether plant, animal, or man, in certain ways. Some plants are nourishing to man, others are poisonous. If man were not on the earth, things would have the same physical and chemical qualities, mechanical laws would be the same as at present so far as we can conclude. Man cannot change the nature of things; but he can acquaint himself with that nature and then put the things into the relations where a given result will follow.

 

But economics has to do with psychological effects

As a result of these differences, things have different relations to wants. These various qualities, physical, chemical, physiological, are important in an economic sense only as they produce psychological effects, that is, as they affect the feelings and judgments of men. We come to some general thoughts which it will be well to define.

 

Some definitions

Gratification is the feeling that results when a want has been met. Feelings are hard to define in words; the best definition is found in the experience of each individual. We can only say, therefore, that gratification is the attainment of desire, the fulfilment of wants. The word that has usually been employed in this sense in economic discussion is "satisfaction"; but by its derivation and general usage satisfaction means "the complete or full gratification" of a desire, and this meaning is quite inconsistent with the thought in many connections in which the word is used. We shall therefore prefer here the word gratification, and its corresponding verb, gratify.

Wealth is the collective term for those things which are felt to be related to the gratification of wants. The word is applied in economic discussion to any part of those things, no matter how small. We shall have occasion later to define and discuss this term more fully.

Welfare, in an immediate or narrow sense, is the same as gratification of the moment; in a broader sense, it means the abiding condition of well-being. We have here a distinction very much like that often made between pleasure and happiness. If we think of only the present moment, welfare is the absence of pain, and the presence of the pleasurable feeling; but if we consider a longer period in a man's life or his entire lifetime, it is seen that many things that afford a momentary gratification do not minister to his ultimate, or abiding, welfare. Moralists and philosophers often have dwelt on this contrast. The difference is illustrated by the thoughtlessness and impulsiveness of a child or savage as contrasted with the more rational life of those with foresight and patience.

 

Economics first studies wealth

Wealth, in the general economic sense, is judged with reference to gratification rather than with reference to abiding welfare. It is the first duty of the economist not to preach what should be, but to understand things as they are. He must, in studying the problem of value, recognize any motive that leads men to attach importance to acts and things. He will therefore take account of abiding welfare and of immediate gratification to exactly the degree that men in general do, and the sad fact is that the present impulse rules a large part of the acts of men. Whether tobacco or alcohol or morphine minister to the abiding happiness of those who use them does not alter the immediate fact that here and now they are sought and an importance is attached to them because of their power to gratify an immediate desire.

 

Then wealth and welfare

In studying the question of social prosperity, however, we must rise to the standpoint of the social philosopher and consider the more abiding effects of wealth. Wants may be developed and made rational, and the permanent prosperity of a community depends upon this result. Any species of animal that continued regularly to enjoy that which weakens the health and strength would become extinct. Any society or individual that continues to derive gratification, to seek its pleasure, in ways that do not, on the average, minister to permanent welfare, sinks in the struggle of life and gives way to those men or nations that have a sounder and healthier adjustment of wants and welfare. We touch here, therefore, on the edge of the great problems of morals, and while we must recognize the contrast that often exists in the life of any particular man between his "pleasures" and his health and happiness, we see that there is a reason why, on the whole, and in the long run, these two cannot remain far apart. The old proverbs, "Be virtuous and you will be happy," "Honesty is the best policy," and "Virtue is its own reward," have a sound basis in the age-long experience of the world. Cynics or jesters may easily disprove these truths in a multitude of particular cases.

 

Freemen are not economic wealth

Wealth does not include such personal qualities as honesty, integrity, good health. Some economists speak of these as "internal goods," but it is far better not to speak of free men or of their qualities as wealth. Many difficulties arise from such a use of the term in practical discussion. One of the most important of all distinctions to maintain in economics is that between material things and men. Only in the case of human slavery may persons be counted as economic wealth. It is a different thing, however, to consider human services as wealth of an ephemeral kind at the moment they are rendered. We are, thus merely recognizing that men may bear at the given moment the same relation to our wants as do material things.

 

II. SOME IMPORTANT ECONOMIC CONCEPTS CONNECTED WITH WEALTH AND WELFARE

 

Popular meaning of useful

Utility, in its broadest usage, is the general capability that things have of ministering to human wellbeing. The term is evidently one without any scientific precision. It expresses only a general or average impression that we have in reference to the relation of a class of goods to human wants. Everyone would agree to the statement that "water is useful," thinking of the fact that it is indispensable to life and that it ministers to life in a multitude of ways. But what of water in one's cellar, water soaking one's clothes on a cold day, water breaking through the walls of a mountain reservoir and carrying death and destruction in its path? The poison that is doing what we at the moment desire, we call useful; that doing what we would prevent, we call harmful. Noxious weeds become "useful" by the discovery of some new process by which they can be worked into other forms, though they may still continue to be noxious in many a farmer's fields. The utility of anything, therefore, is seen to be of a relative and limited nature. The term "utility" in popular speech is very inexact. It can be employed in economic discussion only when carefully modified and defined.

 

Kinds of goods

Goods consist of all those things objective to the user which have a beneficial relation to human wants. They fall into several classes. We may first distinguish between free and economic goods. Free goods are things that exist in superfluity, that is, in quantities sufficient not only to gratify, but to satisfy all the wants that may depend on them. Economic goods are things so limited in quantity that all of the wants to which they could minister are not satisfied. The whole thought of economy begins with scarcity; indeed, even the conception of free goods is hardly possible until some limitation of wants is experienced. Practical economics is the study of the best way to employ things to secure the highest amount of gratification. The problem itself arises out of the fact that many things are used up before all wants dependent on them are completely satisfied.

A distinction is often made between consumption and production goods, or it may be better to say immediate and intermediate goods. Consumption goods are those things which are immediately at the point of gratifying man's desires. Production goods are those things which are not yet ready to gratify desires; some of them, being merely means of securing consumption goods, never will themselves immediately gratify desire.

 

Value is utility given precision

Value, in the narrow personal sense, may be defined as the importance attributed to a good by a man. The vagueness and inexactness of the word "utility," or the word "good," disappears when we reach the word "value." It is not a usual relation or a vague degree of benefit sometimes present and sometimes absent, but it refers to a particular thing, person, time, and condition. Value is in the closest relation with wants, and in this narrow sense depends on the individual's estimate. From the meeting and comparison of the estimates of individuals, arise market values or prices, which are the central object of study in economics.

The Nature of Demand

I. THE COMPARISON OF GOODS IN MAN'S THOUGHT

 

Wants and goods must be constantly adjusted

As wants differ in kind and degree, so goods differ in their power to gratify wants. This general and simple statement unites the leading thoughts of the two chapters preceding. Confirmation of its truth may be found in observation and experience. The purpose of this chapter is to show how, starting from the general nature of wants and the nature of goods, we can arrive at an explanation of the exchange of goods. Recognizing the simple but fundamental fact stated at the opening of this paragraph, an exchange may be seen to be a rational and a logical result when men are living together in

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Verlag: BookRix GmbH & Co. KG

Texte: RITTIK CHANDRA
Bildmaterialien: RITTIK CHANDRA
Lektorat: RITTIK CHANDRA
Tag der Veröffentlichung: 16.03.2014
ISBN: 978-3-7309-9240-1

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