A BOUNTY on the exportation of corn tends to lower its price to the foreign consumer, but it has no permanent effect on its price in the home market.
DAVID RICARDOIt is here we come to the heart of the matter. The economic principle of comparative advantage’, ‘a country may, in return for manufactured commodities, import corn even if it can be grown with less labour than in the country from which it is imported.
More David Ricardo Quotes
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I wish that I may never think the smiles of the great and powerful a sufficient inducement to turn aside from the straight path of honesty and the convictions of my own mind.
DAVID RICARDO -
A rise in wages, from an alteration in the value of money, produces a general effect on price, and for that reason it produces no real effect whatever on profits.
DAVID RICARDO -
The exchangeable value of all commodities rises as the difficulties of their production increase.
DAVID RICARDO -
There can be no greater error then in supposing that capital is increased by non-consumption.
DAVID RICARDO -
Whether a bank lent one million, ten million, or a hundred millions, they would not permanently alter the market rate of interest; they would alter only the value of the money they issued.
DAVID RICARDO -
A rise of wages from this cause will, indeed, be invariably accompanied by a rise in the price of commodities; but in such cases, it will be found that labour and all commodities have not varied in regard to each other, and that the variation has been confined to money.
DAVID RICARDO -
But a tax on luxuries would no other effect than to raise their price. It would fall wholly on the consumer, and could neither increase wages nor lower profits.
DAVID RICARDO -
In the same manner if any nation wasted part of its wealth, or lost part of its trade, it could not retain the same quantity of circulating medium which it before possessed.
DAVID RICARDO -
Whenever the current of money is forcibly stopped, and when money is prevented from settling at its just level, there are no limits to the possible variations of the exchange.
DAVID RICARDO -
Nothing contributes so much to the prosperity and happiness of a country as high profits.
DAVID RICARDO -
It is not by the absolute quantity of produce obtained by either class, that we can correctly judge of the rate of profit, rent, and wages, but by the quantity of labour required to obtain that produce.
DAVID RICARDO -
Again two manufacturers may employ the same amount of fixed, and the same amount of circulating capital; but the durability of their fixed capitals may be very unequal.
DAVID RICARDO -
The factors left out of the Ricardian equation are falling wages and idle capacity.
DAVID RICARDO -
But it is clear that the price of labour has no necessary connection with the price of food, since it depends entirely on the supply of labourers compared with the demand.
DAVID RICARDO -
Neither machines, nor the commodities made by them, rise in real value, but all commodities made by machines fall, and fall in proportion to their durability.
DAVID RICARDO -
For price is everywhere regulated by the return obtained by this last portion of capital, for which no rent whatever is paid.
DAVID RICARDO -
Profits might also increase, because improvements might take place in agriculture, or in the implements of husbandry, which would augment the produce with the same cost of production.
DAVID RICARDO -
During the period of capital moving from one employment to another, the profits on that to which capital is flowing will be relatively high, but will continue so no longer than till the requisite capital is obtained.
DAVID RICARDO -
The farmer and manufacturer can no more live without profit than the labourer without wages.
DAVID RICARDO -
The variation in the value of money, however great, makes no difference in the rate of profits.
DAVID RICARDO -
Neither a state nor a bank ever have had unrestricted power of issuing paper money without abusing that power.
DAVID RICARDO -
There is no way of keeping profits up but by keeping wages down.
DAVID RICARDO -
It is here we come to the heart of the matter. The economic principle of comparative advantage’, ‘a country may, in return for manufactured commodities, import corn even if it can be grown with less labour than in the country from which it is imported.
DAVID RICARDO -
Taxation under every form presents but a choice of evils.
DAVID RICARDO -
Gold, on the contrary, though of little use compared with air or water, will exchange for a great quantity of other goods.
DAVID RICARDO -
But a rise in the wages of labour would not equally affect commodities produced with machinery quickly consumed, and commodities produced with machinery slowly consumed.
DAVID RICARDO