No extension of foreign trade will immediately increase the amount of value in a country, although it will very powerfully contribute to increase the mass of commodities and therefore the sum of enjoyments.
DAVID RICARDOGold and silver, like other commodities, have an intrinsic value, which is not arbitrary, but is dependent on their scarcity, the quantity of labour bestowed in procuring them, and the value of the capital employed in the mines which produce them.
More David Ricardo Quotes
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If English money was of the same value then as before, Hamburgh money must have risen in value. But where is the proof of this?
DAVID RICARDO -
Like all other contracts, wages should be left to the fair and free competition of themarket, and should never be controlled by the interference of the legislature.
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 -
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 -
Whenever, then, the usual and ordinary rate of the profits of agricultural stock, and all the outgoings belonging to the cultivation of land, are together equal to the value of the whole produce, there can be no rent.
DAVID RICARDO -
If the demand for home commodities should be diminished, because of the fall of rent on the part of the landlords, it will be increased in a far greater degree by the increased opulence of the commercial classes.
DAVID RICARDO -
The wheat bought by a farmer to sow is comparatively a fixed capital to the wheat purchased by a baker to make into loaves.
DAVID RICARDO -
There can be no greater error then in supposing that capital is increased by non-consumption.
DAVID RICARDO -
Gold and silver, like other commodities, have an intrinsic value, which is not arbitrary, but is dependent on their scarcity, the quantity of labour bestowed in procuring them, and the value of the capital employed in the mines which produce them.
DAVID RICARDO -
Neither a state nor a bank ever have had unrestricted power of issuing paper money without abusing that power.
DAVID RICARDO -
Rent is the portion of the earth, which is paid to the landlord for the user of the original and indestructible powers of the soil
DAVID RICARDO -
Utility then is not the measure of exchangeable value, although it is absolutely essential to it.
DAVID RICARDO -
Nothing contributes so much to the prosperity and happiness of a country as high profits.
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 -
There is no way of keeping profits up but by keeping wages down.
DAVID RICARDO