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12
The mass of
national capital
is composed of the
sum of the savings
of individuals
13
The addition made
to the mass of national
capital in
each year is the
sum of the savings
made by individuals
in that year
of the fortunes made
– or the steps made
towards the making
of a fortune in that
year.
14
In each year
a certain quantity
of capital is dissipated
by prodigals
and unsuccessful
projectors.
15
But after allowance
made for
all such dissipation
it appears
beyond dispute not
only in this country
but in time of peace
at least in every
civilized country
that a certain
very large proportion
of the income
of each year
is saved up &
added to Capital:
expended in such
productive improvements the
effect of which is
to make an annual
addition to
the income of succeeding
years.
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16
In this country
in the present period
the amount
of such annual
addition is probably
not less than 1/12
of the whole mass
of income – income
from more labour
without stock included:
and if so
it would be more
than 1/6 of the income
resulting from
the employment of
stock.
17
On reflection, it
will hardly appear
probable that the
proportion between
saving and unproductive
expenditure
in a community
will depend upon
the absolute quantity
of money: or
that of the country
were precluded from
making any accessions
to the quantity
of money for
a year or any
greater quantity
of time it would
be precluded from
making as great
an addition to the
mass of its capital
as it did
before: since
whatever were
the ratio of that
addition – i:e:
the ratio of saving
to income – say
is 1/2, that addition
ought equally
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18
be made
by means of the existing
quantity of
money – whatever it
were, as well as
by the means of
any greater.
The savings of
any two periods
will be equal,
if ceteris paribus
the ratio of the
money employed in
the purchase of
productive labour
to that of the money
employed in the purchase
of productive
labour – and of
the money employed
in the purchase
of productive labour,
the part employed
in the purchase
of labour employed
in the production
of articles of slow
consumption to
that employed in
the purchase of
articles of quick
consumption, is
the same in
the one year as
in the other.
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19
The addition
to capital by
paper money,
and by extra
influx even of
money is
fallacious: since
where it adds to
capital in the
lump in the instance
of A, it
takes from capital
in the instance to equal amount
in driblets in the
instance of B.
C. D. &c by dimi
rise of prices,
and thence
diminution in the
savings that can
be made out of
income.
20
The rise of
prices consequent
on the extra influx
of paper money
is felt without compensation
by the
possessors of
unincreasable income:
21
It is felt, and
were it not for the
whatever compensation
it may
bring with it would
be felt in equal
degree by each of the possessors
of increasable
income whose incomes
are raised
by the same cause,
but even where the
amounts of the accession
or compensation
is equal to
the
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21
the amount of the
defalcation, the
relief afforded by
the accession is never
equal to the sense of
pressure produced by
the defalcation.
The pressure amount of the
defalcation is known
and the pressure of
it is felt to its full
amount in the
character of a hardship
and a loss. The
accession is felt
as a gain flowing
naturally from
industry in the
natural course
of things, and but not
being seen to flow
from the same cause
as the loss is not
set against that
loss.
22
By a law in the
constitution of mans
nature the enjoyment
from produced by a gain
to a certain amount
is never equal to
the suffering from produced by
a loss to the same
amount. Hence
it is that where
gain and loss to
the same amount
are viewed separately
and no connection
between them observed,
the suffering predominates:
where were they
to be seen coming at
once and from the same
cause, they would
be compleatly destructive
to each other, and no
suffering would be produced.
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Identifier: | JB/003/084/003 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 3.
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1800-10-27 |
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003 |
annuity notes; manual of political economy |
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084 |
polit. economy annuit. notes? |
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003 |
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rudiments sheet (brouillon) |
2 |
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recto |
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jeremy bentham |
1798 am |
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1798 |
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1494 |
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