shipwrights and carpenters, or plumbers and fitters-attract their full meed of attention; but more importance really attaches to the injuries which one trade inflicts on others by stinting the output of the raw material which they have to use, or by throwing them out of work through a strike in which they have no concern. $ 20. Connection between the moral and the economic problem. As Mill says: "Except on matters of mere detail, there are perhaps no practical questions even among those which approach nearest to the character of pure economic questions which admit aspects of the of being decided on economic premises alone;" and it is alike unscientific and injurious to the public welfare to attempt to discuss men's conduct in industrial conflicts without taking account of other motives beside the desire for pecuniary gain. The world is not ready to apply in practice principles of so lofty a morality, as that implied in many socialistic schemes, which assumes that no one will desire to gain at the expense of an equal loss of happiness to others. But it is ready, and working men among others are ready, to endeavour to act up to the principle, that no one should desire a gain which would involve a very much greater loss of happiness to others. Of course the loss of £1 involves much less loss of happiness to a rich man than to a poor man. And it would not be reasonable to ask working-men to abstain from a measure which would give them a net gain of £1 at the expense of а loss of 30s. to profits, unless it could be shown that this loss would react on wages in the long run. But many of them are willing to admit that no Union should adopt a course which will raise its own wages at the expense of a much greater total loss of wages to others; and if this principle be generally adopted as a basis of action, then nearly all the evil that still remains in the policy of Unions can be removed by such a study of economic science, as will enable them to discern those remote effects of their action "which are not seen," as well as those immediate results "which are seen." Thus Union policy as a whole is likely to be economically successful provided Unionists as individuals and Power and rein their corporate capacity follow the dictates of sponsibility of morality directed by sound knowledge. In this public opinion. respect Unions derive an ever-increasing assistance from public sympathy and public criticism; and the more they extend the sphere of their undertakings by Federation and International alliances, the more dependent do they become on that sympathy and the more amenable to that criticism; the larger the questions at issue, the greater is the force of public opinion. Public opinion, based on sound economics and just morality, will, it may be hoped, become ever more and more the arbiter of the conditions of industry'. 1 The strength and the responsibility of public opinion as regard the modern developments of trade combinations of all kinds are discussed in an address by the present writer to the Economic Section of the British Association, which is republished in the Statistical Journal for Dec. 1890. And something further is said on the meaning of the phrase "a fair rate of wages" with special reference to Conciliation and Arbitration in an Introduction by him to Mr L. L. Price's Industrial Peace, a book which, supplemented by Prof. Munro's papers on Sliding Scales, throws much light on an important class of problems. The general history of Unions is told in the writings of Mr Howell and Mr Burnett, already mentioned, and in those of Prof. Brentano, also in the Reports of a Committee of the National Association for Promoting Social Science in 1860, and of the Royal Commission on Trades Unions in 1866--9. A great deal of information bearing on these and other questions discussed in this Chapter is being published (1892) by the Commission on Labour. Among the many aspects of Unionism with which it has not been possible to deal at present are the subtler and more indirect influences of foreign competition; and the claim of Unions to aid, or sometimes even to compel the action of employers in Regulating Trade. No doubt there are occasions on which a trade cannot continue to produce at its full strength without forcing the sales of its wares on an inelastic market at prices disastrous to itself. But since every check to the production of one trade tends to throw others out of employment, what is called the Regulation of trade often tends to increase instability of prices, of wages and of employment in some directions more than it diminishes them in others; and its general adoption would probably increase the uncertainties of trade and of work. If we assume however that it is reasonable for those in a trade to try to regulate it, it seems to follow that the employed should have their say in the matter; and some slight weight must be conceded to that objection to Sliding Scales, which urges that under them wages are reduced when the employers accept lower prices, without the workers being consulted as to whether they would prefer to produce less, so that higher prices could be got and higher wages paid. INDEX. Words printed in Italics are technical terms: and the numbers immediately Cliffe Leslie 31 Climate, influence of 10 Collective goods 54; property 38-9; Competition, fundamental character- Composite demand 239; supply 241 Conciliation 341, 396-7 Constant Return 200 Consumer's Surplus or Rent 94 (see Rent); how affected by monopolies Consumption 57; ethical aspects of Co-operation 190-3, 305, 328, 341, Cosmopolitan wealth 55 n. Cost of production 214; its relation Cree 382 n. Cumulative effects with regard to Custom 10, 276 n. Darwin 159 Definition 49-50 Demand, Elasticity of 84-89; Law Economic Law 40-3 Education, technical 143-4, 280-1 England, growth of free industry and Equilibrium amount and price 220 Expenses of Production 214 Manufacture 176 Interest 68, 156; gross 295; net 295; Internal goods 52 Interpretation clause in economics Investment of capital 224-7, 292—5 Irregularity of employment 273, 360 Jevons 31, 76 n., 78 n., 205, 223 n. Joint products 240, 242 Joint-Stock Companies 188-190, 304 Keynes 33 n. Labour 58 (see Earnings) Land 105; Capital value of 318 n.; Law 41; nature of 40-3; meaning Law of Constant Return 200 Demand 82 Derived Demand 236 Diminishing Utility 77: in re- Its effect on supply price Survival of the Fittest 160, Leisure 372-3 Localized industries 171-5 Machinery 163-170; its influence on Malthus 29 n., 123-4, 128, 251-2 Margin of Cultivation 113 Marginal Disutility 103 Utility 78 Market 204-9 Marketing 178-9, 242-3 Marriage-rate, causes affecting 125— Marx, Karl 223 n., 298 Material and Immaterial Goods 51 Maximum satisfaction 210 Mediæval towns 11-12 Mercantilists 27 n. Metayer system 320, 322 n. Migration, hindrances to in Middle Mill, John Stuart 31, 33 n., 65, 81 n., Minimum wage 393 Mobility of labour 145-8, 285-7 Monotony of life, and in some cases |