The General Theory of Employment,

Interest, and Money

by

John Maynard Keynes

The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money

John Maynard Keynes

Table of Contents

PREFACE
PREFACE TO THE GERMAN EDITION
PREFACE TO THE JAPANESE EDITION
PREFACE TO THE FRENCH EDITION

Book I: Introduction

1. THE GENERAL THEORY

2. THE POSTULATES OF THE CLASSICAL ECONOMICS
3. THE PRINCIPLE OF EFFECTIVE DEMAND

Book II: Definitions and Ideas

4. THE CHOICE OF UNITS

5. EXPECTATION AS DETERMINING OUTPUT AND EMPLOYMENT
6. THE DEFINITION OF INCOME, SAVING AND INVESTMENT
o APPENDIX ON USER COST
7. THE MEANING OF SAVING AND INVESTMENT FURTHER CONSIDERED

Book III: The Propensity to Consume

8. THE PROPENSITY TO CONSUME:

I. THE OBJECTIVE FACTORS
9. THE PROPENSITY TO CONSUME:
II. THE SUBJECTIVE FACTORS
10. THE MARGINAL PROPENSITY TO CONSUME AND THE MULTIPLIER

Book IV: The Inducement to Invest

11. THE MARGINAL EFFICIENCY OF CAPITAL

12. THE STATE OF LONG-TERM EXPECTATION
13. THE GENERAL THEORY OF THE RATE OF INTEREST
14. THE CLASSICAL THEORY OF THE RATE OF INTEREST
o APPENDIX ON THE RATE OF INTEREST IN MARSHALL'S
PRINCIPLES OF ECONOMICS, RICARDO'S PRINCIPLES OF
POLITICAL ECONOMY, AND ELSEWHERE
15. THE PSYCHOLOGICAL AND BUSINESS INCENTIVES TO LIQUIDITY
16. SUNDRY OBSERVATIONS ON THE NATURE OF CAPITAL
17. THE ESSENTIAL PROPERTIES OF INTEREST AND MONEY
18. THE GENERAL THEORY OF EMPLOYMENT RE-STATED
 Book V: Money-wages and Prices

19. CHANGES IN MONEY-WAGES

o PROFESSOR PIGOU'S 'THEORY OF UNEMPLOYMENT'
20. THE EMPLOYMENT FUNCTION
21. THE THEORY OF PRICES

Short Notes Suggested by the General Theory

22. NOTES ON THE TRADE CYCLE

23. NOTES ON MERCANTILISM, THE USURY LAWS, STAMPED MONEY
AND THEORIES OF UNDER-CONSUMPTION
24. CONCLUDING NOTES ON THE SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY TOWARDS
WHICH THE GENERAL THEORY MIGHT LEAD

Appendix 1
Appendix 2
Appendix 3

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PREFACE

This book is chiefly addressed to my fellow economists. I hope that it will be intelligible
to others. But its main purpose is to deal with difficult questions of theory, and only in
the second place with the applications of this theory to practice. For if orthodox
economics is at fault, the error is to be found not in the superstructure, which has been
erected with great care for logical consistency, but in a lack of clearness and of generality
in the pre misses. Thus I cannot achieve my object of persuading economists to re-
examine critically certain of their basic assumptions except by a highly abstract argument
and also by much controversy. I wish there could have been less of the latter. But I have
thought it important, not only to explain my own point of view, but also to show in what
respects it departs from the prevailing theory. Those, who are strongly wedded to what I
shall call 'the classical theory', will fluctuate, I expect, between a belief that I am quite
wrong and a belief that I am saying nothing new. It is for others to determine if either of
these or the third alternative is right. My controversial passages are aimed at providing
some material for an answer; and I must ask forgiveness if, in the pursuit of sharp
distinctions, my controversy is itself too keen. I myself held with conviction for many
years the theories which I now attack, and I am not, I think, ignorant of their strong points.

The matters at issue are of an importance which cannot be exaggerated. But, if my

explanations are right, it is my fellow economists, not the general public, whom I must
first convince. At this stage of the argument the general public, though welcome at the
debate, are only eavesdroppers at an attempt by an economist to bring to an issue the
deep divergences of opinion between fellow economists which have for the time being
almost destroyed the practical influence of economic theory, and will, until they are
resolved, continue to do so.

The relation between this book and my Treatise on Money [JMK vols. v and vi], which I
published five years ago, is probably clearer to myself than it will be to others; and what
in my own mind is a natural evolution in a line of thought which I have been pursuing for
several years, may sometimes strike the reader as a confusing change of view. This
difficulty is not made less by certain changes in terminology which I have felt compelled
to make. These changes of language I have pointed out in the course of the following
pages; but the general relationship between the two books can be expressed briefly as
follows. When I began to write my Treatise on Money I was still moving along the
traditional lines of regarding the influence of money as something so to speak separate
from the general theory of supply and demand. When I finished it, I had made some
progress towards pushing monetary theory back to becoming a theory of output as a
whole. But my lack of emancipation from preconceived ideas showed itself in what now
seems to me to be the outstanding fault of the theoretical parts of that work (namely,
Books III and IV), that I failed to deal thoroughly with the effects of changes in the level
of output. My so-called 'fundamental equations were an instantaneous picture taken on
the assumption of a given output. They attempted to show how, assuming the given
output, forces could develop which involved a profit-disequilibrium, and thus required a
change in the level of output. But the dynamic development, as distinct from the
instantaneous picture, was left incomplete and extremely confused. This book, on the
other hand, has evolved into what is primarily a study of the forces which determine
changes in the scale of output and employment as a whole; and, whilst it is found that
money enters into the economic scheme in an essential and peculiar manner, technical
monetary detail falls into the background. A monetary economy, we shall find, is
essentially one in which changing views about the future are capable of influencing the
quantity of employment and not merely its direction. But our method of analysing the
economic behaviour of the present under the influence of changing ideas about the future
is one which depends on the interaction of supply and demand, and is in this way linked
up with our fundamental theory of value. We are thus led to a more general theory, which
includes the classical theory with which we are familiar, as a special case.

The writer of a book such as this, treading along unfamiliar paths, is extremely dependent
on criticism and conversation if he is to avoid an undue proportion of mistakes. It is
astonishing what foolish things one can temporarily believe if one thinks too long alone,
particularly in economics (along with the other moral sciences), where it is often
impossible to bring one's ideas to a conclusive test either formal or experimental. In this
book, even more perhaps than in writing my Treatise on Money, I have depended on the
constant advice and constructive criticism of Mr R.F. Kahn. There is a great deal in this
book which would not have taken the shape it has except at his suggestion. I have also
had much help from Mrs Joan Robinson, Mr R.G. Hawtrey and Mr R.F. Harrod, who
have read the whole of the proof-sheets. The index has been compiled by Mr D. M.
Bensusan-Butt of King's College, Cambridge.

The composition of this book has been for the author a long struggle of escape, and so
must the reading of it be for most readers if the author's assault upon them is to be
successful,a struggle of escape from habitual modes of thought and expression. The
ideas which are here expressed so laboriously are extremely simple and should be
obvious. The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping from the old ones,
which ramify, for those brought up as most of us have been, into every corner of our
minds.

J. M. KEYNES

13 December 1935
PREFACE TO THE GERMAN EDITION

Alfred Marshall, on whose Principles of Economics all contemporary English economists

have been brought up, was at particular pains to emphasise the continuity of his thought
with Ricardo's. His work largely consisted in grafting the marginal principle and the
principle of substitution on to the Ricardian tradition; and his theory of output and
consumption as a whole, as distinct from his theory of the production and distribution of
a given output, was never separately expounded. Whether he himself felt the need of such
a theory, I am not sure. But his immediate successors and followers have certainly
dispensed with it and have not, apparently, felt the lack of it. It was in this atmosphere
that I was brought up. I taught these doctrines myself and it is only within the last decade
that I have been conscious of their insufficiency. In my own thought and development,
therefore, this book represents a reaction, a transition away from the English classical (or
orthodox) tradition. My emphasis upon this in the following pages and upon the points of
my divergence from received doctrine has been regarded in some quarters in England as
unduly controversial. But how can one brought up a Catholic in English economics,
indeed a priest of that faith, avoid some controversial emphasis, when he first becomes a
Protestant?

But I fancy that all this may impress German readers somewhat differently. The orthodox
tradition, which ruled in nineteenth century England, never took so firm a hold of
German thought. There have always existed important schools of economists in Germany
who have strongly disputed the adequacy of the classical theory for the analysis of
contemporary events. The Manchester School and Marxism both derive ultimately from
Ricardo,a conclusion which is only superficially surprising. But in Germany there has
always existed a large section of opinion which has adhered neither to the one nor to the
other.

It can scarcely be claimed, however, that this school of thought has erected a rival
theoretical construction; or has even attempted to do so. It has been sceptical, realistic,
content with historical and empirical methods and results, which discard formal analysis.
The most important unorthodox discussion on theoretical lines was that of Wicksell. His
books were available in German (as they were not, until lately, in English); indeed one of
the most important of them was written in German. But his followers were chiefly
Swedes and Austrians, the latter of whom combined his ideas with specifically Austrian
theory so as to bring them in effect, back again towards the classical tradition. Thus
Germany, quite contrary to her habit in most of the sciences, has been content for a whole
century to do without any formal theory of economics which was predominant and
generally accepted.

Perhaps, therefore, I may expect less resistance from German, than from English, readers
in offering a theory of employment and output as a whole, which departs in important
respects from the orthodox tradition. But can I hope to overcome Germany's economic
agnosticism? Can I persuade German economists that methods of formal analysis have
something important to contribute to the interpretation of contemporary events and to the
moulding of contemporary policy? After all, it is German to like a theory. How hungry
and thirsty German economists must feel after having lived all these years without one!
Certainly, it is worth while for me to make the attempt. And if I can contribute some stray
morsels towards the preparation by German economists of a full repast of theory
designed to meet specifically German conditions, I shall be content. For I confess that
much of the following book is illustrated and expounded mainly with reference to the
conditions existing in the Anglo-Saxon countries.

Nevertheless the theory of output as a whole, which is what the following book purports
to provide, is much more easily adapted to the conditions of a totalitarian state, than is the
theory of the production and distribution of a given output produced under conditions of
free competition and a large measure of laissez-faire. The theory of the psychological
laws relating consumption and saving, the influence of loan expenditure on prices and
real wages, the part played by the rate of interestthese remain as necessary ingredients
in our scheme of thought.

I take this opportunity to acknowledge my indebtedness to the excellent work of my

translator Herr Waeger (I hope his vocabulary at the end of this volume may prove useful
beyond its immediate purpose) and to my publishers, Messrs Duncker and Humblot,
whose enterprise, from the days now sixteen years ago when they published my
Economic Consequences of the Peace, has enabled me to maintain contact with German
readers.

J. M. KEYNES

7 September 1936
PREFACE TO THE JAPANESE EDITION

Alfred Marshall, on whose Principles of Economics all contemporary English economists

have been brought up, was at particular pains to emphasise the continuity of his thought
with Ricardo's. His work largely consisted in grafting the marginal principle and the
principle of substitution on to the Ricardian tradition; and his theory of output and
consumption as a whole, as distinct from his theory of the production and distribution of
a given output, was never separately expounded. Whether he himself felt the need of such
a theory, I am not sure. But his immediate successors and followers have certainly
dispensed with it and have not, apparently, felt the lack of it. It was in this atmosphere
that I was brought up. I taught these doctrines myself and it is only within the last decade
that I have been conscious of their insufficiency. In my own thought and development,
therefore, this book represents a reaction, a transition away from the English classical (or
orthodox) tradition. My emphasis upon this in the following pages and upon the points of
my divergence from received doctrine has been regarded in some quarters in England as
unduly controversial. But how can one brought up in English economic orthodoxy,
indeed a priest of that faith at one time, avoid some controversial emphasis, when he first
becomes a Protestant?

Perhaps Japanese readers, however, will neither require nor resist my assaults against the
English tradition. We are well aware of the large scale on which English economic
writings are read in Japan, but we are not so well informed as to how Japanese opinions
regard them. The recent praiseworthy enterprise on the part of the International Economic
Circle of Tokyo in reprinting Malthus's 'Principles of Political Economy' as the first
volume in the Tokyo Series of Reprints encourages me to think that a book which traces
its descent from Malthus rather than Ricardo may be received with sympathy in some
quarters at least.

At any rate I am grateful to the Oriental Economist for making it possible for me to
approach Japanese readers without the extra handicap of a foreign language.

J. M. KEYNES

4 December 1936
PREFACE TO THE FRENCH EDITION

For a hundred years or longer, English Political Economy has been dominated by an
orthodoxy. That is not to say that an unchanging doctrine has prevailed. On the contrary.
There has been a progressive evolution of the doctrine. But its presuppositions, its
atmosphere, its method have remained surprisingly the same, and a remarkable continuity
has been observable through all the changes. In that orthodoxy, in that continuous
transition, I was brought up. I learnt it, I taught it, I wrote it. To those looking from
outside I probably still belong to it. Subsequent historians of doctrine will regard this
book as in essentially the same tradition. But I myself in writing it, and in other recent
work which has led up to it, have felt myself to be breaking away from this orthodoxy, to
be in strong reaction against it, to be escaping from something, to be gaining an
emancipation. And this state of mind on my part is the explanation of certain faults in the
book, in particular its controversial note in some passages, and its air of being addressed
too much to the holders of a particular point of view and too little ad urbem et orbem. I
was wanting to convince my own environment and did not address myself with sufficient
directness to outside opinion. Now three years later, having grown accustomed to my
new skin and having almost forgotten the smell of my old one, I should, if I were writing
afresh, endeavour to free myself from this fault and state my own position in a more
clear-cut manner.

I say all this, partly to explain and partly to excuse, myself to French readers. For in
France there has been no orthodox tradition with the same authority over contemporary
opinion as in my own country. In the United States the position has been much the same
as in England. But in France, as in the rest of Europe, there has been no such dominant
school since the expiry of the school of French Liberal economists who were in their
prime twenty years ago (though they lived to so great an age, long after their influence
had passed away, that it fell to my duty, when I first became a youthful editor of the
Economic Journal to write the obituaries of many of themLevasseur, Molinari, Leroy-
Beaulieu). If Charles Gide had attained to the same influence and authority as Alfred
Marshall, your position would have borne more resemblance to ours. As it is, your
economists are eclectic, too much (we sometimes think) without deep roots in systematic
thought. Perhaps this may make them more easily accessible to what I have to say. But it
may also have the result that my readers will sometimes wonder what I am talking about
when I speak, with what some of my English critics consider a misuse of language, of the
'classical' school of thought and 'classical' economists. It may, therefore, be helpful to my
French readers if I attempt to indicate very briefly what I regard as the main differentiae
of my approach.

I have called my theory a general theory. I mean by this that I am chiefly concerned with
the behaviour of the economic system as a whole,with aggregate incomes, aggregate
profits, aggregate output, aggregate employment, aggregate investment, aggregate saving
rather than with the incomes, profits, output, employment, investment and saving of
particular industries, firms or individuals. And I argue that important mistakes have been
made through extending to the system as a whole conclusion which have been correctly
arrived at in respect of a part of it taken in isolation.

Let me give examples of what I mean. My contention that for the system as a whole the
amount of income which is saved, in the sense that it is not spent on current consumption,
is and must necessarily be exactly equal to the amount of net new investment has been
considered a paradox and has been the occasion of widespread controversy. The
explanation of this is undoubtedly to be found in the fact that this relationship of equality
between saving and investment, which necessarily holds good for the system as a whole,
does not hold good at all for a particular individual. There is no reason whatever why the
new investment for which I am responsible should bear any relation whatever to the
amount of my own savings. Quite legitimately we regard an individual's income as
independent of what he himself consumes and invests. But this, I have to point out,
should not have led us to overlook the fact that the demand arising out of the
consumption and investment of one individual is the source of the incomes of other
individuals, so that incomes in general are not independent, quite the contrary, of the
disposition of individuals to spend and invest; and since in turn the readiness of
individuals to spend and invest depends on their incomes, a relationship is set up between
aggregate savings and aggregate investment which can be very easily shown, beyond any
possibility of reasonable dispute, to be one of exact and necessary equality. Rightly
regarded this is a banal conclusion. But it sets in motion a train of thought from which
more substantial matters follow. It is shown that, generally speaking, the actual level of
output and employment depends, not on the capacity to produce or on the pre-existing
level of incomes, but on the current decisions to produce which depend in turn on current
decisions to invest and on present expectations of current and prospective consumption.
Moreover, as soon as we know the propensity to consume and to save (as I call it), that is
to say the result for the community as a whole of the individual psychological
inclinations as to how to dispose of given incomes, we can calculate what level of
incomes, and therefore what level of output and employment, is in profit-equilibrium
with a given level of new investment; out of which develops the doctrine of the
Multiplier. Or again, it becomes evident that an increased propensity to save will ceteris
paribus contract incomes and output; whilst an increased inducement to invest will
expand them. We are thus able to analyse the factors which determine the income and
output of the system as a whole;we have, in the most exact sense, a theory of
employment. Conclusions emerge from this reasoning which are particularly relevant to
the problems of public finance and public policy generally and of the trade cycle.

Another feature, especially characteristic of this book, is the theory of the rate of interest.
In recent times it has been held by many economists that the rate of current saving
determined the supply of free capital, that the rate of current investment governed the
demand for it, and that the rate of interest was, so to speak, the equilibrating price-factor
determined by the point of intersection of the supply curve of savings and the demand
curve of investment. But if aggregate saving is necessarily and in all circumstances
exactly equal to aggregate investment, it is evident that this explanation collapses. We
have to search elsewhere for the solution. I find it in the idea that it is the function of the
rate of interest to preserve equilibrium, not between the demand and the supply of new
capital goods, but between the demand and the supply of money, that is to say between
the demand for liquidity and the means of satisfying this demand. I am here returning to
the doctrine of the older, pre-nineteenth century economists. Montesquieu, for example,
saw this truth with considerable clarity,Montesquieu who was the real French
equivalent of Adam Smith, the greatest of your economists, head and shoulders above the
physiocrats in penetration, clear-headedness and good sense (which are the qualities an
economist should have). But I must leave it to the text of this book to show how in detail
all this works out.

I have called this book the General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money; and the
third feature to which I may call attention is the treatment of money and prices. The
following analysis registers my final escape from the confusions of the Quantity Theory,
which once entangled me. I regard the price level as a whole as being determined in
precisely the same way as individual prices; that is to say, under the influence of supply
and demand. Technical conditions, the level of wages, the extent of unused capacity of
plant and labour, and the state of markets and competition determine the supply
conditions of individual products and of products as a whole. The decisions of
entrepreneurs, which provide the incomes of individual producers and the decisions of
those individuals as to the disposition of such incomes determine the demand conditions.
And pricesboth individual prices and the price-levelemerge as the resultant of these
two factors. Money, and the quantity of money, are not direct influences at this stage of
the proceedings. They have done their work at an earlier stage of the analysis. The
quantity of money determines the supply of liquid resources, and hence the rate of
interest, and in conjunction with other factors (particularly that of confidence) the
inducement to invest, which in turn fixes the equilibrium level of incomes, output and
employment and (at each stage in conjunction with other factors) the price-level as a
whole through the influences of supply and demand thus established.

I believe that economics everywhere up to recent times has been dominated, much more
than has been understood, by the doctrines associated with the name of J.-B. Say. It is
true that his 'law of markets' has been long abandoned by most economists; but they have
not extricated themselves from his basic assumptions and particularly from his fallacy
that demand is created by supply. Say was implicitly assuming that the economic system
was always operating up to its full capacity, so that a new activity was always in
substitution for, and never in addition to, some other activity. Nearly all subsequent
economic theory has depended on, in the sense that it has required, this same assumption.
Yet a theory so based is clearly incompetent to tackle the problems of unemployment and
of the trade cycle. Perhaps I can best express to French readers what I claim for this book
by saying that in the theory of production it is a final break-away from the doctrines of J.-
B. Say and that in the theory of interest it is a return to the doctrines of Montesquieu.

J. M. KEYNES

20 February 1939

King's College, Cambridge

Chapter 1

THE GENERAL THEORY

I have called this book the General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, placing
the emphasis on the prefix general. The object of such a title is to contrast the character
of my arguments and conclusions with those of the classical[1] theory of the subject, upon
which I was brought up and which dominates the economic thought, both practical and
theoretical, of the governing and academic classes of this generation, as it has for a
hundred years past. I shall argue that the postulates of the classical theory are applicable
to a special case only and not to the general case, the situation which it assumes being a
limiting point of the possible positions of equilibrium. Moreover, the characteristics of
the special case assumed by the classical theory happen not to be those of the economic
society in which we actually live, with the result that its teaching is misleading and
disastrous if we attempt to apply it to the facts of experience.

1. The classical economists was a name invented by Marx to cover Ricardo and James Mill and
their predecessors, that is to say for the founders of the theory which culminated in the Ricardian
economics. I have become accustomed, perhaps perpetrating a solecism, to include in the classical
school the followers of Ricardo, those, that is to say, who adopted and perfected the theory of the
Ricardian economics, including (for example) J. S. Mill, Marshall, Edgeworth and Prof. Pigou.
Chapter 2

THE POSTULATES OF THE CLASSICAL ECONOMICS

Most treatises on the theory of value and production are primarily concerned with the
distribution of a given volume of employed resources between different uses and with the
conditions which, assuming the employment of this quantity of resources, determine their
relative rewards and the relative values of their products[1].

The question, also, of the volume of the available resources, in the sense of the size of the
employable population, the extent of natural wealth and the accumulated capital
equipment, has often been treated descriptively. But the pure theory of what determines
the actual employment of the available resources has seldom been examined in great
detail. To say that it has not been examined at all would, of course, be absurd. For every
discussion concerning fluctuations of employment, of which there have been many, has
been concerned with it. I mean, not that the topic has been overlooked, but that the
fundamental theory underlying it has been deemed so simple and obvious that it has
received, at the most, a bare mention[2].

The classical theory of employmentsupposedly simple and obvioushas been based, I

think, on two fundamental postulates, though practically without discussion, namely:

I. The wage is equal to the marginal product of labour

That is to say, the wage of an employed person is equal to the value which would be lost
if employment were to be reduced by one unit (after deducting any other costs which this
reduction of output would avoid); subject, however, to the qualification that the equality
may be disturbed, in accordance with certain principles, if competition and markets are
imperfect.

II. The utility of the wage when a given volume of labour is employed is equal to the
marginal disutility of that amount of employment.

That is to say, the real wage of an employed person is that which is just sufficient (in the
estimation of the employed persons themselves) to induce the volume of labour actually
employed to be forthcoming; subject to the qualification that the equality for each
individual unit of labour may be disturbed by combination between employable units
analogous to the imperfections of competition which qualify the first postulate. Disutility
must be here understood to cover every kind of reason which might lead a man, or a body
of men, to withhold their labour rather than accept a wage which had to them a utility
below a certain minimum.

This postulate is compatible with what may be called 'frictional' unemployment. For a
realistic interpretation of it legitimately allows for various inexactnesses of adjustment
which stand in the way of continuous full employment: for example, unemployment due
to a temporary want of balance between the relative quantities of specialised resources as
a result of miscalculation or intermittent demand; or to time-lags consequent on
unforeseen changes; or to the fact that the change-over from one employment to another
cannot be effected without a certain delay, so that there will always exist in a non-static
society a proportion of resources unemployed 'between jobs'. In addition to 'frictional'
unemployment, the postulate is also compatible with 'voluntary' unemployment due to the
refusal or inability of a unit of labour, as a result of legislation or social practices or of
combination for collective bargaining or of slow response to change or of mere human
obstinacy, to accept a reward corresponding to the value of the product attributable to its
marginal productivity. But these two categories of 'frictional' unemployment and
'voluntary' unemployment are comprehensive. The classical postulates do not admit of
the possibility of the third category, which I shall define below as 'involuntary'
unemployment.

Subject to these qualifications, the volume of employed resources is duly determined,

according to the classical theory, by the two postulates. The first gives us the demand
schedule for employment, the second gives us the supply schedule; and the amount of
employment is fixed at the point where the utility of the marginal product balances the
disutility of the marginal employment. It would follow from this that there are only four
possible means of increasing employment:

(a) An improvement in organisation or in foresight which diminishes 'frictional'

unemployment;

(b) a decrease in the marginal disutility of labour, as expressed by the real wage for
which additional labour is available, so as to diminish 'voluntary' unemployment;

(c) an increase in the marginal physical productivity of labour in the wage-goods

industries (to use Professor Pigou's convenient term for goods upon the price of which
the utility of the money-wage depends);

or (d) an increase in the price of non-wage-goods compared with the price of wage-goods,
associated with a shift in the expenditure of non-wage-earners from wage-goods to non-
wage-goods.

This, to the best of my understanding, is the substance of Professor Pigou's Theory of

Unemploymentthe only detailed account of the classical theory of employment which
exists[3].

II

Is it true that the above categories are comprehensive in view of the fact that the
population generally is seldom doing as much work as it would like to do on the basis of
the current wage? For, admittedly, more labour would, as a rule, be forthcoming at the
existing money-wage if it were demanded[4]. The classical school reconcile this
phenomenon with their second postulate by arguing that, while the demand for labour at
the existing money-wage may be satisfied before everyone willing to work at this wage is
employed, this situation is due to an open or tacit agreement amongst workers not to
work for less, and that if labour as a whole would agree to a reduction of money-wages
more employment would be forthcoming. If this is the case, such unemployment, though
apparently involuntary, is not strictly so, and ought to be included under the above
category of 'voluntary' unemployment due to the effects of collective bargaining, etc.

This calls for two observations, the first of which relates to the actual attitude of workers
towards real wages and money-wages respectively and is not theoretically fundamental,
but the second of which is fundamental.

Let us assume, for the moment, that labour is not prepared to work for a lower money-
wage and that a reduction in the existing level of money-wages would lead, through
strikes or otherwise, to a withdrawal from the labour market of labour which is now
employed. Does it follow from this that the existing level of real wages accurately
measures the marginal disutility of labour? Not necessarily. For, although a reduction in
the existing money-wage would lead to a withdrawal of labour, it does not follow that a
fall in the value of the existing money-wage in terms of wage-goods would do so, if it
were due to a rise in the price of the latter. In other words, it may be the case that within a
certain range the demand of labour is for a minimum money-wage and not for a
minimum real wage. The classical school have tacitly assumed that this would involve no
significant change in their theory. But this is not so. For if the supply of labour is not a
function of real wages as its sole variable, their argument breaks down entirely and leaves
the question of what the actual employment will be quite indeterminate[5]. They do not
seem to have realised that, unless the supply of labour is a function of real wages alone,
their supply curve for labour will shift bodily with every movement of prices. Thus their
method is tied up with their very special assumptions, and cannot be adapted to deal with
the more general case.

Now ordinary experience tells us, beyond doubt, that a situation where labour stipulates
(within limits) for a money-wage rather than a real wage, so far from being a mere
possibility, is the normal case. Whilst workers will usually resist a reduction of money-
wages, it is not their practice to withdraw their labour whenever there is a rise in the price
of wage-goods. It is sometimes said that it would be illogical for labour to resist a
reduction of money-wages but not to resist a reduction of real wages. For reasons given
below (p. 14), this might not be so illogical as it appears at first; and, as we shall see later,
fortunately so. But, whether logical or illogical, experience shows that this is how labour
in fact behaves.

Moreover, the contention that the unemployment which characterises a depression is due
to a refusal by labour to accept a reduction of money-wages is not clearly supported by
the facts. It is not very plausible to assert that unemployment in the United States in 1932
was due either to labour obstinately refusing to accept a reduction of money-wages or to
its obstinately demanding a real wage beyond what the productivity of the economic
machine was capable of furnishing. Wide variations are experienced in the volume of
employment without any apparent change either in the minimum real demands of labour
or in its productivity. Labour is not more truculent in the depression than in the boom
far from it. Nor is its physical productivity less. These facts from experience are a prima
facie ground for questioning the adequacy of the classical analysis.

It would be interesting to see the results of a statistical enquiry into the actual relationship
between changes in money-wages and changes in real wages. In the case of a change
peculiar to a particular industry one would expect the change in real wages to be in the
same direction as the change in money-wages. But in the case of changes in the general
level of wages, it will be found, I think, that the change in real wages associated with a
change in money-wages, so far from being usually in the same direction, is almost always
in the opposite direction. When money-wages are rising, that is to say, it will be found
that real wages are falling; and when money-wages are falling, real wages are rising. This
is because, in the short period, falling money-wages and rising real wages are each, for
independent reasons, likely to accompany decreasing employment; labour being readier
to accept wage-cuts when employment is falling off, yet real wages inevitably rising in
the same circumstances on account of the increasing marginal return to a given capital
equipment when output is diminished.

If, indeed, it were true that the existing real wage is a minimum below which more labour
than is now employed will not be forthcoming in any circumstances, involuntary
unemployment, apart from frictional unemployment, would be non-existent. But to
suppose that this is invariably the case would be absurd. For more labour than is at
present employed is usually available at the existing money-wage, even though the price
of wage-goods is rising and, consequently, the real wage falling. If this is true, the wage-
goods equivalent of the existing money-wage is not an accurate indication of the
marginal disutility of labour, and the second postulate does not hold good.

But there is a more fundamental objection. The second postulate flows from the idea that
the real wages of labour depend on the wage bargains which labour makes with the
entrepreneurs. It is admitted, of course, that the bargains are actually made in terms of
money, and even that the real wages acceptable to labour are not altogether independent
of what the corresponding money-wage happens to be. Nevertheless it is the money-wage
thus arrived at which is held to determine the real wage. Thus the classical theory
assumes that it is always open to labour to reduce its real wage by accepting a reduction
in its money-wage. The postulate that there is a tendency for the real wage to come to
equality with the marginal disutility of labour clearly presumes that labour itself is in a
position to decide the real wage for which it works, though not the quantity of
employment forthcoming at this wage.

The traditional theory maintains, in short, that the wage bargains between the
entrepreneurs and the workers determine the real wage; so that, assuming free
competition amongst employers and no restrictive combination amongst workers, the
latter can, if they wish, bring their real wages into conformity with the marginal disutility
of the amount of employment offered by the employers at that wage. If this is not true,
then there is no longer any reason to expect a tendency towards equality between the real
wage and the marginal disutility of labour.

The classical conclusions are intended, it must be remembered, to apply to the whole
body of labour and do not mean merely that a single individual can get employment by
accepting a cut in money-wages which his fellows refuse. They are supposed to be
equally applicable to a closed system as to an open system, and are not dependent on the
characteristics of an open system or on the effects of a reduction of money-wages in a
single country on its foreign trade, which lie, of course, entirely outside the field of this
discussion. Nor are they based on indirect effects due to a lower wages-bill in terms of
money having certain reactions on the banking system and the state of credit, effects
which we shall examine in detail in chapter 19. They are based on the belief that in a
closed system a reduction in the general level of money-wages will be accompanied, at
any rate in the short period and subject only to minor qualifications, by some, though not
always a proportionate, reduction in real wages.

Now the assumption that the general level of real wages depends on the money-wage
bargains between the employers and the workers is not obviously true. Indeed it is
strange that so little attempt should have been made to prove or to refute it. For it is far
from being consistent with the general tenor of the classical theory, which has taught us
to believe that prices are governed by marginal prime cost in terms of money and that
money-wages largely govern marginal prime cost. Thus if money-wages change, one
would have expected the classical school to argue that prices would change in almost the
same proportion, leaving the real wage and the level of unemployment practically the
same as before, any small gain or loss to labour being at the expense or profit of other
elements of marginal cost which have been left unaltered[6]. They seem, however, to have
been diverted from this line of thought, partly by the settled conviction that labour is in a
position to determine its own real wage and partly, perhaps, by preoccupation with the
idea that prices depend on the quantity of money. And the belief in the proposition that
labour is always in a position to determine its own real wage, once adopted, has been
unattained by its being confused with the proposition that labour is always in a position to
determine what real wage shall correspond to full employment, i.e. the maximum quantity
of employment which is compatible with a given real wage.

To sum up: there are two objections to the second postulate of the classical theory. The
first relates to the actual behaviour of labour. A fall in real wages due to a rise in prices,
with money-wages unaltered, does not, as a rule, cause the supply of available labour on
offer at the current wage to fall below the amount actually employed prior to the rise of
prices. To state it does is to suppose that all those who are now unemployed though
willing to work at the current wage will withdraw the offer of their labour in the event of
even a small rise in the cost of living. Yet this strange supposition apparently underlies
Professor Pigou's Theory of Unemployment[7], and it is what all members of the orthodox
school are tacitly assuming.

But the other, more fundamental, objection, which we shall develop in the ensuing
chapters, flows from our disputing the assumption that the general level of real wages is
directly determined by the character of the wage bargain. In assuming that the wage
bargain determines the real wage the classical school have slept in an illicit assumption.
For there may be no method available to labour as a whole whereby it can bring the
wage-goods equivalent of the general level of money wages into conformity with the
marginal disutility of the current volume of employment. There may exist no expedient
by which labour as a whole can reduce its real wage to a given figure by making revised
money bargains with the entrepreneurs. This will be our contention. We shall endeavour
to show that primarily it is certain other forces which determine the general level of real
wages. The attempt to elucidate this problem will be one of our main themes. We shall
argue that there has been a fundamental misunderstanding of how in this respect the
economy in which we live actually works.

III

Though the struggle over money-wages between individuals and groups is often believed
to determine the general level of real-wages, it is, in fact, concerned with a different
object. Since there is imperfect mobility of labour, and wages do not tend to an exact
equality of net advantage in different occupations, any individual or group of individuals,
who consent to a reduction of money-wages relatively to others, will suffer a relative
reduction in real wages, which is a sufficient justification for them to resist it. On the
other hand it would be impracticable to resist every reduction of real wages, due to a
change in the purchasing-power of money which affects all workers alike; and in fact
reductions of real wages arising in this way are not, as a rule, resisted unless they proceed
to an extreme degree. Moreover, a resistance to reductions in money-wages applying to
particular industries does not raise the same insuperable bar to an increase in aggregate
employment which would result from a similar resistance to every reduction in real
wages.

In other words, the struggle about money-wages primarily affects the distribution of the
aggregate real wage between different labour-groups, and not its average amount per unit
of employment, which depends, as we shall see, on a different set of forces. The effect of
combination on the part of a group of workers is to protect their relative real wage. The
general level of real wages depends on the other forces of the economic system.

Thus it is fortunate that the workers, though unconsciously, are instinctively more
reasonable economists than the classical school, inasmuch as they resist reductions of
money-wages, which are seldom or never of an all-round character, even though the
existing real equivalent of these wages exceeds the marginal disutility of the existing
employment; whereas they do not resist reductions of real wages, which are associated
with increases in aggregate employment and leave relative money-wages unchanged,
unless the reduction proceeds so far as to threaten a reduction of the real wage below the
marginal disutility of the existing volume of employment. Every trade union will put up
some resistance to a cut in money-wages, however small. But since no trade union would
dream of striking on every occasion of a rise in the cost of living, they do not raise the
obstacle to any increase in aggregate employment which is attributed to them by the
classical school.
IV

We must now define the third category of unemployment, namely 'involuntary'

unemployment in the strict sense, the possibility of which the classical theory does not
admit.

Clearly we do not mean by 'involuntary' unemployment the mere existence of an

unexhausted capacity to work. An eight-hour day does not constitute unemployment
because it is not beyond human capacity to work ten hours. Nor should we regard as
'involuntary' unemployment the withdrawal of their labour by a body of workers because
they do not choose to work for less than a certain real reward. Furthermore, it will be
convenient to exclude 'frictional' unemployment from our definition of 'involuntary'
unemployment. My definition is, therefore, as follows: Men are involuntarily
unemployed If, in the event of a small rise in the price of wage-goods relatively to the
money-wage, both the aggregate supply of labour willing to work for the current money-
wage and the aggregate demand for it at that wage would be greater than the existing
volume of employment. An alternative definition, which amounts, however, to the same
thing, will be given in the next chapter (Chapter 3).

It follows from this definition that the equality of the real wage to the marginal disutility
of employment presupposed by the second postulate, realistically interpreted,
corresponds to the absence of 'involuntary' unemployment. This state of affairs we shall
describe as 'full' employment, both 'frictional' and 'voluntary' unemployment being
consistent with 'full' employment thus defined. This fits in, we shall find, with other
characteristics of the classical theory, which is best regarded as a theory of distribution in
conditions of full employment. So long as the classical postulates hold good,
unemployment, which is in the above sense involuntary, cannot occur. Apparent
unemployment must, therefore, be the result either of temporary loss of work of the
'between jobs' type or of intermittent demand for highly specialised resources or of the
effect of a trade union 'closed shop' on the employment of free labour. Thus writers in the
classical tradition, overlooking the special assumption underlying their theory, have been
driven inevitably to the conclusion, perfectly logical on their assumption, that apparent
unemployment (apart from the admitted exceptions) must be due at bottom to a refusal by
the unemployed factors to accept a reward which corresponds to their marginal
productivity. A classical economist may sympathise with labour in refusing to accept a
cut in its money-wage, and he will admit that it may not be wise to make it to meet
conditions which are temporary; but scientific integrity forces him to declare that this
refusal is, nevertheless, at the bottom of the trouble.

Obviously, however, if the classical theory is only applicable to the case of full
employment, it is fallacious to apply it to the problems of involuntary unemploymentif
there be such a thing (and who will deny it?). The classical theorists resemble Euclidean
geometers in a non-Euclidean world who, discovering that in experience straight lines
apparently parallel often meet, rebuke the lines for not keeping straightas the only
remedy for the unfortunate collisions which are occurring. Yet, in truth, there is no
remedy except to throw over the axiom of parallels and to work out a non-Euclidean
geometry. Something similar is required to-day in economics. We need to throw over the
second postulate of the classical doctrine and to work out the behaviour of a system in
which involuntary unemployment in the strict sense is possible.

In emphasising our point of departure from the classical system, we must not overlook an
important point of agreement. For we shall maintain the first postulate as heretofore,
subject only to the same qualifications as in the classical theory; and we must pause, for a
moment, to consider what this involves.

It means that, with a given organisation, equipment and technique, real wages and the
volume of output (and hence of employment) are uniquely correlated, so that, in general,
an increase in employment can only occur to the accompaniment of a decline in the rate
of real wages. Thus I am not disputing this vital fact which the classical economists have
(rightly) asserted as indefeasible. In a given state of organisation, equipment and
technique, the real wage earned by a unit of labour has a unique (inverse) correlation with
the volume of employment. Thus if employment increases, then, in the short period, the
reward per unit of labour in terms of wage-goods must, in general, decline and profits
increase[8]. This is simply the obverse of the familiar proposition that industry is normally
working subject to decreasing returns in the short period during which equipment etc. is
assumed to be constant; so that the marginal product in the wage-good industries (which
governs real wages) necessarily diminishes as employment is increased. So long, indeed,
as this proposition holds, any means of increasing employment must lead at the same
time to a diminution of the marginal product and hence of the rate of wages measured in
terms of this product.

But when we have thrown over the second postulate, a decline in employment, although
necessarily associated with labour's receiving a wage equal in value to a larger quantity of
wage-goods, is not necessarily due to labour's demanding a larger quantity of wage-
goods; and a willingness on the part of labour to accept lower money-wages is not
necessarily a remedy for unemployment. The theory of wages in relation to employment,
to which we are here leading up, cannot be fully elucidated, however, until chapter 19
and its Appendix have been reached.

VI

From the time of Say and Ricardo the classical economists have taught that supply
creates its own demand;meaning by this in some significant, but not clearly defined,
sense that the whole of the costs of production must necessarily be spent in the aggregate,
directly or indirectly, on purchasing the product.

In J.S. Mill's Principles of Political Economy the doctrine is expressly set forth:

What constitutes the means of payment for commodities is simply

commodities. Each person's means of paying for the productions of other
 people consist of those which he himself possesses. All sellers are
inevitably, and by the meaning of the word, buyers. Could we suddenly
double the productive powers of the country, we should double the supply
of commodities in every market; but we should, by the same stroke,
double the purchasing power. Everybody would bring a double demand as
well as supply; everybody would be able to buy twice as much, because
every one would have twice as much to offer in exchange.

As a corollary of the same doctrine, it has been supposed that any individual act of
abstaining from consumption necessarily leads to, and amounts to the same thing as,
causing the labour and commodities thus released from supplying consumption to be
invested in the production of capital wealth. The following passage from Marshall's Pure
Theory of Domestic Values[9] illustrates the traditional approach:

The whole of a man's income is expended in the purchase of services and

of commodities. It is indeed commonly said that a man spends some
portion of his income and saves another. But it is a familiar economic
axiom that a man purchases labour and commodities with that portion of
his income which he saves just as much as he does with that he is said to
spend. He is said to spend when he seeks to obtain present enjoyment from
the services and commodities which he purchases. He is said to save when
he causes the labour and the commodities which he purchases to be
devoted to the production of wealth from which he expects to derive the
means of enjoyment in the future.

It is true that it would not be easy to quote comparable passages from Marshall's later
work[10] or from Edgeworth or Professor Pigou. The doctrine is never stated to-day in this
crude form. Nevertheless it still underlies the whole classical theory, which would
collapse without it. Contemporary economists, who might hesitate to agree with Mill, do
not hesitate to accept conclusions which require Mill's doctrine as their premises. The
conviction, which runs, for example, through almost all Professor Pigou's work, that
money makes no real difference except frictionally and that the theory of production and
employment can be worked out (like Mill's) as being based on 'real' exchanges with
money introduced perfunctorily in a later chapter, is the modern version of the classical
tradition. Contemporary thought is still deeply steeped in the notion that if people do not
spend their money in one way they will spend it in another[11]. Post-war economists
seldom, indeed, succeed in maintaining this standpoint consistently; for their thought to-
day is too much permeated with the contrary tendency and with facts of experience too
obviously inconsistent with their former view[12]. But they have not drawn sufficiently far-
reaching consequences; and have not revised their fundamental theory.

In the first instance, these conclusions may have been applied to the kind of economy in
which we actually live by false analogy from some kind of non-exchange Robinson
Crusoe economy, in which the income which individuals consume or retain as a result of
their productive activity is, actually and exclusively, the output in specie of that activity.
But, apart from this, the conclusion that the costs of output are always covered in the
aggregate by the sale-proceeds resulting from demand, has great plausibility, because it is
difficult to distinguish it from another, similar-looking proposition which is indubitable,
namely that the income derived in the aggregate by all the elements in the community
concerned in a productive activity necessarily has a value exactly equal to the value of
the output.

Similarly it is natural to suppose that the act of an individual, by which he enriches

himself without apparently taking anything from anyone else, must also enrich the
community as a whole; so that (as in the passage just quoted from Marshall) an act of
individual saving inevitably leads to a parallel act of investment. For, once more, it is
indubitable that the sum of the net increments of the wealth of individuals must be
exactly equal to the aggregate net increment of the wealth of the community.

Those who think in this way are deceived, nevertheless, by an optical illusion, which
makes two essentially different activities appear to be the same. They are fallaciously
supposing that there is a nexus which unites decisions to abstain from present
consumption with decisions to provide for future consumption; whereas the motives
which determine the latter are not linked in any simple way with the motives which
determine the former.

It is, then, the assumption of equality between the demand price of output as a whole and
its supply price which is to be regarded as the classical theory's 'axiom of parallels'.
Granted this, all the rest followsthe social advantages of private and national thrift, the
traditional attitude towards the rate of interest, the classical theory of unemployment, the
quantity theory of money, the unqualified advantages of laissez-faire in respect of foreign
trade and much else which we shall have to question.

VII

At different points in this chapter we have made the classical theory to depend in
succession on the assumptions:

1. that the real wage is equal to the marginal disutility of the existing employment;
2. that there is no such thing as involuntary unemployment in the strict sense;
3. that supply creates its own demand in the sense that the aggregate demand price is
equal to the aggregate supply price for all levels of output and employment.

These three assumptions, however, all amount to the same thing in the sense that they all
stand and fall together, any one of them logically involving the other two.

1. This is in the Ricardian tradition. For Ricardo expressly repudiated any interest in the amount of
the national dividend, as distinct from its distribution. In this he was assessing correctly the
character of his own theory. But his successors, less clear-sighted, have used the classical theory in
discussions concerning the causes of wealth. Vide Ricardos letter to Malthus of October 9, 1820:
Political Economy you think is an enquiry into the nature and causes of wealth I think it
should be called an enquiry into the laws which determine the division of the produce of industry
amongst the classes who concur in its formation. No law can be laid down respecting quantity, but
 a tolerably correct one can be laid down respecting proportions. Every day I am more satisfied
that the former enquiry is vain and delusive, and the latter only the true objects of the science.

2. For example, Prof. Pigou in the Economics of Welfare (4th ed. p. 127) writes (my italics):
Throughout this discussion, except when the contrary is expressly stated, the fact that some
resources are generally unemployed against the will of the owners is ignored. This does not affect
the substance of the argument, while it simplifies its exposition.. Thus, whilst Ricardo expressly
disclaimed any attempt to deal with the amount of the national dividend as a whole, Prof. Pigou, in
a book which is specifically directed to the problem of the national dividend, maintains that the
same theory holds when there is some involuntary unemployment as in the case of full
employment.

3. Prof. Pigous Theory of Unemployment is examined in more detail in the Appendix to Chapter 19
below.

4. Cf. the quotation from Prof. Pigou above, p. 5, footnote.

5. This point is dealt with in detail in the Appendix to Chapter 19 below.

6. This argument would, indeed, contain, to my thinking, a large element of truth, though the
complete results of a change in money-wages are more complex, as we shall show in Chapter 19
below.

7. Cf. Chapter 19, Appendix.

8. The argument runs as follows: n men are employed, the nth man adds a bushel a day to the
harvest, and wages have a buying power of a bushel a day. The n + 1 th man, however, would only
add .9 bushel a day, and employment cannot, therefore, rise to n + 1 men unless the price of corn
rises relatively to wages until daily wages have a buying power of .9 bushel. Aggregate wages
would then amount to 9/10 (n + 1) bushels as compared with n bushels previously. Thus the
employment of an additional man will, if it occurs, necessarily involve a transfer of income from
those previously in work to the entrepreneurs.

9. p. 34.

10. Mr. J. A. Hobson, after quoting in his Physiology of Industry (p. 102) the above passage from Mill,
points out that Marshall commented as follows on this passage as early as his Economics of
Industry, p. 154. But though men have the power to purchase, they may not choose to use it.
But, Mr Hobson continues, he fails to grasp the critical importance of this fact, and appears
to limit its action to periods of crisis. This has remained fair comment, I think, in the light of
Marshalls later work.

11. Cf. Alfred and Mary Marshall, Economics of Industry, p. 17: It is not good for trade to have
dresses made of material which wears out quickly. For if people did not spend their means on
buying new dresses they would spend them on giving employment to labour in some other way.
The reader will notice that I am again quoting from the earlier Marshall. The Marshall of the
Principles had become sufficiently doubtful to be very cautious and evasive. But the old ideas
were never repudiated or rooted out of the basic assumptions of his thought.

12. It is this distinction of Prof. Robbins that he, almost alone, continues to maintain a consistent
scheme of thought, his practical recommendations belonging to the same system as his theory.
Chapter 3

THE PRINCIPLE OF EFFECTIVE DEMAND

We need, to start with, a few terms which will be defined precisely later. In a given state
of technique, resources and costs, the employment of a given volume of labour by an
entrepreneur involves him in two kinds of expense: first of all, the amounts which he
pays out to the factors of production (exclusive of other entrepreneurs) for their current
services, which we shall call the factor cost of the employment in question; and secondly,
the amounts which he pays out to other entrepreneurs for what he has to purchase from
them together with the sacrifice which he incurs by employing the equipment instead of
leaving it idle, which we shall call the user cost of the employment in question[1]. The
excess of the value of the resulting output over the sum of its factor cost and its user cost
is the profit or, as we shall call it, the income of the entrepreneur. The factor cost is, of
course, the same thing, looked at from the point of view of the entrepreneur, as what the
factors of production regard as their income. Thus the factor cost and the entrepreneur's
profit make up, between them, what we shall define as the total income resulting from the
employment given by the entrepreneur. The entrepreneur's profit thus defined is, as it
should be, the quantity which he endeavours to maximise when he is deciding what
amount of employment to offer. It is sometimes convenient, when we are looking at it
from the entrepreneur's standpoint, to call the aggregate income (i.e. factor cost plus
profit) resulting from a given amount of employment the proceeds of that employment.
On the other hand, the aggregate supply price[2] of the output of a given amount of
employment is the expectation of proceeds which will just make it worth the while of the
entrepreneurs to give that employment[3].

It follows that in a given situation of technique, resources and factor cost per unit of
employment, the amount of employment, both in each individual firm and industry and in
the aggregate, depends on the amount of the proceeds which the entrepreneurs expect to
receive from the corresponding output[4]. For entrepreneurs will endeavour to fix the
amount of employment at the level which they expect to maximise the excess of the
proceeds over the factor cost.

Let Z be the aggregate supply price of the output from employing N men, the relationship
between Z and N being written Z = (N), which can be called the aggregate supply
function[5]. Similarly, let D be the proceeds which entrepreneurs expect to receive from
the employment of N men, the relationship between D and N being written D = f(N),
which can be called the aggregate demand function.

Now if for a given value of N the expected proceeds are greater than the aggregate supply
price, i.e. if D is greater than Z, there will be an incentive to entrepreneurs to increase
employment beyond N and, if necessary, to raise costs by competing with one another for
the factors of production, up to the value of N for which Z has become equal to D. Thus
the volume of employment is given by the point of intersection between the aggregate
demand function and the aggregate supply function; for it is at this point that the
entrepreneurs' expectation of profits will be maximised. The value of D at the point of the
aggregate demand function, where it is intersected by the aggregate supply function, will
be called the effective demand. Since this is the substance of the General Theory of
Employment, which it will be our object to expound, the succeeding chapters will be
largely occupied with examining the various factors upon which these two functions
depend.

The classical doctrine, on the other hand, which used to be expressed categorically in the
statement that 'Supply creates its own Demand' and continues to underlie all orthodox
economic theory, involves a special assumption as to the relationship between these two
functions. For 'Supply creates its own Demand' must mean that f(N) and (N) are equal
for all values of N, i.e. for all levels of output and employment; and that when there is an
increase in Z ( = (N)) corresponding to an increase in N, D ( = f(N)) necessarily
increases by the same amount as Z. The classical theory assumes, in other words, that the
aggregate demand price (or proceeds) always accommodates itself to the aggregate
supply price; so that, whatever the value of N may be, the proceeds D assume a value
equal to the aggregate supply price Z which corresponds to N. That is to say, effective
demand, instead of having a unique equilibrium value, is an infinite range of values all
equally admissible; and the amount of employment is indeterminate except in so far as
the marginal disutility of labour sets an upper limit.

If this were true, competition between entrepreneurs would always lead to an expansion
of employment up to the point at which the supply of output as a whole ceases to be
elastic, i.e. where a further increase in the value of the effective demand will no longer be
accompanied by any increase in output. Evidently this amounts to the same thing as full
employment. In the previous chapter we have given a definition of full employment in
terms of the behaviour of labour. An alternative, though equivalent, criterion is that at
which we have now arrived, namely a situation in which aggregate employment is
inelastic in response to an increase in the effective demand for its output. Thus Say's law,
that the aggregate demand price of output as a whole is equal to its aggregate supply price
for all volumes of output, is equivalent to the proposition that there is no obstacle to full
employment. If, however, this is not the true law relating the aggregate demand and
supply functions, there is a vitally important chapter of economic theory which remains
to be written and without which all discussions concerning the volume of aggregate
employment are futile.

II

A brief summary of the theory of employment to be worked out in the course of the
following chapters may, perhaps, help the reader at this stage, even though it may not be
fully intelligible. The terms involved will be more carefully defined in due course. In this
summary we shall assume that the money-wage and other factor costs are constant per
unit of labour employed. But this simplification, with which we shall dispense later, is
introduced solely to facilitate the exposition. The essential character of the argument is
precisely the same whether or not money-wages, etc., are liable to change.

The outline of our theory can be expressed as follows. When employment increases,
aggregate real income is increased. The psychology of the community is such that when
aggregate real income is increased aggregate consumption is increased, but not by so
much as income. Hence employers would make a loss if the whole of the increased
employment were to be devoted to satisfying the increased demand for immediate
consumption. Thus, to justify any given amount of employment there must be an amount
of current investment sufficient to absorb the excess of total output over what the
community chooses to consume when employment is at the given level. For unless there
is this amount of investment, the receipts of the entrepreneurs will be less than is required
to induce them to offer the given amount of employment. It follows, therefore, that, given
what we shall call the community's propensity to consume, the equilibrium level of
employment, i.e. the level at which there is no inducement to employers as a whole either
to expand or to contract employment, will depend on the amount of current investment.
The amount of current investment will depend, in turn, on what we shall call the
inducement to invest; and the inducement to invest will be found to depend on the
relation between the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital and the complex of
rates of interest on loans of various maturities and risks.

Thus, given the propensity to consume and the rate of new investment, there will be only
one level of employment consistent with equilibrium; since any other level will lead to
inequality between the aggregate supply price of output as a whole and its aggregate
demand price. This level cannot be greater than full employment, i.e. the real wage
cannot be less than the marginal disutility of labour. But there is no reason in general for
expecting it to be equal to full employment. The effective demand associated with full
employment is a special case, only realised when the propensity to consume and the
inducement to invest stand in a particular relationship to one another. This particular
relationship, which corresponds to the assumptions of the classical theory, is in a sense an
optimum relationship. But it can only exist when, by accident or design, current
investment provides an amount of demand just equal to the excess of the aggregate
supply price of the output resulting from full employment over what the community will
choose to spend on consumption when it is fully employed.

This theory can be summed up in the following propositions:

(1) In a given situation of technique, resources and costs, income (both money-income
and real income) depends on the volume of employment N.

(2) The relationship between the community's income and what it can be expected to
spend on consumption, designated by D1, will depend on the psychological characteristic
of the community, which we shall call its propensity to consume. That is to say,
consumption will depend on the level of aggregate income and, therefore, on the level of
employment N, except when there is some change in the propensity to consume.
(3) The amount of labour N which the entrepreneurs decide to employ depends on the
sum (D) of two quantities, namely D1, the amount which the community is expected to
spend on consumption, and D2, the amount which it is expected to devote to new
investment. D is what we have called above the effective demand.

(4) Since D1 + D2 = D = (N), where is the aggregate supply function, and since, as
we have seen in (2) above, D1 is a function of N, which we may write (N), depending on
the propensity to consume, it follows that (N) (N) = D2.

(5) Hence the volume of employment in equilibrium depends on (i) the aggregate supply
function, (ii) the propensity to consume, and (iii) the volume of investment, D2. This is
the essence of the General Theory of Employment.

(6) For every value of N there is a corresponding marginal productivity of labour in the
wage-goods industries; and it is this which determines the real wage. (5) is, therefore,
subject to the condition that N cannot exceed the value which reduces the real wage to
equality with the marginal disutility of labour. This means that not all changes in D are
compatible with our temporary assumption that money-wages are constant. Thus it will
be essential to a full statement of our theory to dispense with this assumption.

(7) On the classical theory, according to which D = (N) for all values of N, the volume
of employment is in neutral equilibrium for all values of N less than its maximum value;
so that the forces of competition between entrepreneurs may be expected to push it to this
maximum value. Only at this point, on the classical theory, can there be stable
equilibrium.

(8) When employment increases, D1will increase, but not by so much as D; since when
our income increases our consumption increases also, but not by so much. The key to our
practical problem is to be found in this psychological law. For it follows from this that
the greater the volume of employment the greater will be the gap between the aggregate
supply price (Z) of the corresponding output and the sum (D1) which the entrepreneurs
can expect to get back out of the expenditure of consumers. Hence, if there is no change
in the propensity to consume, employment cannot increase, unless at the same time D2 is
increasing so as to fill the increasing gap between Z and D1. Thusexcept on the special
assumptions of the classical theory according to which there is some force in operation
which, when employment increases, always causes D2 to increase sufficiently to fill the
widening gap between Z and D1the economic system may find itself in stable
equilibrium with N at a level below full employment, namely at the level given by the
intersection of the aggregate demand function with the aggregate supply function.

Thus the volume of employment is not determined by the marginal disutility of labour
measured in terms of real wages, except in so far as the supply of labour available at a
given real wage sets a maximum level to employment. The propensity to consume and
the rate of new investment determine between them the volume of employment, and the
volume of employment is uniquely related to a given level of real wagesnot the other
way round. If the propensity to consume and the rate of new investment result in a
deficient effective demand, the actual level of employment will fall short of the supply of
labour potentially available at the existing real wage, and the equilibrium real wage will
be greater than the marginal disutility of the equilibrium level of employment.

This analysis supplies us with an explanation of the paradox of poverty in the midst of
plenty. For the mere existence of an insufficiency of effective demand may, and often
will, bring the increase of employment to a standstill before a level of full employment
has been reached. The insufficiency of effective demand will inhibit the process of
production in spite of the fact that the marginal product of labour still exceeds in value
the marginal disutility of employment.

Moreover the richer the community, the wider will tend to be the gap between its actual
and its potential production; and therefore the more obvious and outrageous the defects of
the economic system. For a poor community will be prone to consume by far the greater
part of its output, so that a very modest measure of investment will be sufficient to
provide full employment; whereas a wealthy community will have to discover much
ampler opportunities for investment if the saving propensities of its wealthier members
are to be compatible with the employment of its poorer members. If in a potentially
wealthy community the inducement to invest is weak, then, in spite of its potential wealth,
the working of the principle of effective demand will compel it to reduce its actual output,
until, in spite of its potential wealth, it has become so poor that its surplus over its
consumption is sufficiently diminished to correspond to the weakness of the inducement
to invest.

But worse still. Not only is the marginal propensity to consume[6] weaker in a wealthy
community, but, owing to its accumulation of capital being already larger, the
opportunities for further investment are less attractive unless the rate of interest falls at a
sufficiently rapid rate; which 'brings us to the theory of the rate of interest and to the
reasons why it does not automatically fall to the appropriate level, which will occupy
Book IV.

Thus the analysis of the propensity to consume, the definition of the marginal efficiency
of capital and the theory of the rate of interest are the three main gaps in our existing
knowledge which it will be necessary to fill. When this has been accomplished, we shall
find that the theory of prices falls into its proper place as a matter which is subsidiary to
our general theory. We shall discover, however, that money plays an essential part in our
theory of the rate of interest; and we shall attempt to disentangle the peculiar
characteristics of money which distinguish it from other things.

III

The idea that we can safely neglect the aggregate demand function is fundamental to the
Ricardian economics, which underlie what we have been taught for more than a century.
Malthus, indeed, had vehemently opposed Ricardo's doctrine that it was impossible for
effective demand to be deficient; but vainly. For, since Malthus was unable to explain
clearly (apart from an appeal to the facts of common observation) how and why effective
demand could be deficient or excessive, he failed to furnish an alternative construction;
and Ricardo conquered England as completely as the Holy Inquisition conquered Spain.
Not only was his theory accepted by the city, by statesmen and by the academic world.
But controversy ceased; the other point of view completely disappeared; it ceased to be
discussed. The great puzzle of effective demand with which Malthus had wrestled
vanished from economic literature. You will not find it mentioned even once in the whole
works of Marshall, Edgeworth and Professor Pigou, from whose hands the classical
theory has received its most mature embodiment. It could only live on furtively, below
the surface, in the underworlds of Karl Marx, Silvio Gesell or Major Douglas.

The completeness of the Ricardian victory is something of a curiosity and a mystery. It

must have been due to a complex of suitabilities in the doctrine to the environment into
which it was projected. That it reached conclusions quite different from what the ordinary
uninstructed person would expect, added, I suppose, to its intellectual prestige. That its
teaching, translated into practice, was austere and often unpalatable, lent it virtue. That it
was adapted to carry a vast and consistent logical superstructure, gave it beauty. That it
could explain much social injustice and apparent cruelty as an inevitable incident in the
scheme of progress, and the attempt to change such things as likely on the whole to do
more harm than good, commended it to authority. That it afforded a measure of
justification to the free activities of the individual capitalist, attracted to it the support of
the dominant social force behind authority.

But although the doctrine itself has remained unquestioned by orthodox economists up to
a late date, its signal failure for purposes of scientific prediction has greatly impaired, in
the course of time, the prestige of its practitioners. For professional economists, after
Malthus, were apparently unmoved by the lack of correspondence between the results of
their theory and the facts of observation;a discrepancy which the ordinary man has not
failed to observe, with the result of his growing unwillingness to accord to economists
that measure of respect which he gives to other groups of scientists whose theoretical
results are confirmed by observation when they are applied to the facts.

The celebrated optimism of traditional economic theory, which has led to economists
being looked upon as Candides, who, having left this world for the cultivation of their
gardens, teach that all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds provided we will let
well alone, is also to be traced, I think, to their having neglected to take account of the
drag on prosperity which can be exercised by an insufficiency of effective demand. For
there would obviously be a natural tendency towards the optimum employment of
resources in a society which was functioning after the manner of the classical postulates.
It may well be that the classical theory represents the way in which we should like our
economy to behave. But to assume that it actually does so is to assume our difficulties
away.

1. A precise definition of user cost will be given in Chapter 6.

2. Not to be confused (vide infra) with the supply price of a unit of output in the ordinary sense of
this term.
3. The reader will observe that I am deducting the user cost both from the proceeds and from the
aggregate supply price of a given volume of output, so that both these terms are to be interpreted
net of user cost; whereas the aggregate sums paid by the purchasers are, of course, gross of user
cost. The reasons why this is convenient will be given in Chapter 6. The essential point is that the
aggregate proceeds and aggregate supply price net of user cost can be defined uniquely and
unambiguously; whereas, since user cost is obviously dependent both on the degree of integration
of industry and on the extent to which entrepreneurs buy from one another, there can be no
definition of the aggregate sums paid by purchasers, inclusive of user cost, which is independent of
these factors. There is a similar difficulty even in defining supply price in the ordinary sense for an
individual producer; and in the case of the aggregate supply price of output as a whole serious
difficulties of duplication are involved, which have not always been faced. If the term is to be
interpreted gross of user cost, they can only be overcome by making special assumptions relating
to the integration of entrepreneurs in groups according as they produce consumption-goods or
capital-goods which are obscure and complicated in themselves and do not correspond to the facts.
If, however, aggregate supply price is defined as above net of user cost, the difficulties do not arise.
The reader is advised, however, to await the fuller discussion in Chapter 6 and its appendix.

4. An entrepreneur, who has to reach a practical decision as to his scale of production, does not, of
course, entertain a single undoubting expectation of what the sale-proceeds of a given output will
be, but several hypothetical expectations held with varying degrees of probability and definiteness.
By his expectation of proceeds I mean, therefore, that expectation of proceeds which, if it were
held with certainty, would lead to the same behaviour as does the bundle of vague and more
various possibilities which actually makes up his state of expectation when he reaches his decision.

5. In Chapter 20 a function closely related to the above will be called the employment function.

6. Defined in Chapter 10, below.

Chapter 4

THE CHOICE OF UNITS

In this and the next three chapters we shall be occupied with an attempt to clear up
certain perplexities which have no peculiar or exclusive relevance to the problems which
it is our special purpose to examine. Thus these chapters are in the nature of a digression,
which will prevent us for a time from pursuing our main theme. Their subject-matter is
only discussed here because it does not happen to have been already treated elsewhere in
a way which I find adequate to the needs of my own particular enquiry.

The three perplexities which most impeded my progress in writing this book, so that I
could not express myself conveniently until I had found some solution for them, are:
firstly, the choice of the units of quantity appropriate to the problems of the economic
system as a whole; secondly, the part played by expectation in economic analysis; and,
thirdly, the definition of income.

II

That the units, in terms of which economists commonly work, are unsatisfactory can be
illustrated by the concepts of the national dividend, the stock of real capital and the
general price-level:

(i) The national dividend, as defined by Marshall and Professor Pigou[1], measures the
volume of current output or real income and not the value of output or money-income[2].
Furthermore, it depends, in some sense, on net output;on the net addition, that is to say,
to the resources of the community available for consumption or for retention as capital
stock, due to the economic activities and sacrifices of the current period, after allowing
for the wastage of the stock of real capital existing at the commencement of the period.
On this basis an attempt is made to erect a quantitative science. But it is a grave objection
to this definition for such a purpose that the community's output of goods and services is
a non-homogeneous complex which cannot be measured, strictly speaking, except in
certain special cases, as for example when all the items of one output are included in the
same proportions in another output.

(ii) The difficulty is even greater when, in order to calculate net output, we try to measure
the net addition to capital equipment; for we have to find some basis for a quantitative
comparison between the new items of equipment produced during the period and the old
items which have perished by wastage. In order to arrive at the net national dividend,
Professor Pigou[3] deducts such obsolescence, etc., 'as may fairly be called "normal"; and
the practical test of normality is that the depletion is sufficiently regular to be foreseen, if
not in detail, at least in the large'. But, since this deduction is not a deduction in terms of
money, he is involved in assuming that there can be a change in physical quantity,
although there has been no physical change; i.e. he is covertly introducing changes in
value.

Moreover, he is unable to devise any satisfactory formula[4] to evaluate new equipment

against old when, owing to changes in technique, the two are not identical. I believe that
the concept at which Professor Pigou is aiming is the right and appropriate concept for
economic analysis. But, until a satisfactory system of units has been adopted, its precise
definition is an impossible task. The problem of comparing one real output with another
and of then calculating net output by setting off new items of equipment against the
wastage of old items presents conundrums which permit, one can confidently say, of no
solution.

(iii) Thirdly, the well-known, but unavoidable, element of vagueness which admittedly
attends the concept of the general price-level makes this term very unsatisfactory for the
purposes of a causal analysis, which ought to be exact.

Nevertheless these difficulties are rightly regarded as 'conundrums'. They are 'purely
theoretical' in the sense that they never perplex, or indeed enter in any way into, business
decisions and have no relevance to the causal sequence of economic events, which are
clear-cut and determinate in spite of the quantitative indeterminacy of these concepts. It is
natural, therefore, to conclude that they not only lack precision but are unnecessary.
Obviously our quantitative analysis must be expressed without using any quantitatively
vague expressions. And, indeed, as soon as one makes the attempt, it becomes clear, as I
hope to show, that one can get on much better without them.

The fact that two incommensurable collections of miscellaneous objects cannot in

themselves provide the material for a quantitative analysis need not, of course, prevent us
from making approximate statistical comparisons, depending on some broad element of
judgment rather than of strict calculation, which may possess significance and validity
within certain limits.

But the proper place for such things as net real output and the general level of prices lies
within the field of historical and statistical description, and their purpose should be to
satisfy historical or social curiosity, a purpose for which perfect precisionsuch as our
causal analysis requires, whether or not our knowledge of the actual values of the
relevant quantities is complete or exactis neither usual nor necessary. To say that net
output to-day is greater, but the price-level lower, than ten years ago or one year ago, is a
proposition of a similar character to the statement that Queen Victoria was a better queen
but not a happier woman than Queen Elizabetha proposition not without meaning and
not without interest, but unsuitable as material for the differential calculus. Our precision
will be a mock precision if we try to use such partly vague and non-quantitative concepts
as the basis of a quantitative analysis.
III

On every particular occasion, let it be remembered, an entrepreneur is concerned with

decisions as to the scale on which to work a given capital equipment; and when we say
that the expectation of an increased demand, i.e. a raising of the aggregate demand
function, will lead to an increase in aggregate output, we really mean that the firms,
which own the capital equipment, will be induced to associate with it a greater aggregate
employment of labour. In the case of an individual firm or industry producing a
homogeneous product we can speak legitimately, if we wish, of increases or decreases of
output. But when we are aggregating the activities of all firms, we cannot speak
accurately except in terms of quantities of employment applied to a given equipment. The
concepts of output as a whole and its price-level are not required in this context, since we
have no need of an absolute measure of current aggregate output, such as would enable us
to compare its amount with the amount which would result from the association of a
different capital equipment with a different quantity of employment. When, for purposes
of description or rough comparison, we wish to speak of an increase of output, we must
rely on the general presumption that the amount of employment associated with a given
capital equipment will be a satisfactory index of the amount of resultant output;the two
being presumed to increase and decrease together, though not in a definite numerical
proportion.

In dealing with the theory of employment I propose, therefore, to make use of only two
fundamental units of quantity, namely, quantities of money-value and quantities of
employment. The first of these is strictly homogeneous, and the second can be made so.
For, in so far as different grades and kinds of labour and salaried assistance enjoy a more
or less fixed relative remuneration, the quantity of employment can be sufficiently
defined for our purpose by taking an hour's employment of ordinary labour as our unit
and weighting an hour's employment of special labour in proportion to its remuneration;
i.e. an hour of special labour remunerated at double ordinary rates will count as two units.
We shall call the unit in which the quantity of employment is measured the labour-unit;
and the money-wage of a labour-unit we shall call the wage-unit[5]. Thus, if E is the
wages (and salaries) bill, W the wage-unit, and N the quantity of employment,
E = N W.

This assumption of homogeneity in the supply of labour is not upset by the obvious fact
of great differences in the specialised skill of individual workers and in their suitability
for different occupations. For, if the remuneration of the workers is proportional to their
efficiency, the differences are dealt with by our having regarded individuals as
contributing to the supply of labour in proportion to their remuneration; whilst if, as
output increases, a given firm has to bring in labour which is less and less efficient for its
special purposes per wage-unit paid to it, this is merely one factor among others leading
to a diminishing return from the capital equipment in terms of output as more labour is
employed on it. We subsume, so to speak, the non-homogeneity of equally remunerated
labour units in the equipment, which we regard as less and less adapted to employ the
available labour units as output increases, instead of regarding the available labour units
as less and less adapted to use a homogeneous capital equipment. Thus if there is no
surplus of specialised or practised labour and the use of less suitable labour involves a
higher labour cost per unit of output, this means that the rate at which the return from the
equipment diminishes as employment increases is more rapid than it would be if there
were such a surplus[6]. Even in the limiting case where different labour units were so
highly specialised as to be altogether incapable of being substituted for one another, there
is no awkwardness; for this merely means that the elasticity of supply of output from a
particular type of capital equipment falls suddenly to zero when all the available labour
specialised to its use is already employed[7]. Thus our assumption of a homogeneous unit
of labour involves no difficulties unless there is great instability in the relative
remuneration of different labour-units; and even this difficulty can be dealt with, if it
arises, by supposing a rapid liability to change in the supply of labour and the shape of
the aggregate supply function.

It is my belief that much unnecessary perplexity can be avoided if we limit ourselves

strictly to the two units, money and labour, when we are dealing with the behaviour of the
economic system as a whole; reserving the use of units of particular outputs and
equipments to the occasions when we are analysing the output of individual firms or
industries in isolation; and the use of vague concepts, such as the quantity of output as a
whole, the quantity of capital equipment as a whole and the general level of prices, to the
occasions when we are attempting some historical comparison which is within certain
(perhaps fairly wide) limits avowedly imprecise and approximate.

It follows that we shall measure changes in current output by reference to the number of
hours of labour paid for (whether to satisfy consumers or to produce fresh capital
equipment) on the existing capital equipment, hours of skilled labour being weighted in
proportion to their remuneration. We have no need of a quantitative comparison between
this output and the output which would result from associating a different set of workers
with a different capital equipment. To predict how entrepreneurs possessing a given
equipment will respond to a shift in the aggregate demand function it is not necessary to
know how the quantity of the resulting output, the standard of life and the general level of
prices would compare with what they were at a different date or in another country.

IV

It is easily shown that the conditions of supply, such as are usually expressed in terms of
the supply curve, and the elasticity of supply relating output to price, can be handled in
terms of our two chosen units by means of the aggregate supply function, without
reference to quantities of output, whether we are concerned with a particular firm or
industry or with economic activity as a whole. For the aggregate supply function for a
given firm (and similarly for a given industry or for industry as a whole) is given by

Zr = r(Nr),

where Zr is the proceeds (net of user cost) the expectation of which will induce a level of
employment Nr. If, therefore, the relation between employment and output is such that an
employment Nr results in an output Or, where Or = r(Nr), it follows that
 Zr + Ur(Nr) r(Nr) + Ur(Nr)
p = =
Or r(Nr)

is the ordinary supply curve, where Ur(Nr) is the (expected) user cost corresponding to a
level of employment Nr.

Thus in the case of each homogeneous commodity, for which Or = r(Nr) has a definite
meaning, we can evaluate Zr = r(Nr) in the ordinary way; but we can then aggregate
the Nr's in a way in which we cannot aggregate the Or's, since Or is not a numerical
quantity. Moreover, if we can assume that, in a given environment, a given aggregate
employment will be distributed in a unique way between different industries, so that Nr is
a function of N, further simplifications are possible.

1. Vide Pigou, Economics of Welfare, passim, and particularly Part I. chap. iii.

2. Though, as a convenient compromise, the real income, which is taken to constitute the National
Dividend, is usually limited to those goods and services which can be bought for money.

3. Economics of Welfare, Part I. chap. v., on What is meant by maintaining Capital intact; as
amended by a recent article in the Economic Journal, June 1935, p. 225.

4. Cf. Prof. Hayeks criticisms, Economica, Aug. 1935, p. 247.

5. If X stands for any quantity measured in terms of money, it will often be convenient to write Xw
for the same quantity measured in terms of the wage-unit.

6. This is the main reason why the supply price of output rises with increasing demand even when
there is still a surplus of equipment identical in type with the equipment in use. If we suppose that
the surplus supply of labour forms a pool equally available to all entrepreneurs and that labour
employed for a given purpose is rewarded, in part at least, per unit of effort and not with strict
regard to its efficiency in its actual particular employment (which is in most cases the realistic
assumption to make), the diminishing efficiency of the labour employed is an outstanding example
of rising supply price with increasing output, not due to internal diseconomies.

7. How the supply curve in ordinary use is supposed to deal with the above difficulty I cannot say,
since those who use this curve have not made their assumptions very clear. Probably they are
assuming that labour employed for a given purpose is always rewarded with strict regard to its
efficiency for that purpose. But this is unrealistic. Perhaps the essential reason for treating the
varying efficiency of labour as though it belonged to the equipment lies in the fact that the
increasing surpluses, which emerge as output is increased, accrue in practice mainly to the owners
of the equipment and not to the more efficient workers (though these may get an advantage
through being employed more regularly and by receiving earlier promotion); that is to say, men of
differing efficiency working at the same job are seldom paid at rates closely proportional to their
efficiencies. Where, however, increased pay for higher efficiency occurs, and in so far as it occurs,
my method takes account of it; since in calculating the number of labour units employed, the
individual workers are weighted in proportion to their remuneration. On my assumptions
interesting complications obviously arise where we are dealing with particular supply curves since
their shape will depend on the demand for suitable labour in other directions. To ignore these
complications would, as I have said, be unrealistic. But we need not consider them when we are
dealing with employment as a whole, provided we assume that a given volume of effective demand
has a particular distribution of this demand between different products uniquely associated with it.
It may be, however, that this would not hold good irrespective of the particular cause of the
change in demand. E.g. an increase in effective demand due to an increased propensity to consume
might find itself faced by a different aggregate supply function from that which would face an
equal increase in demand due to an increased inducement to invest. All this, however, belongs to
the detailed analysis of the general ideas here set forth, which it is no part of my immediate
purpose to pursue.
Chapter 5

EXPECTATION AS DETERMINING OUTPUT AND EMPLOYMENT

All production is for the purpose of ultimately satisfying a consumer. Time usually
elapses, howeverand sometimes much timebetween the incurring of costs by the
producer (with the consumer in view) and the purchase of the output by the ultimate
consumer. Meanwhile the entrepreneur (including both the producer and the investor in
this description) has to form the best expectations he can as to what the consumers will be
prepared to pay when he is ready to supply them (directly or indirectly) after the elapse of
what may be a lengthy period; and he has no choice but to be guided by these
expectations[1], if he is to produce at all by processes which occupy time.

These expectations, upon which business decisions depend, fall into two groups, certain
individuals or firms being specialised in the business of framing the first type of
expectation and others in the business of framing the second. The first type is concerned
with the price which a manufacturer can expect to get for his 'finished' output at the time
when he commits himself to starting the process which will produce it; output being
'finished' (from the point of view of the manufacturer) when it is ready to be used or to be
sold to a second party. The second type is concerned with what the entrepreneur can hope
to earn in the shape of future returns if he purchases (or, perhaps, manufactures) 'finished'
output as an addition to his capital equipment. We may call the former short-term
expectation and the latter long-term expectation.

Thus the behaviour of each individual firm in deciding its daily[2] output will be
determined by its short-term expectationsexpectations as to the cost of output on
various possible scales and expectations as to the sale-proceeds of this output; though, in
the case of additions to capital equipment and even of sales to distributors, these short-
term expectations will largely depend on the long-term (or medium-term) expectations of
other parties. It is upon these various expectations that the amount of employment which
the firms offer will depend. The actually realised results of the production and sale of
output will only be relevant to employment in so far as they cause a modification of
subsequent expectations. Nor, on the other hand, are the original expectations relevant,
which led the firm to acquire the capital equipment and the stock of intermediate products
and half-finished materials with which it finds itself at the time when it has to decide the
next day's output. Thus, on each and every occasion of such a decision, the decision will
be made, with reference indeed to this equipment and stock, but in the light of the current
expectations of prospective costs and sale-proceeds.

Now, in general, a change in expectations (whether short-term or long-term) will only

produce its full effect on employment over a considerable period. The change in
employment due to a change in expectations will not be the same on the second day after
the change as on the first, or the same on the third day as on the second, and so on, even
though there be no further change in expectations. In the case of short-term expectations
this is because changes in expectation are not, as a rule, sufficiently violent or rapid,
when they are for the worse, to cause the abandonment of work on all the productive
processes which, in the light of the revised expectation, it was a mistake to have begun;
whilst, when they are for the better, some time for preparation must needs elapse before
employment can reach the level at which it would have stood if the state of expectation
had been revised sooner. In the case of long-term expectations, equipment which will not
be replaced will continue to give employment until it is worn out; whilst when the change
in long-term expectations is for the better, employment may be at a higher level at first,
than it will be after there has been time to adjust the equipment to the new situation.

If we suppose a state of expectation to continue for a sufficient length of time for the
effect on employment to have worked itself out so completely that there is, broadly
speaking, no piece of employment going on which would not have taken place if the new
state of expectation had always existed, the steady level of employment[3] thus attained
may be called the long-period employment corresponding to that state of expectation. It
follows that, although expectation may change so frequently that the actual level of
employment has never had time to reach the long-period employment corresponding to
the existing state of expectation, nevertheless every state of expectation has its definite
corresponding level of long-period employment.

Let us consider, first of all, the process of transition to a long-period position due to a
change in expectation, which is not confused or interrupted by any further change in
expectation. We will first suppose that the change is of such a character that the new
long-period employment will be greater than the old. Now, as a rule, it will only be the
rate of input which will be much affected at the beginning, that is to say, the volume of
work on the earlier stages of new processes of production, whilst the output of
consumption-goods and the amount of employment on the later stages of processes which
were started before the change will remain much the same as before. In so far as there
were stocks of partly finished goods, this conclusion may be modified; though it is likely
to remain true that the initial increase in employment will be modest. As, however, the
days pass by, employment will gradually increase. Moreover, it is easy to conceive of
conditions which will cause it to increase at some stage to a higher level than the new
long-period employment. For the process of building up capital to satisfy the new state of
expectation may lead to more employment and also to more current consumption than
will occur when the long-period position has been reached. Thus the change in
expectation may lead to a gradual crescendo in the level of employment, rising to a peak
and then declining to the new long-period level. The same thing may occur even if the
new long-period level is the same as the old, if the change represents a change in the
direction of consumption which renders certain existing processes and their equipment
obsolete. Or again, if the new long-period employment is less than the old, the level of
employment during the transition may fall for a time below what the new long-period
level is going to be. Thus a mere change in expectation is capable of producing an
oscillation of the same kind of shape as a cyclical movement, in the course of working
itself out. It was movements of this kind which I discussed in my Treatise on Money in
connection with the building up or the depletion of stocks of working and liquid capital
consequent on change.

An uninterrupted process of transition, such as the above, to a new long-period position

can be complicated in detail. But the actual course of events is more complicated still.
For the state of expectation is liable to constant change, a new expectation being
superimposed long before the previous change has fully worked itself out; so that the
economic machine is occupied at any given time with a number of overlapping activities,
the existence of which is due to various past states of expectation.

II

This leads us to the relevance of this discussion for our present purpose. It is evident from
the above that the level of employment at any time depends, in a sense, not merely on the
existing state of expectation but on the states of expectation which have existed over a
certain past period. Nevertheless past expectations, which have not yet worked
themselves out, are embodied in the to-day's capital equipment with reference to which
the entrepreneur has to make to-day's decisions, and only influence his decisions in so far
as they are so embodied. It follows, therefore, that, in spite of the above, to-day's
employment can be correctly described as being governed by to-day's expectations taken
in conjunction with to-day's capital equipment.

Express reference to current long-term expectations can seldom be avoided. But it will
often be safe to omit express reference to short-term expectation, in view of the fact that
in practice the process of revision of short-term expectation is a gradual and continuous
one, carried on largely in the light of realised results; so that expected and realised results
run into and overlap one another in their influence. For, although output and employment
are determined by the producer's short-term expectations and not by past results, the most
recent results usually play a predominant part in determining what these expectations are.
It would be too complicated to work out the expectations de novo whenever a productive
process was being started; and it would, moreover, be a waste of time since a large part of
the circumstances usually continue substantially unchanged from one day to the next.
Accordingly it is sensible for producers to base their expectations on the assumption that
the most recently realised results will continue, except in so far as there are definite
reasons for expecting a change. Thus in practice there is a large overlap between the
effects on employment of the realised sale-proceeds of recent output and those of the
sale-proceeds expected from current input; and producers' forecasts are more often
gradually modified in the light of results than in anticipation of prospective changes[4].

Nevertheless, we must not forget that, in the case of durable goods, the producer's short-
term expectations are based on the current long-term expectations of the investor; and it
is of the nature of long-term expectations that they cannot be checked at short intervals in
the light of realised results. Moreover, as we shall see in chapter 12, where we shall
consider long-term expectations in more detail, they are liable to sudden revision. Thus
the factor of current long-term expectations cannot be even approximately eliminated or
replaced by realised results.
1. For the method of arriving at an equivalent of these expectations in terms of sale-proceeds see
footnote (3) to p. 24 above.

2. Daily here stands for the shortest interval after which the firm is free to revise its decision as to
how much employment to offer. It is, so to speak, the minimum effective unit of economic time.

3. It is not necessary that the level of long-period employment should be constant, i.e. long-period
conditions are not necessarily static. For example, a steady increase in wealth or population may
constitute a part of the unchanging expectation. The only condition is that the existing
expectations should have been foreseen sufficiently far ahead.

4. This emphasis on the expectation entertained when the decision to produce is taken, meets, I think,
Mr. Hawtreys point that input and accumulation of stocks before prices have fallen or
disappointment in respect of output is reflected in a realised loss relatively to expectation. For the
accumulation of unsold stocks (or decline of forward orders) is precisely the kind of event which is
most likely to cause input to differ from what mere statistics of the sale-proceeds of previous
output would indicate if they were to be projected without criticism into the next period.
Chapter 6

THE DEFINITION OF INCOME, SAVING AND INVESTMENT

I. Income

During any period of time an entrepreneur will have sold finished output to consumers or
to other entrepreneurs for a certain sum which we will designate as A. He will also have
spent a certain sum, designated by A1, on purchasing finished output from other
entrepreneurs. And he will end up with a capital equipment, which term includes both his
stocks of unfinished goods or working capital and his stocks of finished goods, having a
value G.

Some part, however, of A + G A1 will be attributable, not to the activities of the period
in question, but to the capital equipment which he had at the beginning of the period. We
must, therefore, in order to arrive at what we mean by the income of the current period,
deduct from A + G A1 a certain sum, to represent that part of its value which has been
(in some sense) contributed by the equipment inherited from the previous period. The
problem of defining income is solved as soon as we have found a satisfactory method for
calculating this deduction.

There are two possible principles for calculating it, each of which has a certain
significance;one of them in connection with production, and the other in connection
with consumption. Let us consider them in turn.

(i) The actual value G of the capital equipment at the end of the period is the net result of
the entrepreneur, on the one hand, having maintained and improved it during the period,
both by purchases from other entrepreneurs and by work done upon it by himself, and, on
the other hand, having exhausted or depreciated it through using it to produce output. If
he had decided not to use it to produce output, there is, nevertheless, a certain optimum
sum which it would have paid him to spend on maintaining and improving it. Let us
suppose that, in this event, he would have spent B' on its maintenance and improvement,
and that, having had this spent on it, it would have been worth G' at the end of the period.
That is to say, G' B' is the maximum net value which might have been conserved from
the previous period, if it had not been used to produce A. The excess of this potential
value of the equipment over G A1 is the measure of what has been sacrificed (one way
or another) to produce A. Let us call this quantity, namely

(G' B') (G A1),

which measures the sacrifice of value involved in the production of A, the user cost of A.
User cost will be written U[1]. The amount paid out by the entrepreneur to the other
factors of production in return for their services, which from their point of view is their
income, we will call the factor cost of A. The sum of the factor cost F and the user cost U
we shall call the prime cost of the output A.

We can then define the income[2] of the entrepreneur as being the excess of the value of
his finished output sold during the period over his prime cost. The entrepreneur's income,
that is to say, is taken as being equal to the quantity, depending on his scale of production,
which he endeavours to maximise, i.e. to his gross profit in the ordinary sense of this
term;which agrees with common sense. Hence, since the income of the rest of the
community is equal to the entrepreneur's factor cost, aggregate income is equal to A U.

Income, thus defined, is a completely unambiguous quantity. Moreover, since it is the

entrepreneur's expectation of the excess of this quantity over his outgoings to the other
factors of production which he endeavours to maximise when he decides how much
employment to give to the other factors of production, it is the quantity which is causally
significant for employment.

It is conceivable, of course, that G A1 may exceed G' B', so that user cost will be
negative. For example, this may well be the case if we happen to choose our period in
such a way that input has been increasing during the period but without there having been
time for the increased output to reach the stage of being finished and sold. It will also be
the case, whenever there is positive investment, if we imagine industry to be so much
integrated that entrepreneurs make most of their equipment for themselves. Since,
however, user cost is only negative when the entrepreneur has been increasing his capital
equipment by his own labour, we can, in an economy where capital equipment is largely
manufactured by different firms from those which use it, normally think of user cost as
being positive. Moreover, it is difficult to conceive of a case where marginal user cost
associated with an increase in A, i.e. dU/dA, will be other than positive.

It may be convenient to mention here, in anticipation of the latter part of this chapter, that,
for the community as a whole, the aggregate consumption (C) of the period is equal to
(A A1), and the aggregate investment (I) is equal to (A1 U). Moreover, U is the
individual entrepreneur's disinvestment (and U his investment) in respect of his own
equipment exclusive of what he buys from other entrepreneurs. Thus in a completely
integrated system (where A1 = 0) consumption is equal to A and investment to U, i.e.
to G (G' B'). The slight complication of the above, through the introduction of A1, is
simply due to the desirability of providing in a generalised way for the case of a non-
integrated system of production.

Furthermore, the effective demand is simply the aggregate income (or proceeds) which
the entrepreneurs expect to receive, inclusive of the incomes which they will hand on to
the other factors of production, from the amount of current employment which they
decide to give. The aggregate demand function relates various hypothetical quantities of
employment to the proceeds which their outputs are expected to yield; and the effective
demand is the point on the aggregate demand function which becomes effective because,
taken in conjunction with the conditions of supply, it corresponds to the level of
employment which maximises the entrepreneur's expectation of profit.
This set of definitions also has the advantage that we can equate the marginal proceeds
(or income) to the marginal factor cost; and thus arrive at the same sort of propositions
relating marginal proceeds thus defined to marginal factor costs as have been stated by
those economists who, by ignoring user cost or assuming it to be zero, have equated
supply price[3] to marginal factor cost[4].

(ii) We turn, next, to the second of the principles referred to above. We have dealt so far
with that part of the change in the value of the capital equipment at the end of the period
as compared with its value at the beginning which is due to the voluntary decisions of the
entrepreneur in seeking to maximise his profit. But there may, in addition, be an
involuntary loss (or gain) in the value of his capital equipment, occurring for reasons
beyond his control and irrespective of his current decisions, on account of (e.g.) a change
in market values, wastage by obsolescence or the mere passage of time, or destruction by
catastrophe such as war or earthquake. Now some part of these involuntary losses, whilst
they are unavoidable, arebroadly speakingnot unexpected; such as losses through the
lapse of time irrespective of use, and also 'normal' obsolescence which, as Professor
Pigou expresses it, 'is sufficiently regular to be foreseen, if not in detail, at least in the
large', including, we may add, those losses to the community as a whole which are
sufficiently regular to be commonly regarded as 'insurable risks'. Let us ignore for the
moment the fact that the amount of the expected loss depends on when the expectation is
assumed to be framed, and let us call the depreciation of the equipment, which is
involuntary but not unexpected, i.e. the excess of the expected depreciation over the user
cost, the supplementary cost, which will be written V. It is, perhaps, hardly necessary to
point out that this definition is not the same as Marshall's definition of supplementary
cost, though the underlying idea, namely, of dealing with that part of the expected
depreciation which does not enter into prime cost, is similar.

In reckoning, therefore, the net income and the net profit of the entrepreneur it is usual to
deduct the estimated amount of the supplementary cost from his income and gross profit
as defined above. For the psychological effect on the entrepreneur, when he is
considering what he is free to spend and to save, of the supplementary cost is virtually the
same as though it came off his gross profit. In his capacity as a producer deciding
whether or not to use the equipment, prime cost and gross profit, as defined above, are
the significant concepts. But in his capacity as a consumer the amount of the
supplementary cost works on his mind in the same way as if it were a part of the prime
cost. Hence we shall not only come nearest to common usage but will also arrive at a
concept which is relevant to the amount of consumption, if, in defining aggregate net
income, we deduct the supplementary cost as well as the user cost, so that aggregate net
income is equal to A U V.

There remains the change in the value of the equipment, due to unforeseen changes in
market values, exceptional obsolescence or destruction by catastrophe, which is both
involuntary andin a broad senseunforeseen. The actual loss under this head, which
we disregard even in reckoning net income and charge to capital account, may be called
the windfall loss.
The causal significance of net income lies in the psychological influence of the
magnitude of V on the amount of current consumption, since net income is what we
suppose the ordinary man to reckon his available income to be when he is deciding how
much to spend on current consumption. This is not, of course, the only factor of which he
takes account when he is deciding how much to spend. It makes a considerable difference,
for example, how much windfall gain or loss he is making on capital account. But there is
a difference between the supplementary cost and a windfall loss in that changes in the
former are apt to affect him in just the same way as changes in his gross profit. It is the
excess of the proceeds of the current output over the sum of the prime cost and the
supplementary cost which is relevant to the entrepreneur's consumption; whereas,
although the windfall loss (or gain) enters into his decisions, it does not enter into them
on the same scalea given windfall loss does not have the same effect as an equal
supplementary cost.

We must now recur, however, to the point that the line between supplementary costs and
windfall losses, i.e. between those unavoidable losses which we think it proper to debit to
income account and those which it is reasonable to reckon as a windfall loss (or gain) on
capital account, is partly a conventional or psychological one, depending on what are the
commonly accepted criteria for estimating the former. For no unique principle can be
established for the estimation of supplementary cost, and its amount will depend on our
choice of an accounting method. The expected value of the supplementary cost, when the
equipment was originally produced, is a definite quantity. But if it is re-estimated
subsequently, its amount over the remainder of the life of the equipment may have
changed as a result of a change in the meantime in our expectations; the windfall capital
loss being the discounted value of the difference between the former and the revised
expectation of the prospective series of U + V. It is a widely approved principle of
business accounting, endorsed by the Inland Revenue authorities, to establish a figure for
the sum of the supplementary cost and the user cost when the equipment is acquired and
to maintain this unaltered during the life of the equipment, irrespective of subsequent
changes in expectation. In this case the supplementary cost over any period must be taken
as the excess of this predetermined figure over the actual user cost. This has the
advantage of ensuring that the windfall gain or loss shall be zero over the life of the
equipment taken as a whole. But it is also reasonable in certain circumstances to
recalculate the allowance for supplementary cost on the basis of current values and
expectations at an arbitrary accounting interval, e.g. annually. Business men in fact differ
as to which course they adopt. It may be convenient to call the initial expectation of
supplementary cost when the equipment is first acquired the basic supplementary cost,
and the same quantity recalculated up to date on the basis of current values and
expectations the current supplementary cost.

Thus we cannot get closer to a quantitative definition of supplementary cost than that it
comprises those deductions from his income which a typical entrepreneur makes before
reckoning what he considers his net income for the purpose of declaring a dividend (in
the case of a corporation) or of deciding the scale of his current consumption (in the case
of an individual). Since windfall charges on capital account are not going to be ruled out
of the picture, it is clearly better, in case of doubt, to assign an item to capital account,
and to include in supplementary cost only what rather obviously belongs there. For any
overloading of the former can be corrected by allowing it more influence on the rate of
current consumption than it would otherwise have had.

It will be seen that our definition of net income comes very close to Marshall's definition
of income, when he decided to take refuge in the practices of the Income Tax
Commissioners andbroadly speaking to regard as income whatever they, with their
experience, choose to treat as such. For the fabric of their decisions can be regarded as
the result of the most careful and extensive investigation which is available, to interpret
what, in practice, it is usual to treat as net income. It also corresponds to the money value
of Professor Pigou's most recent definition of the national dividend[5].

It remains true, however, that net income, being based on an equivocal criterion which
different authorities might interpret differently, is not perfectly clear-cut. Professor Hayek,
for example, has suggested that an individual owner of capital goods might aim at
keeping the income he derives from his possessions constant, so that he would not feel
himself free to spend his income on consumption until he had set aside sufficient to offset
any tendency of his investment-income to decline for whatever reason[6]. I doubt if such
an individual exists; but, obviously, no theoretical objection can be raised against this
deduction as providing a possible psychological criterion of net income. But when
Professor Hayek infers that the concepts of saving and investment suffer from a
corresponding vagueness, he is only right if he means net saving and net investment. The
saving and the investment, which are relevant to the theory of employment, are clear of
this defect, and are capable of objective definition, as we have shown above.

Thus it is a mistake to put all the emphasis on net income, which is only relevant to
decisions concerning consumption, and is, moreover, only separated from various other
factors affecting consumption by a narrow line; and to overlook (as has been usual) the
concept of income proper, which is the concept relevant to decisions concerning current
production and is quite unambiguous.

The above definitions of income and of net income are intended to conform as closely as
possible to common usage. It is necessary, therefore, that I should at once remind the
reader that in my Treatise on Money I defined income in a special sense. The peculiarity
in my former definition related to that part of aggregate income which accrues to the
entrepreneurs, since I took neither the profit (whether gross or net) actually realised from
their current operations nor the profit which they expected when they decided to
undertake their current operations, but in some sense (not, as I now think, sufficiently
defined if we allow for the possibility of changes in the scale of output) a normal or
equilibrium profit; with the result that on this definition saving exceeded investment by
the amount of the excess of normal profit over the actual profit. I am afraid that this use
of terms has caused considerable confusion, especially in the case of the correlative use
of saving; since conclusions (relating, in particular, to the excess of saving over
investment), which were only valid if the terms employed were interpreted in my special
sense, have been frequently adopted in popular discussion as though the terms were being
employed in their more familiar sense. For this reason, and also because I no longer
require my former terms to express my ideas accurately, I have decided to discard
themwith much regret for the confusion which they have caused.

II. Saving and Investment

Amidst the welter of divergent usages of terms, it is agreeable to discover one fixed point.
So far as I know, everyone is agreed that saving means the excess of income over
expenditure on consumption. Thus any doubts about the meaning of saving must arise
from doubts about the meaning either of income or of consumption. Income we have
defined above. Expenditure on consumption during any period must mean the value of
goods sold to consumers during that period, which throws us back to the question of what
is meant by a consumer-purchaser. Any reasonable definition of the line between
consumer-purchasers and investor-purchasers will serve us equally well, provided that it
is consistently applied. Such problem as there is, e.g. whether it is right to regard the
purchase of a motor-car as a consumer-purchase and the purchase of a house as an
investor-purchase, has been frequently discussed and I have nothing material to add to the
discussion.

The criterion must obviously correspond to where we draw the line between the
consumer and the entrepreneur. Thus when we have defined A1 as the value of what one
entrepreneur has purchased from another, we have implicitly settled the question. It
follows that expenditure on consumption can be unambiguously defined as (A A1),
where A is the total sales made during the period and A1 is the total sales made by one
entrepreneur to another. In what follows it will be convenient, as a rule, to omit and write
A for the aggregate sales of all kinds, A1 for the aggregate sales from one entrepreneur to
another and U for the aggregate user costs of the entrepreneurs.

Having now defined both income and consumption, the definition of saving, which is the
excess of income over consumption, naturally follows. Since income is equal to A U
and consumption is equal to A A1, it follows that saving is equal to A1 U. Similarly,
we have net saving for the excess of net income over consumption, equal to A1 U V.

Our definition of income also leads at once to the definition of current investment. For we
must mean by this the current addition to the value of the capital equipment which has
resulted from the productive activity of the period. This is, clearly, equal to what we have
just defined as saving. For it is that part of the income of the period which has not passed
into consumption. We have seen above that as the result of the production of any period
entrepreneurs end up with having sold finished output having a value A and with a capital
equipment which has suffered a deterioration measured by U (or an improvement
measured by U where U is negative) as a result of having produced and parted with A,
after allowing for purchases A1 from other entrepreneurs. During the same period finished
output having a value A A1 will have passed into consumption. The excess of A U
over A A1, namely A1 U, is the addition to capital equipment as a result of the
productive activities of the period and is, therefore, the investment of the period.
Similarly A1 U V; which is the net addition to capital equipment, after allowing for
normal impairment in the value of capital apart from its being used and apart from
windfall changes in the value of the equipment chargeable to capital account, is the net
investment of the period.

Whilst, therefore, the amount of saving is an outcome of the collective behaviour of

individual consumers and the amount of investment of the collective behaviour of
individual entrepreneurs, these two amounts are necessarily equal, since each of them is
equal to the excess of income over consumption. Moreover, this conclusion in no way
depends on any subtleties or peculiarities in the definition of income given above.
Provided it is agreed that income is equal to the value of current output, that current
investment is equal to the value of that part of current output which is not consumed, and
that saving is equal to the excess of income over consumptionall of which is
conformable both to common sense and to the traditional usage of the great majority of
economiststhe equality of saving and investment necessarily follows. In short,

Income = value of output = consumption + investment.

Saving = income consumption.

Therefore saving = investment.

Thus any set of definitions which satisfy the above conditions leads to the same
conclusion. It is only by denying the validity of one or other of them that the conclusion
can be avoided.

The equivalence between the quantity of saving and the quantity of investment emerges
from the bilateral character of the transactions between the producer on the one hand and,
on the other hand, the consumer or the purchaser of capital equipment.

Income is created by the value in excess of user cost which the producer obtains for the
output he has sold; but the whole of this output must obviously have been sold either to a
consumer or to another entrepreneur; and each entrepreneur's current investment is equal
to the excess of the equipment which he has purchased from other entrepreneurs over his
own user cost. Hence, in the aggregate the excess of income over consumption, which we
call saving, cannot differ from the addition to capital equipment which we call investment.
And similarly with net saving and net investment. Saving, in fact, is a mere residual. The
decisions to consume and the decisions to invest between them determine incomes.
Assuming that the decisions to invest become effective, they must in doing so either
curtail consumption or expand income. Thus the act of investment in itself cannot help
causing the residual or margin, which we call saving, to increase by a corresponding
amount.

It might be, of course, that individuals were so tte monte in their decisions as to how
much they themselves would save and invest respectively, that there would be no point of
price equilibrium at which transactions could take place. In this case our terms would
cease to be applicable, since output would no longer have a definite market value, prices
would find no resting-place between zero and infinity. Experience shows, however, that
this, in fact, is not so; and that there are habits of psychological response which allow of
an equilibrium being reached at which the readiness to buy is equal to the readiness to
sell. That there should be such a thing as a market value for output is, at the same time, a
necessary condition for money-income to possess a definite value and a sufficient
condition for the aggregate amount which saving individuals decide to save to be equal to
the aggregate amount which investing individuals decide to invest.

Clearness of mind on this matter is best reached, perhaps, by thinking in terms of

decisions to consume (or to refrain from consuming) rather than of decisions to save. A
decision to consume or not to consume truly lies within the power of the individual; so
does a decision to invest or not to invest. The amounts of aggregate income and of
aggregate saving are the results of the free choices of individuals whether or not to
consume and whether or not to invest; but they are neither of them capable of assuming
an independent value resulting from a separate set of decisions taken irrespective of the
decisions concerning consumption and investment. In accordance with this principle, the
conception of the propensity to consume will, in what follows, take the place of the
propensity or disposition to save.

1. Some further observations on user cost are given in an appendix to this chapter.

2. As distinguished from his net income which we shall define below.

3. Supply price is, I think, an incompletely defined term, if the problem of defining user cost has been
ignored. The matter is further discussed in the appendix to this chapter, where I argue that the
exclusion of user cost from supply price, whilst sometimes appropriate in the case of aggregate
supply price, is inappropriate to the problems of the supply price of a unit of output for an
individual firm.

4. For example, let us take Zw = f(N), or alternatively Z = W. f(N) as the aggregate supply function
(where W is the wage-unit and W.Zw = Z). Then, since the proceeds of the marginal product is
equal to the marginal factor-cost at every point on the aggregate supply curve, we have

N = Aw - Uw = Zw = (N),

that is to say f'(N) = 1; provided that factor cost bears a constant ratio to wage-cost, and that the
aggregate supply function for each firm (the number of which is assumed to be constant) is
independent of the number of men employed in other industries, so that the terms of the above
equation, which hold good for each individual entrepreneur, can be summed for the entrepreneurs
as a whole. This means that, if wages are constant and other factor costs are a constant proportion
of the wages-bill, the aggregate supply function is linear with a slope given by the reciprocal of the
money-wage.

5. Economic Journal, June 1935, p. 235.

6. The Maintenance of Capital, Economica, August 1935, p. 241 et seq.

APPENDIX ON USER COST

User cost has, I think, an importance for the classical theory of value which has been
overlooked. There is more to be said about it than would be relevant or appropriate in this
place. But, as a digression, we will examine it somewhat further in this appendix.

An entrepreneur's user cost is by definition equal to

A1 + (G' B') G,

where A1 is the amount of our entrepreneur's purchases from other entrepreneurs, G the
actual value of his capital equipment at the end of the period, and G' the value it might
have had at the end of the period if he had refrained from using it and had spent the
optimum sum B' on its maintenance and improvement. Now G (G' B'), namely the
increment in the value of the entrepreneur's equipment beyond the net value which he has
inherited from the previous period, represents the entrepreneur's current investment in his
equipment and can be written I. Thus U, the user cost of his sales-turnover A, is equal to
A1 I where A1 is what he has bought from other entrepreneurs and I is what he has
currently invested in his own equipment. A little reflection will show that all this is no
more than common sense. Some part of his outgoings to other entrepreneurs is balanced
by the value of his current investment in his own equipment, and the rest represents the
sacrifice which the output he has sold must have cost him over and above the total sum
which he has paid out to the factors of production. If the reader tries to express the
substance of this otherwise, he will find that its advantage lies in its avoidance of
insoluble (and unnecessary) accounting problems. There is, I think, no other way of
analysing the current proceeds of production unambiguously. If industry is completely
integrated or if the entrepreneur has bought nothing from outside, so that A1 = 0, the user
cost is simply the equivalent of the current disinvestment involved in using the
equipment; but we are still left with the advantage that we do not require at any stage of
the analysis to allocate the factor cost between the goods which are sold and the
equipment which is retained. Thus we can regard the employment given by a firm,
whether integrated or individual, as depending on a single consolidated decisiona
procedure which corresponds to the actual interlocking character of the production of
what is currently sold with total production.

The concept of user cost enables us, moreover, to give a clearer definition than that
usually adopted of the short-period supply price of a unit of a firm's saleable output. For
the short-period supply price is the sum of the marginal factor cost and the marginal user
cost.
Now in the modern theory of value it has been a usual practice to equate the short-period
supply price to the marginal factor cost alone. It is obvious, however, that this is only
legitimate if marginal user cost is zero or if supply price is specially defined so as to be
net of marginal user cost, just as I have defined (p. 24 above) 'proceeds' and 'aggregate
supply price' as being net of aggregate user cost. But, whereas it may be occasionally
convenient in dealing with output as a whole to deduct user cost, this procedure deprives
our analysis of all reality if it is habitually (and tacitly) applied to the output of a single
industry or firm, since it divorces the 'supply price' of an article from any ordinary sense
of its 'price'; and some confusion may have resulted from the practice of doing so. It
seems to have been assumed that 'supply price' has an obvious meaning as applied to a
unit of the saleable output of an individual firm, and the matter has not been deemed to
require discussion. Yet the treatment both of what is purchased from other firms and of
the wastage of the firm's own equipment as a consequence of producing the marginal
output involves the whole pack of perplexities which attend the definition of income. For,
even if we assume that the marginal cost of purchases from other firms involved in
selling an additional unit of output has to be deducted from the sale-proceeds per unit in
order to give us what we mean by our firm's supply price, we still have to allow for the
marginal disinvestment in the firm's own equipment involved in producing the marginal
output. Even if all production is carried on by a completely integrated firm, it is still
illegitimate to suppose that the marginal user cost is zero, i.e. that the marginal
disinvestment in equipment due to the production of the marginal output can generally be
neglected.

The concepts of user cost and of supplementary cost also enable us to establish a clearer
relationship between long-period supply price and short-period supply price. Long-period
cost must obviously include an amount to cover the basic supplementary cost as well as
the expected prime cost appropriately averaged over the life of the equipment. That is to
say, the long-period cost of the output is equal to the expected sum of the prime cost and
the supplementary cost; and, furthermore, in order to yield a normal profit, the long-
period supply price must exceed the long-period cost thus calculated by an amount
determined by the current rate of interest on loans of comparable term and risk, reckoned
as a percentage of the cost of the equipment. Or if we prefer to take a standard 'pure' rate
of interest, we must include in the long-period cost a third term which we might call the
risk-cost to cover the unknown possibilities of the actual yield differing from the
expected yield. Thus the long-period supply price is equal to the sum of the prime cost,
the supplementary cost, the risk cost and the interest cost, into which several components
it can be analysed. The short-period supply price, on the other hand, is equal to the
marginal prime cost. The entrepreneur must, therefore, expect, when he buys or
constructs his equipment, to cover his supplementary cost, his risk cost and his interest
cost out of the excess of the marginal value of the prime cost over its average value; so
that in long-period equilibrium the excess of the marginal prime cost over the average
prime cost is equal to the sum of the supplementary, risk and interest costs[1].

The level of output, at which marginal prime cost is exactly equal to the sum of the
average prime and supplementary costs, has a special importance, because it is the point
at which the entrepreneur's trading account breaks even. It corresponds, that is to say, to
the point of zero net profit; whilst with a smaller output than this he is trading at a net
loss.

The extent to which the supplementary cost has to be provided for apart from the prime
cost varies very much from one type of equipment to another. Two extreme cases are the
following:

(i) Some part of the maintenance of the equipment must necessarily take place pari passu
with the act of using it (e.g. oiling the machine). The expense of this (apart from outside
purchases) is included in the factor cost. If, for physical reasons, the exact amount of the
whole of the current depreciation has necessarily to be made good in this way, the
amount of the user cost (apart from outside purchases) would be equal and opposite to
that of the supplementary cost; and in long-period equilibrium the marginal factor cost
would exceed the average factor cost by an amount equal to the risk and interest cost.

(ii) Some part of the deterioration in the value of the equipment only occurs if it is used.
The cost of this is charged in user cost, in so far as it is not made good pari passu with
the act of using it. If loss in the value of the equipment could only occur in this way,
supplementary cost would be zero.

It may be worth pointing out that an entrepreneur does not use his oldest and worst
equipment first, merely because its user cost is low; since its low user cost may be
outweighed by its relative inefficiency, i.e. by its high factor cost. Thus an entrepreneur
uses by preference that part of his equipment for which the user cost plus factor cost is
least per unit of output[2]. It follows that for any given volume of output of the product in
question there is a corresponding user cost[3], but that this total user cost does not bear a
uniform relation to the marginal user cost, i.e. to the increment of user cost due to an
increment in the rate of output.

II

User cost constitutes one of the links between the present and the future. For in deciding
his scale of production an entrepreneur has to exercise a choice between using up his
equipment now and preserving it to be used later on. It is the expected sacrifice of future
benefit involved in present use which determines the amount of the user cost, and it is the
marginal amount of this sacrifice which, together with the marginal factor cost and the
expectation of the marginal proceeds, determines his scale of production. How, then, is
the user cost of an act of production calculated by the entrepreneur?

We have defined the user cost as the reduction in the value of the equipment due to using
it as compared with not using it, after allowing for the cost of the maintenance and
improvements which it would be worth while to undertake and for purchases from other
entrepreneurs. It must be arrived at, therefore, by calculating the discounted value of the
additional prospective yield which would be obtained at some later date if it were not
used now. Now this must be at least equal to the present value of the opportunity to
postpone replacement which will result from laying up the equipment; and it may be
more[4].

If there is no surplus or redundant stock, so that more units of similar equipment are
being newly produced every year either as an addition or in replacement, it is evident that
marginal user cost will be calculable by reference to the amount by which the life or
efficiency of the equipment will be shortened if it is used, and the current replacement
cost. If, however, there is redundant equipment, then the user cost will also depend on the
rate of interest and the current (i.e. re-estimated) supplementary cost over the period of
time before the redundancy is expected to be absorbed through wastage, etc. In this way
interest cost and current supplementary cost enter indirectly into the calculation of user
cost.

The calculation is exhibited in its simplest and most intelligible form when the factor cost
is zero, e.g. in the case of a redundant stock of a raw material such as copper, on the lines
which I have worked out in my Treatise on Money, vol. ii. chap. 29. Let us take the
prospective values of copper at various future dates, a series which will be governed by
the rate at which redundancy is being absorbed and gradually approaches the estimated
normal cost. The present value or user cost of a ton of surplus copper will then be equal
to the greatest of the values obtainable by subtracting from the estimated future value at
any given date of a ton of copper the interest cost and the current supplementary cost on a
ton of copper between that date and the present.

In the same way the user cost of a ship or factory or machine, when these equipments are
in redundant supply, is its estimated replacement cost discounted at the percentage rate of
its interest and current supplementary costs to the prospective date of absorption of the
redundancy.

We have assumed above that the equipment will be replaced in due course by an identical
article. If the equipment in question will not be renewed identically when it is worn out,
then its user cost has to be calculated by taking a proportion of the user cost of the new
equipment, which will be erected to do its work when it is discarded, given by its
comparative efficiency.

III

The reader should notice that, where the equipment is not obsolescent but merely
redundant for the time being, the difference between the actual user cost and its normal
value (i.e. the value when there is no redundant equipment) varies with the interval of
time which is expected to elapse before the redundancy is absorbed. Thus if the type of
equipment in question is of all ages and not 'bunched', so that a fair proportion is reaching
the end of its life annually, the marginal user cost will not decline greatly unless the
redundancy is exceptionally excessive. In the case of a general slump, marginal user cost
will depend on how long entrepreneurs expect the slump to last. Thus the rise in the
supply price when affairs begin to mend may be partly due to a sharp increase in
marginal user cost due to a revision of their expectations.
It has sometimes been argued, contrary to the opinion of business men, that organised
schemes for scrapping redundant plant cannot have the desired effect of raising prices
unless they apply to the whole of the redundant plant. But the concept of user cost shows
how the scrapping of (say) half the redundant plant may have the effect of raising prices
immediately. For by bringing the date of the absorption of the redundancy nearer, this
policy raises marginal user cost and consequently increases the current supply price. Thus
business men would seem to have the notion of user cost implicitly in mind, though they
do not formulate it distinctly. If the supplementary cost is heavy, it follows that the
marginal user cost will be low when there is surplus equipment. Moreover, when there is
surplus equipment, the marginal factor and user costs are unlikely to be much in excess of
their average value. If both these conditions are fulfilled, the existence of surplus
equipment is likely to lead to the entrepreneur's working at a net loss, and perhaps at a
heavy net loss. There will not be a sudden transition from this state of affairs to a normal
profit, taking place at the moment when the redundancy is absorbed. As the redundancy
becomes less, the user cost will gradually increase; and the excess of marginal over
average factor and user cost may also gradually increase.

IV

In Marshall's Principles of Economics (6th ed. p.360) a part of user cost is included in
prime cost under the heading of 'extra wear-and-tear of plant'. But no guidance is given as
to how this item is to be calculated or as to its importance. In his Theory of
Unemployment (p.42) Professor Pigou expressly assumes that the marginal disinvestment
in equipment due to the marginal output can, in general, be neglected: 'The differences in
the quantity of wear-and-tear suffered by equipment and in the costs of non-manual
labour employed, that are associated with differences in output, are ignored, as being, in
general, of secondary importance'[5]. Indeed, the notion that the disinvestment in
equipment is zero at the margin of production runs through a good deal of recent
economic theory. But the whole problem is brought to an obvious head as soon as it is
thought necessary to explain exactly what is meant by the supply price of an individual
firm.

It is true that the cost of maintenance of idle plant may often, for the reasons given above,
reduce the magnitude of marginal user cost, especially in a slump which is expected to
last a long time. Nevertheless a very low user cost at the margin is not a characteristic of
the short period as such, but of particular situations and types of equipment where the
cost of maintaining idle plant happens to be heavy, and of those disequilibria which are
characterised by very rapid obsolescence or great redundancy, especially if it is coupled
with a large proportion of comparatively new plant.

In the case of raw materials the necessity of allowing for user cost is obvious;if a ton of
copper is used up to-day it cannot be used to-morrow, and the value which the copper
would have for the purposes of to-morrow must clearly he reckoned as a part of the
marginal cost. But the fact has been overlooked that copper is only an extreme case of
what occurs whenever capital equipment is used to produce. The assumption that there is
a sharp division between raw materials where we must allow for the disinvestment due to
using them and fixed capital where we can safely neglect it does not correspond to the
facts;especially in normal conditions where equipment is falling due for replacement
every year and the use of equipment brings nearer the date at which replacement is
necessary.

It is an advantage of the concepts of user cost and supplementary cost that they are as
applicable to working and liquid capital as to fixed capital. The essential difference
between raw materials and fixed capital lies not in their liability to user and
supplementary costs, but in the fact that the return to liquid capital consists of a single
term; whereas in the case of fixed capital, which is durable and used up gradually, the
return consists of a series of user costs and profits earned in successive periods.

1. This way of putting it depends on the convenient assumption that the marginal prime cost curve is
continuous throughout its length for changes in output. In fact, this assumption is often unrealistic,
and there may be one or more points of discontinuity, especially when we reach an output
corresponding to the technical full capacity of the equipment. In this case the marginal analysis
partially breaks down; and the price may exceed the marginal prime cost, where the latter is
reckoned in respect of a small decrease of output. (Similarly there may often be a discontinuity in
the downward direction. i.e. for a reduction in output below a certain point). This is important
when we are considering the short-period supply price in long-period equilibrium, since in that
case any discontinuities, which may exist corresponding to a point of technical full capacity, must
be supposed to be in operation. Thus the short-period supply price in long-period equilibrium may
have to exceed the marginal prime cost (reckoned in terms of a small decrease of output).

2. Since user cost partly depends on expectations as to the future level of wages, a reduction in the
wage-unit which is expected to be short-lived will cause factor cost and user cost to move in
different proportions and so affect what equipment is used, and, conceivably, the level of effective
demand, since factor cost may enter into the determination of effective demand in a different way
from user cost.

3. The user cost of the equipment which is first brought into use is not only independent of the total
volume of output (see below); i.e. the user cost may be affected all along the line when the total
volume of output is changed.

4. It will be more when it is expected that a more than normal yield can be obtained at some later
date, which, however, is not expected to last long enough to justify (or give time for) the
production of new equipment. To-days user cost is equal to the maximum of the discounted values
of the potential expected yields of all the tomorrows.

5. Mr. Hawtrey (Economica, May 1934, p. 145) has called attention to Prof. Pigous identification of
supply price with marginal labour cost, and has contended that Prof. Pigous argument is thereby
seriously vitiated.
Chapter 7

THE MEANING OF SAVING AND INVESTMENT FURTHER

CONSIDERED

In the previous chapter saving and investment have been so defined that they are
necessarily equal in amount, being, for the community as a whole, merely different
aspects of the same thing. Several contemporary writers (including myself in my Treatise
on Money) have, however, given special definitions of these terms on which they are not
necessarily equal. Others have written on the assumption that they may be unequal
without prefacing their discussion with any definitions at all. It will be useful, therefore,
with a view to relating the foregoing to other discussions of these terms, to classify some
of the various uses of them which appear to be current.

So far as I know, everyone agrees in meaning by saving the excess of income over what
is spent on consumption. It would certainly be very inconvenient and misleading not to
mean this. Nor is there any important difference of opinion as to what is meant by
expenditure on consumption. Thus the differences of usage arise either out of the
definition of investment or out of that of income.

II

Let us take investment first. In popular usage it is common to mean by this the purchase
of an asset, old or new, by an individual or a corporation. Occasionally, the term might be
restricted to the purchase of an asset on the Stock Exchange. But we speak just as readily
of investing, for example, in a house, or in a machine, or in a stock of finished or
unfinished goods; and, broadly speaking, new investment, as distinguished from
reinvestment, means the purchase of a capital asset of any kind out of income. If we
reckon the sale of an investment as being negative investment, i.e. disinvestment, my
own definition is in accordance with popular usage; since exchanges of old investments
necessarily cancel out. We have, indeed, to adjust for the creation and discharge of debts
(including changes in the quantity of credit or money); but since for the community as a
whole the increase or decrease of the aggregate creditor position is always exactly equal
to the increase or decrease of the aggregate debtor position, this complication also cancels
out when we are dealing with aggregate investment. Thus, assuming that income in the
popular sense corresponds to my net income, aggregate investment in the popular sense
coincides with my definition of net investment, namely the net addition to all kinds of
capital equipment, after allowing for those changes in the value of the old capital
equipment which are taken into account in reckoning net income.

Investment, thus defined, includes, therefore, the increment of capital equipment, whether
it consists of fixed capital, working capital or liquid capital; and the significant
differences of definition (apart from the distinction between investment and net
investment) are due to the exclusion from investment of one or more of these categories.

Mr Hawtrey, for example, who attaches great importance to changes in liquid capital, i.e.
to undesigned increments (or decrements) in the stock of unsold goods, has suggested a
possible definition of investment from which such changes are excluded. In this case an
excess of saving over investment would be the same thing as an undesigned increment in
the stock of unsold goods, i.e. as an increase of liquid capital. Mr Hawtrey has not
convinced me that this is the factor to stress; for it lays all the emphasis on the correction
of changes which were in the first instance unforeseen, as compared with those which are,
rightly or wrongly, anticipated. Mr Hawtrey regards the daily decisions of entrepreneurs
concerning their scale of output as being varied from the scale of the previous day by
reference to the changes in their stock of unsold goods. Certainly, in the case of
consumption goods, this plays an important part in their decisions. But I see no object in
excluding the play of other factors on their decisions; and I prefer, therefore, to
emphasise the total change of effective demand and not merely that part of the change in
effective demand which reflects the increase or decrease of unsold stocks in the previous
period. Moreover, in the case of fixed capital, the increase or decrease of unused capacity
corresponds to the increase or decrease in unsold stocks in its effect on decisions to
produce; and I do not see how Mr Hawtrey's method can handle this at least equally
important factor.

It seems probable that capital formation and capital consumption, as used by the Austrian
school of economists, are not identical either with investment and disinvestment as
defined above or with net investment and disinvestment. In particular, capital
consumption is said to occur in circumstances where there is quite clearly no net decrease
in capital equipment as defined above. I have, however, been unable to discover a
reference to any passage where the meaning of these terms is clearly explained. The
statement, for example, that capital formation occurs when there is a lengthening of the
period of production does not much advance matters.

III

We come next to the divergences between saving and investment which are due to a
special definition of income and hence of the excess of income over consumption. My
own use of terms in my Treatise on Money is an example of this. For, as I have explained
on p. 60 above, the definition of income, which I there employed, differed from my
present definition by reckoning as the income of entrepreneurs not their actually realised
profits but (in some sense) their 'normal profit'. Thus by an excess of saving over
investment I meant that the scale of output was such that entrepreneurs were earning a
less than normal profit from their ownership of the capital equipment; and by an
increased excess of saving over investment I meant that a decline was taking place in the
actual profits, so that they would be under a motive to contract output.

As I now think, the volume of employment (and consequently of output and real income)
is fixed by the entrepreneur under the motive of seeking to maximise his present and
prospective profits (the allowance for user cost being determined by his view as to the
use of equipment which will maximise his return from it over its whole life); whilst the
volume of employment which will maximise his profit depends on the aggregate demand
function given by his expectations of the sum of the proceeds resulting from consumption
and investment respectively on various hypotheses. In my Treatise on Money the concept
of changes in the excess of investment over saving, as there defined, was a way of
handling changes in profit, though I did not in that book distinguish clearly between
expected and realised results[1]. I there argued that change in the excess of investment
over saving was the motive force governing changes in the volume of output. Thus the
new argument, though (as I now think) much more accurate and instructive, is essentially
a development of the old. Expressed in the language of my Treatise on Money, it would
run: the expectation of an increased excess of investment over saving, given the former
volume of employment and output, will induce entrepreneurs to increase the volume of
employment and output. The significance of both my present and my former arguments
lies in their attempt to show that the volume of employment is determined by the
estimates of effective demand made by the entrepreneurs, an expected increase of
investment relatively to saving as defined in my Treatise on Money being a criterion of
an increase in effective demand. But the exposition in my Treatise on Money is, of course,
very confusing and incomplete in the light of the further developments here set forth.

Mr D. H. Robertson has defined to-day's income as being equal to yesterday's

consumption plus investment, so that to-day's saving, in his sense, is equal to yesterday's
investment plus the excess of yesterday's consumption over to-day's consumption. On
this definition saving can exceed investment, namely, by the excess of yesterday's income
(in my sense) over to-day's income. Thus when Mr Robertson says that there is an excess
of saving over investment, he means literally the same thing as I mean when I say that
income is falling, and the excess of saving in his sense is exactly equal to the decline of
income in my sense. If it were true that current expectations were always determined by
yesterday's realised results, to-day's effective demand would be equal to yesterday's
income. Thus Mr Robertson's method might be regarded as an alternative. attempt to
mine (being, perhaps, a first approximation to it) to make the same distinction, so vital for
causal analysis, that I have tried to make by the contrast between effective demand and
income[2].

IV

We come next to the much vaguer ideas associated with the phrase 'forced saving'. Is any
clear significance discoverable in these? In my Treatise on Money (vol.1, p. 171, footnote
[JMK, vol. V, p.154] I gave some references to earlier uses of this phrase and suggested
that they bore some affinity to the difference between investment and 'saving' in the sense
in which I there used the latter term. I am no longer confident that there was in fact so
much affinity as I then supposed. In any case, I feel sure that 'forced saving' and
analogous phrases employed more recently (e.g. by Professor Hayek or Professor
Robbins) have no definite relation to the difference between investment and 'saving' in
the sense intended in my Treatise on Money. For whilst these authors have not explained
exactly what they mean by this term, it is clear that 'forced saving', in their sense, is a
phenomenon which results directly from, and is measured by, changes in the quantity of
money or bank-credit.

It is evident that a change in the volume of output and employment will, indeed, cause a
change in income measured in wage-units; that a change in the wage-unit will cause both
a redistribution of income between borrowers and lenders and a change in aggregate
income measured in money; and that in either event there will (or may) be a change in the
amount saved. Since, therefore, changes in the quantity of money may result, through
their effect on the rate of interest, in a change in the volume and distribution of income
(as we shall show later), such changes may involve, indirectly, a change in the amount
saved. But such changes in the amounts saved are no more 'forced savings' than any other
changes in the amounts saved due to a change in circumstances; and there is no means of
distinguishing between one case and another, unless we specify the amount saved in
certain given conditions as our norm or standard. Moreover, as we shall see, the amount
of the change in aggregate saving which results from a given change in the quantity of
money is highly variable and depends on many other factors.

Thus 'forced saving' has no meaning until we have specified some standard rate of saving.
If we select (as might be reasonable) the rate of saving which corresponds to an
established state of full employment, the above definition would become: 'Forced saving
is the excess of actual saving over what would be saved if there were full employment in
a position of long-period equilibrium'. This definition would make good sense, but a
sense in which a forced excess of saving would be a very rare and a very unstable
phenomenon, and a forced deficiency of saving the usual state of affairs.

Professor Hayek's interesting 'Note on the Development of the Doctrine of Forced

Saving'[3] shows that this was in fact the original meaning of the term. 'Forced saving' or
'forced frugality' was, in the first instance, a conception of Bentham's; and Bentham
expressly stated that he had in mind the consequences of an increase in the quantity of
money (relatively to the quantity of things vendible for money) in circumstances of 'all
hands being employed and employed in the most advantageous manner'[4]. In such
circumstances, Bentham points out, real income cannot be increased, and, consequently,
additional investment, taking place as a result of the transition, involves forced frugality
'at the expense of national comfort and national justice'. All the nineteenth-century
writers who dealt with this matter had virtually the same idea in mind. But an attempt to
extend this perfectly clear notion to conditions of less than full employment involves
difficulties. It is true, of course (owing to the fact of diminishing returns to an increase in
the employment applied to a given capital equipment), that any increase in employment
involves some sacrifice of real income to those who were already employed, but an
attempt to relate this loss to the increase in investment which may accompany the
increase in employment is not likely to be fruitful. At any rate I am not aware of any
attempt having been made by the modern writers who are interested in 'forced saving' to
extend the idea to conditions where employment is increasing; and they seem, as a rule,
to overlook the fact that the extension of the Benthamite concept of forced frugality to
conditions of less than full employment requires some explanation or qualification.
V

The prevalence of the idea that saving and investment, taken in their straightforward
sense, can differ from one another, is to be explained, I think, by an optical illusion due to
regarding an individual depositor's relation to his bank as being a one-sided transaction,
instead of seeing it as the two-sided transaction which it actually is. It is supposed that a
depositor and his bank can somehow contrive between them to perform an operation by
which savings can disappear into the banking system so that they are lost to investment,
or, contrariwise, that the banking system can make it possible for investment to occur, to
which no saving corresponds. But no one can save without acquiring an asset, whether it
be cash or a debt or capital-goods; and no one can acquire an asset which he did not
previously possess, unless either an asset of equal value is newly produced or someone
else parts with an asset of that value which he previously had. In the first alternative there
is a corresponding new investment: in the second alternative someone else must be
dissaving an equal sum. For his loss of wealth must be due to his consumption exceeding
his income, and not to a loss on capital account through a change in the value of a capital-
asset, since it is not a case of his suffering a loss of value which his asset formerly had; he
is duly receiving the current value of his asset and yet is not retaining this value in wealth
of any form, i.e. he must be spending it on current consumption in excess of current
income. Moreover, if it is the banking system which parts with an asset, someone must be
parting with cash. It follows that the aggregate saving of the first individual and of others
taken together must necessarily be equal to the amount of current new investment.

The notion that the creation of credit by the banking system allows investment to take
place to which 'no genuine saving' corresponds can only be the result of isolating one of
the consequences of the increased bank-credit to the exclusion of the others. If the grant
of a bank credit to an entrepreneur additional to the credits already existing allows him to
make an addition to current investment which would not have occurred otherwise,
incomes will necessarily be increased and at a rate which will normally exceed the rate of
increased investment. Moreover, except in conditions of full employment, there will be
an increase of real income as well as of money-income. The public will exercise 'a free
choice' as to the proportion in which they divide their increase of income between saving
and spending; and it is impossible that the intention of the entrepreneur who has
borrowed in order to increase investment can become effective (except in substitution for
investment by other entrepreneurs which would have occurred otherwise) at a faster rate
than the public decide to increase their savings. Moreover, the savings which result from
this decision are just as genuine as any other savings. No one can be compelled to own
the additional money corresponding to the new bank-credit, unless he deliberately prefers
to hold more money rather than some other form of wealth. Yet employment, incomes
and prices cannot help moving in such a way that in the new situation someone does
choose to hold the additional money. It is true that an unexpected increase of investment
in a particular direction may cause an irregularity in the rate of aggregate saving and
investment which would not have occurred if it had been sufficiently foreseen. It is also
true that the grant of the bank-credit will set up three tendencies(1) for output to
increase, (2) for the marginal product to rise in value in terms of the wage-unit (which in
conditions of decreasing return must necessarily accompany an increase of output), and
(3) for the wage-unit to rise in terms of money (since this is a frequent concomitant of
better employment); and these tendencies may affect the distribution of real income
between different groups. But these tendencies are characteristic of a state of increasing
output as such, and will occur just as much if the increase in output has been initiated
otherwise than by an increase in bank-credit. They can only be avoided by avoiding any
course of action capable of improving employment. Much of the above, however, is
anticipating the result of discussions which have not yet been reached.

Thus the old-fashioned view that saving always involves investment, though incomplete
and misleading, is formally sounder than the new-fangled view that there can be saving
without investment or investment without 'genuine' saving. The error lies in proceeding to
the plausible inference that, when an individual saves, he will increase aggregate
investment by an equal amount. It is true, that, when an individual saves he increases his
own wealth. But the conclusion that he also increases aggregate wealth fails to allow for
the possibility that an act of individual saving may react on someone else's savings and
hence on someone else's wealth.

The reconciliation of the identity between saving and investment with the apparent 'free-
will' of the individual to save what he chooses irrespective of what he or others may be
investing, essentially depends on saving being, like spending, a two-sided affair. For
although the amount of his own saving is unlikely to have any significant influence on his
own income, the reactions of the amount of his consumption on the incomes of others
makes it impossible for all individuals simultaneously to save any given sums. Every
such attempt to save more by reducing consumption will so affect incomes that the
attempt necessarily defeats itself. It is, of course, just as impossible for the community as
a whole to save less than the amount of current investment, since the attempt to do so will
necessarily raise incomes to a level at which the sums which individuals choose to save
add up to a figure exactly equal to the amount of investment.

The above is closely analogous with the proposition which harmonises the liberty, which
every individual possesses, to change, whenever he chooses, the amount of money he
holds, with the necessity for the total amount of money, which individual balances add up
to, to be exactly equal to the amount of cash which the banking system has created. In
this latter case the equality is brought about by the fact that the amount of money which
people choose to hold is not independent of their incomes or of the prices of the things
(primarily securities), the purchase of which is the natural alternative to holding money.
Thus incomes and such prices necessarily change until the aggregate of the amounts of
money which individuals choose to hold at the new level of incomes and prices thus
brought about has come to equality with the amount of money created by the banking
system. This, indeed, is the fundamental proposition of monetary theory.

Both these propositions follow merely from the fact that there cannot be a buyer without
a seller or a seller without a buyer. Though an individual whose transactions are small in
relation to the market can safely neglect the fact that demand is not a one-sided
transaction, it makes nonsense to neglect it when we come to aggregate demand. This is
the vital difference between the theory of the economic behaviour of the aggregate and
the theory of the behaviour of the individual unit, in which we assume that changes in the
individual's own demand do not affect his income.

1. My method there was to regard the current realised profit as determining the current expectation
of profit.

2. Vide Mr. Robertsons article Saving and Hoarding (Economic Journal, September 1933, p. 399)
and the discussion between Mr. Robertson, Mr. Hawtrey and myself (Economic Journal,
December 1933, p. 658).

3. Quarterly Journal of Economics, Nov. 1932, p. 123.

4. Loc. cit. p. 125.

Chapter 8

THE PROPENSITY TO CONSUME:

I. THE OBJECTIVE FACTORS

We are now in a position to return to our main theme, from which we broke off at the end
of Book I in order to deal with certain general problems of method and definition. The
ultimate object of our analysis is to discover what determines the volume of employment.
So far we have established the preliminary conclusion that the volume of employment is
determined by the point of intersection of the aggregate supply function with the
aggregate demand function. The aggregate supply function, however, which depends in
the main on the physical conditions of supply, involves few considerations which are not
already familiar. The form may be unfamiliar but the underlying factors are not new. We
shall return to the aggregate supply function in chapter 20, where we discuss its inverse
under the name of the employment function. But, in the main, it is the part played by the
aggregate demand function which has been overlooked; and it is to the aggregate demand
function that we shall devote Books III and IV.

The aggregate demand function relates any given level of employment to the 'proceeds'
which that level of employment is expected to realise. The 'proceeds' are made up of the
sum of two quantitiesthe sum which will be spent on consumption when employment
is at the given level, and the sum which will be devoted to investment. The factors which
govern these two quantities are largely distinct. In this book we shall consider the former,
namely what factors determine the sum which will be spent on consumption when
employment is at a given level; and in Book IV we shall proceed to the factors which
determine the sum which will be devoted to investment.

Since we are here concerned in determining what sum will be spent on consumption
when employment is at a given level, we should, strictly speaking, consider the function
which relates the former quantity (C) to the latter (N). It is more convenient, however, to
work in terms of a slightly different function, namely, the function which relates the
consumption in terms of wage-units (Cw) to the income in terms of wage-units (Yw)
corresponding to a level of employment N. This suffers from the objection that Yw is not a
unique function of N, which is the same in all circumstances. For the relationship
between Yw and N may depend (though probably in a very minor degree) on the precise
nature of the employment. That is to say, two different distributions of a given aggregate
employment N between different employments might (owing to the different shapes of
the individual employment functionsa matter to be discussed in Chapter 20 below) lead
to different values of Yw. In conceivable circumstances a special allowance might have to
be made for this factor. But in general it is a good approximation to regard Yw as uniquely
determined by N. We will therefore define what we shall call the propensity to consume
as the functional relationship between Yw a given level of income in terms of wage-units,
and Cw the expenditure on consumption out of that level of income, so that

Cw = (Y w) or C = W (Yw).

The amount that the community spends on consumption obviously depends (i) partly on
the amount of its income, (ii) partly on the other objective attendant circumstances, and
(iii) partly on the subjective needs and the psychological propensities and habits of the
individuals composing it and the principles on which the income is divided between them
(which may suffer modification as output is increased). The motives to spending interact
and the attempt to classify them runs the danger of false division. Nevertheless it will
clear our minds to consider them separately under two broad heads which we shall call
the subjective factors and the objective factors. The subjective factors, which we shall
consider in more detail in the next chapter, include those psychological characteristics of
human nature and those social practices and institutions which, though not unalterable,
are unlikely to undergo a material change over a short period of time except in abnormal
or revolutionary circumstances. In an historical enquiry or in comparing one social
system with another of a different type, it is necessary to take account of the manner in
which changes in the subjective factors may affect the propensity to consume. But, in
general, we shall in what follows take the subjective factors as given; and we shall
assume that the propensity to consume depends only on changes in the objective factors.

II

The principal objective factors which influence the propensity to consume appear to be
the following:

(1) A change in the wage-unit. Consumption (C) is obviously much more a function of (in
some sense) real income than of money-income. In a given state of technique and tastes
and of social conditions determining the distribution of income, a man's real income will
rise and fall with the amount of his command over labour-units, i.e. with the amount of
his income measured in wage-units; though when the aggregate volume of output
changes, his real income will (owing to the operation of decreasing returns) rise less than
in proportion to his income measured in wage-units. As a first approximation, therefore,
we can reasonably assume that, if the wage-unit changes, the expenditure on consumption
corresponding to a given level of employment will, like prices, change in the same
proportion; though in some circumstances we may have to make an allowance for the
possible reactions on aggregate consumption of the change in the distribution of a given
real income between entrepreneurs and rentiers resulting from a change in the wage-unit.
Apart from this, we have already allowed for changes in the wage-unit by defining the
propensity to consume in terms of income measured in terms of wage-units.

(2) A change in the difference between income and net income. We have shown above
that the amount of consumption depends on net income rather than on income, since it is,
by definition, his net income that a man has primarily in mind when he is deciding his
scale of consumption. In a given situation there may be a somewhat stable relationship
between the two, in the sense that there will be a function uniquely relating different
levels of income to the corresponding levels of net income. If, however, this should not
be the case, such part of any change in income as is not reflected in net income must be
neglected since it will have no effect on consumption; and, similarly, a change in net
income, not reflected in income, must be allowed for. Save in exceptional circumstances,
however, I doubt the practical importance of this factor. We will return to a fuller
discussion of the effect on consumption of the difference between income and net income
in the fourth section of this chapter.

(3) Windfall changes in capital-values not allowed for in calculating net income. These
are of much more importance in modifying the propensity to consume, since they will
bear no stable or regular relationship to the amount of income. The consumption of the
wealth-owning class may be extremely susceptible to unforeseen changes in the money-
value of its wealth. This should be classified amongst the major factors capable of
causing short-period changes in the propensity to consume.

(4) Changes in the rate of time-discounting, i.e. in the ratio of exchange between present
goods and future goods. This is not quite the same thing as the rate of interest, since it
allows for future changes in the purchasing power of money in so far as these are
foreseen. Account has also to be taken of all kinds of risks, such as the prospect of not
living to enjoy the future goods or of confiscatory taxation. As an approximation,
however, we can identify this with the rate of interest.

The influence of this factor on the rate of spending out of a given income is open to a
good deal of doubt. For the classical theory of the rate of interest[1], which was based on
the idea that the rate of interest was the factor which brought the supply and demand for
savings into equilibrium, it was convenient to suppose that expenditure on consumption
is cet. par. negatively sensitive to changes in the rate of interest, so that any rise in the
rate of interest would appreciably diminish consumption. It has long been recognised,
however, that the total effect of changes in the rate of interest on the readiness to spend
on present consumption is complex and uncertain, being dependent on conflicting
tendencies, since some of the subjective motives towards saving will be more easily
satisfied if the rate of interest rises, whilst others will be weakened. Over a long period
substantial changes in the rate of interest probably tend to modify social habits
considerably, thus affecting the subjective propensity to spendthough in which
direction it would be hard to say, except in the light of actual experience. The usual type
of short-period fluctuation in the rate of interest is not likely, however, to have much
direct influence on spending either way.

There are not many people who will alter their way of living because the rate of interest
has fallen from 5 to 4 per cent, if their aggregate income is the same as before. Indirectly
there may be more effects, though not all in the same direction. Perhaps the most
important influence, operating through changes in the rate of interest, on the readiness to
spend out of a given income, depends on the effect of these changes on the appreciation
or depreciation in the price of securities and other assets. For if a man is enjoying a
windfall increment in the value of his capital, it is natural that his motives towards current
spending should be strengthened, even though in terms of income his capital is worth no
more than before; and weakened if he is suffering capital losses. But this indirect
influence we have allowed for already under (3) above. Apart from this, the main
conclusion suggested by experience is, I think, that the short-period influence of the rate
of interest on individual spending out of a given income is secondary and relatively
unimportant, except, perhaps, where unusually large changes are in question. When the
rate of interest falls very low indeed, the increase in the ratio between an annuity
purchasable for a given sum and the annual interest on that sum may, however, provide
an important source of negative saving by encouraging the practice of providing for old
age by the purchase of an annuity.

The abnormal situation, where the propensity to consume may be sharply affected by the
development of extreme uncertainty concerning the future and what it may bring forth,
should also, perhaps, be classified under this heading.

(5) Changes in fiscal policy. In so far as the inducement to the individual to save depends
on the future return which he expects, it clearly depends not only on the rate of interest
but on the fiscal policy of the government. Income taxes, especially when they
discriminate against 'unearned' income, taxes on capital-profits, death-duties and the like
are as relevant as the rate of interest; whilst the range of possible changes in fiscal policy
may be greater, in expectation at least, than for the rate of interest itself. If fiscal policy is
used as a deliberate instrument for the more equal distribution of incomes, its effect in
increasing the propensity to consume is, of course, all the greater[2].

We must also take account of the effect on the aggregate propensity to consume of
government sinking funds for the discharge of debt paid for out of ordinary taxation. For
these represent a species of corporate saving, so that a policy of substantial sinking funds
must be regarded in given circumstances as reducing the propensity to consume. It is for
this reason that a change-over from a policy of government borrowing to the opposite
policy of providing sinking funds (or vice versa) is capable of causing a severe
contraction (or marked expansion) of effective demand.

(6) Changes in expectations of the relation between the present and the future level of
income. We must catalogue this factor for the sake of formal completeness. But, whilst it
may affect considerably a particular individual's propensity to consume, it is likely to
average out for the community as a whole. Moreover, it is a matter about which there is,
as a rule, too much uncertainty for it to exert much influence.

We are left therefore, with the conclusion that in a given situation the propensity to
consume may be considered a fairly stable function, provided that we have eliminated
changes in the wage-unit in terms of money. Windfall changes in capital-values will be
capable of changing the propensity to consume, and substantial changes in the rate of
interest and in fiscal policy may make some difference; but the other objective factors
which might affect it, whilst they must not be overlooked, are not likely to be important
in ordinary circumstances.
The fact that, given the general economic situation, the expenditure on consumption in
terms of the wage-unit depends in the main, on the volume of output and employment is
the justification for summing up the other factors in the portmanteau function 'propensity
to consume'. For whilst the other factors are capable of varying {and this must not be
forgotten), the aggregate income measured in terms of the wage-unit is, as a rule, the
principal variable upon which the consumption-constituent of the aggregate demand
function will depend.

III

Granted, then, that the propensity to consume is a fairly stable function so that, as a rule,
the amount of aggregate consumption mainly depends on the amount of aggregate
income (both measured in terms of wage-units), changes in the propensity itself being
treated as a secondary influence, what is the normal shape of this function?

The fundamental psychological law, upon which we are entitled to depend with great
confidence both a priori from our knowledge of human nature and from the detailed facts
of experience, is that men are disposed, as a rule and on the average, to increase their
consumption as their income increases, but not by as much as the increase in their income.
That is to say, if Cw is the amount of consumption and Yw is income (both measured in
wage-units) Cw has the same sign as Yw but is smaller in amount, i.e. dCw/dYw is
positive and less than unity.

This is especially the case where we have short periods in view, as in the case of the so-
called cyclical fluctuations of employment during which habits, as distinct from more
permanent psychological propensities, are not given time enough to adapt themselves to
changed objective circumstances. For a man's habitual standard of life usually has the
first claim on his income, and he is apt to save the difference which discovers itself
between his actual income and the expense of his habitual standard; or, if he does adjust
his expenditure to changes in his income, he will over short periods do so imperfectly.
Thus a rising income will often be accompanied by increased saving, and a falling
income by decreased saving, on a greater scale at first than subsequently.

But, apart from short-period changes in the level of income, it is also obvious that a
higher absolute level of income will tend, as a rule, to widen the gap between income and
consumption. For the satisfaction of the immediate primary needs of a man and his
family is usually a stronger motive than the motives towards accumulation, which only
acquire effective sway when a margin of comfort has been attained. These reasons will
lead, as a rule, to a greater proportion of income being saved as real income increases.
But whether or not a greater proportion is saved, we take it as a fundamental
psychological rule of any modern community that, when its real income is increased, it
will not increase its consumption by an equal absolute amount, so that a greater absolute
amount must be saved, unless a large and unusual change is occurring at the same time in
other factors. As we shall show subsequently[3], the stability of the economic system
essentially depends on this rule prevailing in practice. This means that, if employment
and hence aggregate income increase, not all the additional employment will be required
to satisfy the needs of additional consumption.

On the other hand, a decline in income due to a decline in the level of employment, if it
goes far, may even cause consumption to exceed income not only by some individuals
and institutions using up the financial reserves which they have accumulated in better
times, but also by the government, which will be liable, willingly or unwillingly, to run
into a budgetary deficit or will provide unemployment relief; for example, out of
borrowed money. Thus, when employment falls to a low level, aggregate consumption
will decline by a smaller amount than that by which real income has declined, by reason
both of the habitual behaviour of individuals and also of the probable policy of
governments; which is the explanation why a new position of equilibrium can usually be
reached within a modest range of fluctuation. Otherwise a fall in employment and income,
once started, might proceed to extreme lengths.

This simple principle leads, it will be seen, to the same conclusion as before, namely, that
employment can only increase pari passu with an increase in investment; unless, indeed,
there is a change in the propensity to consume. For since consumers will spend less than
the increase in aggregate supply price when employment is increased, the increased
employment will prove unprofitable unless there is an increase in investment to fill the
gap.

IV

We must not underestimate the importance of the fact already mentioned above that,
whereas employment is a function of the expected consumption and the expected
investment, consumption is, cet. par., a function of net income, i.e. of net investment (net
income being equal to consumption plus net investment). In other words, the larger the
financial provision which it is thought necessary to make before reckoning net income,
the less favourable to consumption, and therefore to employment, will a given level of
investment prove to be.

When the whole of this financial provision (or supplementary cost) is in fact currently
expended in the upkeep of the already existing capital equipment, this point is not likely
to be overlooked. But when the financial provision exceeds the actual expenditure on
current upkeep, the practical results of this in its effect on employment are not always
appreciated. For the amount of this excess neither directly gives rise to current investment
nor is available to pay for consumption. It has, therefore, to be balanced by new
investment, the demand for which has arisen quite independently of the current wastage
of old equipment against which the financial provision is being made; with the result that
the new investment available to provide current income is correspondingly diminished
and a more intense demand for new investment is necessary to make possible a given
level of employment. Moreover, much the same considerations apply to the allowance for
wastage included in user cost, in so far as the wastage is not actually made good.
Take a house which continues to be habitable until it is demolished or abandoned. If a
certain sum is written off its value out of the annual rent paid by the tenants, which the
landlord neither spends on upkeep nor regards as net income available for consumption,
this provision, whether it is a part of U or of V; constitutes a drag on employment all
through the life of the house, suddenly made good in a lump when the house has to be
rebuilt.

In a stationary economy all this might not be worth mentioning, since in each year the
depreciation allowances in respect of old houses would be exactly offset by the new
houses built in replacement of those reaching the end of their lives in that year. But such
factors may be serious in a non-static economy, especially during a period which
immediately succeeds a lively burst of investment in long-lived capital. For in such
circumstances a very large proportion of the new items of investment may be absorbed by
the larger financial provisions made by entrepreneurs in respect of existing capital
equipment, upon the repairs and renewal of which, though it is wearing out with time, the
date has not yet arrived for spending anything approaching the full financial provision
which is being set aside; with the result that incomes cannot rise above a level which is
low enough to correspond with a low aggregate of net investment. Thus sinking funds,
etc., are apt to withdraw spending power from the consumer long before the demand for
expenditure on replacements (which such provisions are anticipating) comes into play; i.e.
they diminish the current effective demand and only increase it in the year in which the
replacement is actually made. If the effect of this is aggravated by 'financial prudence', i.e.
by its being thought advisable to 'write off' the initial cost more rapidly than the
equipment actually wears out, the cumulative result may be very serious indeed.

In the United States, for example, by 1929 the rapid capital expansion of the previous
five years had led cumulatively to the setting up of sinking funds and depreciation
allowances, in respect of plant which did not need replacement, on so huge a scale that an
enormous volume of entirely new investment was required merely to absorb these
financial provisions; and it became almost hopeless to find still more new investment on
a sufficient scale to provide for such new saving as a wealthy community in full
employment would be disposed to set aside. This factor alone was probably sufficient to
cause a slump. And, furthermore, since 'financial prudence' of this kind continued to be
exercised through the slump by those great corporations which were still in a position to
afford it, it offered a serious obstacle to early recovery.

Or again, in Great Britain at the present time (1935) the substantial amount of house-
building and of other new investments since the war has led to an amount of sinking
funds being set up much in excess of any present requirements for expenditure on repairs
and renewals, a tendency which has been accentuated, where the investment has been
made by local authorities and public boards, by the principles of 'sound' finance which
often require sinking funds sufficient to write off the initial cost some time before
replacement will actually fall due; with the result that even if private individuals were
ready to spend the whole of their net incomes it would be a severe task to restore full
employment in the face of this heavy volume of statutory provision by public and semi-
public authorities, entirely dissociated from any corresponding new investment. The
sinking funds of local authorities now stand, I think[4], at an annual figure of more than
half the amount which these authorities are spending on the whole of their new
developments[5]. Yet it is not certain that the Ministry of Health are aware, when they
insist on stiff sinking funds by local authorities, how much they may be aggravating the
problem of unemployment. In the case of advances by building societies to help an
individual to build his own house, the desire to be clear of debt more rapidly than the
house actually deteriorates may stimulate the house-owner to save more than he
otherwise would;though this factor should be classified, perhaps, as diminishing the
propensity to consume directly rather than through its effect on net income. In actual
figures, repayments of mortgages advanced by building societies, which amounted to
24,000,000 in 1925, had risen to 68,000,000 by 1933, as compared with new advances
of 103,000,000; and to-day the repayments are probably still higher.

That it is investment, rather than net investment, which emerges from the statistics of
output, is brought out forcibly and naturally in Mr Colin Clark's National Income,
19241931[6]. He also shows what a large proportion depreciation, etc., normally bears to
the value of investment. For example, he estimates that in Great Britain, over the years
19281931, the investment and the net investment were as follows, though his gross
investment is probably somewhat greater than my investment, inasmuch as it may include
a part of user cost, and it is not clear how closely his 'net investment' corresponds to my
definition of this term:

( million)
1928 1929 1930 1931
Gross Investment-Output 791 731 620 482
'Value of physical wasting of old capital' 433 435 437 439
Net Investment 358 296 183 43

Mr Kuznets has arrived at much the same conclusion in compiling the statistics of the
Gross Capital Formation (as he calls what I call investment) in the United States,
19191933. The physical fact, to which the statistics of output correspond, is inevitably
the gross, and not the net, investment. Mr Kuznets has also discovered the difficulties in
passing from gross investment to net investment. 'The difficulty', he writes, 'of passing
from gross to net capital formation, that is, the difficulty of correcting for the
consumption of existing durable commodities, is not only in the lack of data. The very
concept of annual consumption of commodities that last over a number of years suffers
from ambiguity'[7]. He falls back, therefore, 'on the assumption that the allowance for
depreciation and depletion on the books of business firms describes correctly the volume
of consumption of already existing, finished durable goods used by business firms' On
the other hand, he attempts no deduction at all in respect of houses and other durable
commodities in the hands of individuals. His very interesting results for the United States
can be summarised as follows:
 (Millions of dollars)
1925 1926 1927 1928 1929
Gross capital formation (after allowing for net
30,706 33,571 31,157 33,934 34,491
change in business inventories)
Entrepreneurs' servicing, repairs, maintenance,
7,685 8,288 8,223 8,481 9,010
depreciation and depletion
Net capital formation (on Mr Kuznets' definition) 23,021 25,283 22,934 25,453 25,481
(Millions of dollars)
1930 1931 1932 1933
Gross capital formation (after allowing for net change in
27,538 18,721 7,780 14,879
business inventories)
Entrepreneurs' servicing, repairs, maintenance, depreciation
8,502 7,623 6,543 8,204
and depletion
Net capital formation (on Mr Kuznets' definition) 19,036 11,098 1,237 6,675

Several facts emerge with prominence from this table. Net capital formation was very
steady over the quinquennium 19251929, with only a 10 percent increase in the latter
part of the upward movement. The deduction for entrepreneurs' repairs, maintenance,
depreciation and depletion remained at a high figure even at the bottom of the slump. But
Mr Kuznets' method must surely lead to too low an estimate of the annual increase in
depreciation, etc.; for he puts the latter at less than 1 per cent per annum of the new net
capital formation. Above all, net capital formation suffered an appalling collapse after
1929, falling in 1932 to a figure no less than 95 per cent below the average of the
quinquennium 19251929.

The above is, to some extent, a digression. But it is important to emphasise the magnitude
of the deduction which has to be made from the income of a society, which already
possesses a large stock of capital, before we arrive at the net income which is ordinarily
available for consumption. For if we overlook this, we may underestimate the heavy drag
on the propensity to consume which exists even in conditions where the public is ready to
consume a very large proportion of its net income.

Consumptionto repeat the obviousis the sole end and object of all economic activity.
Opportunities for employment are necessarily limited by the extent of aggregate demand.
Aggregate demand can be derived only from present consumption or from present
provision for future consumption. The consumption for which we can profitably provide
in advance cannot be pushed indefinitely into the future. We cannot, as a community,
provide for future consumption by financial expedients but only by current physical
output. In so far as our social and business organisation separates financial provision for
the future from physical provision for the future so that efforts to secure the former do not
necessarily carry the latter with them, financial prudence will be liable to diminish
aggregate demand and thus impair well-being, as there are many examples to testify. The
greater, moreover, the consumption for which we have provided in advance, the more
difficult it is to find something further to provide for in advance, and the greater our
dependence on present consumption as a source of demand. Yet the larger our incomes,
the greater, unfortunately, is the margin between our incomes and our consumption. So,
failing some novel expedient, there is, as we shall see, no answer to the riddle, except that
there must be sufficient unemployment to keep us so poor that our consumption falls
short of our income by no more than the equivalent of the physical provision for future
consumption which it pays to produce to-day.

Or look at the matter thus. Consumption is satisfied partly by objects produced currently
and partly by objects produced previously, i.e. by disinvestment. To the extent that
consumption is satisfied by the latter, there is a contraction of current demand, since to
that extent a part of current expenditure fails to find its way back as a part of net income.
Contrariwise whenever an object is produced within the period with a view to satisfying
consumption subsequently, an expansion of current demand is set up. Now all capital-
investment is destined to result, sooner or later, in capital-disinvestment. Thus the
problem of providing that new capital-investment shall always outrun capital-
disinvestment sufficiently to fill the gap between net income and consumption, presents a
problem which is increasingly difficult as capital increases. New capital-investment can
only take place in excess of current capital-disinvestment if future expenditure on
consumption is expected to increase. Each time we secure to-day's equilibrium by
increased investment we are aggravating the difficulty of securing equilibrium to-morrow.
A diminished propensity to consume to-day can only be accommodated to the public
advantage if an increased propensity to consume is expected to exist some day. We are
reminded of 'The Fable of the Bees'the gay of tomorrow are absolutely indispensable to
provide a raison d'tre for the grave of to-day. It is a curious thing, worthy of mention,
that the popular mind seems only to be aware of this ultimate perplexity where public
investment is concerned, as in the case of road-building and house-building and the like.
It is commonly urged as an objection to schemes for raising employment by investment
under the auspices of public authority that it is laying up trouble for the future. 'What will
you do,' it is asked, 'when you have built all the houses and roads and town halls and
electric grids and water supplies and so forth which the stationary population of the future
can be expected to require?' But it is not so easily understood that the same difficulty
applies to private investment and to industrial expansion; particularly to the latter, since it
is much easier to see an early satiation of the demand for new factories and plant which
absorb individually but little money, than of the demand for dwelling-houses.

The obstacle to a clear understanding is, in these examples, much the same as in many
academic discussions of capital, namely, an inadequate appreciation of the fact that
capital is not a self-subsistent entity existing apart from consumption. On the contrary,
every weakening in the propensity to consume regarded as a permanent habit must
weaken the demand for capital as well as the demand for consumption.

1. Cf. Chapter 14 below.

2. It may be mentioned, in passing, that the effect of fiscal policy on the growth of wealth has been the
subject of an important misunderstanding which, however, we cannot discuss adequately without
the assistance of the theory of the rate of interest to be given in Book IV.

3. Cf. p. 251 below.

4. The actual figures are deemed of so little interest that they are only published two years or more in
arrears.

5. In the year ending March 31, 1930, local authorities spent 87,000,000 on capital account, of which
37,000,000 was provided by sinking funds, etc., in respect of previous capital expenditure; in the
year ending March 31, 1933, the figures were 81,000,000 and 46,000,000.

6. Op. cit. pp. 117 and 138.

7. These references are taken from a Bulletin (No. 52) of the National Bureau of Economic Research,
giving preliminary results of Mr. Kuznets forthcoming book.
Chapter 9

THE PROPENSITY TO CONSUME:

II. THE SUBJECTIVE FACTORS

There remains the second category of factors which affect the amount of consumption out
of a given incomenamely, those subjective and social incentives which determine how
much is spent, given the aggregate of income in terms of wage-units and given the
relevant objective factors which we have already discussed. Since, however, the analysis
of these factors raises no point of novelty, it may be sufficient if we give a catalogue of
the more important, without enlarging on them at any length.

There are, in general, eight main motives or objects of a subjective character which lead
individuals to refrain from spending out of their incomes:

(i) To build up a reserve against unforeseen contingencies;

(ii) To provide for an anticipated future relation between the income and
the needs of the individual or his family different from that which exists in
the present, as, for example, in relation to old age, family education, or the
maintenance of dependents;

(iii) To enjoy interest and appreciation, i.e. because a larger real

consumption at a later date is preferred to a smaller immediate
consumption;

(iv) To enjoy a gradually increasing expenditure, since it gratifies a

common instinct to look forward to a gradually improving standard of life
rather than the contrary, even though the capacity for enjoyment may be
diminishing;

(v) To enjoy a sense of independence and the power to do things, though

without a clear idea or definite intention of specific action;

(vi) To secure a masse de manoeuvre to carry out speculative or business

projects;

(vii) To bequeath a fortune;

(viii) To satisfy pure miserliness, i.e. unreasonable but insistent inhibitions

against acts of expenditure as such.
These eight motives might be called the motives of Precaution, Foresight, Calculation,
Improvement, Independence, Enterprise, Pride and Avarice; and we could also draw up a
corresponding list of motives to consumption such as Enjoyment, Short sightedness,
Generosity, Miscalculation, Ostentation and Extravagance.

Apart from the savings accumulated by individuals, there is also the large amount of
income, varying perhaps from one-third to two-thirds of the total accumulation in a
modern industrial community such as Great Britain or the United States, which is
withheld by central and local government, by institutions and by business corporations
for motives largely analogous to, but not identical with, those actuating individuals, and
mainly the four following:

(i) The motive of enterpriseto secure resources to carry out further

capital investment without incurring debt or raising further capital on the
market;

(ii) The motive of liquidityto secure liquid resources to meet

emergencies, difficulties and depressions;

(iii) The motive of improvementto secure a gradually increasing income,

which, incidentally, will protect the management from criticism, since
increasing income due to accumulation is seldom distinguished from
increasing income due to efficiency;

(iv) The motive of financial prudence and the anxiety to be 'on the right
side' by making a financial provision in excess of user and supplementary
cost, so as to discharge debt and write off the cost of assets ahead of;
rather than behind, the actual rate of wastage and obsolescence, the
strength of this motive mainly depending on the quantity and character of
the capital equipment and the rate of technical change.

Corresponding to these motives which favour the withholding of a part of income from
consumption, there are also operative at times motives which lead to an excess of
consumption over income. Several of the motives towards positive saving catalogued
above as affecting individuals have their intended counterpart in negative saving at a later
date, as, for example, with saving to provide for family needs or old age. Unemployment
relief financed by borrowing is best regarded as negative saving.

Now the strength of all these motives will vary enormously according to the institutions
and organisation of the economic society which we presume, according to habits formed
by race, education, convention, religion and current morals, according to present hopes
and past experience, according to the scale and technique of capital equipment, and
according to the prevailing distribution of wealth and the established standards of life. In
the argument of this book, however, we shall not concern ourselves, except in occasional
digressions, with the results of far-reaching social changes or with the slow effects of
secular progress. We shall, that is to say, take as given the main background of subjective
motives to saving and to consumption respectively. In so far as the distribution of wealth
is determined by the more or less permanent social structure of the community, this also
can be reckoned a factor, subject only to slow change and over a long period, which we
can take as given in our present context.

II

Since, therefore, the main background of subjective and social incentives changes slowly,
whilst the short-period influence of changes in the rate of interest and the other objective
factors is often of secondary importance, we are left with the conclusion that short-period
changes in consumption largely depend on changes in the rate at which income
(measured in wage-units) is being earned and not on changes in the propensity to
consume out of a given income.

We must, however, guard against a misunderstanding. The above means that the
influence of moderate changes in the rate of interest on the propensity to consume is
usually small. It does not mean that changes in the rate of interest have only a small
influence on the amounts actually saved and consumed. Quite the contrary. The influence
of changes in the rate of interest on the amount actually saved is of paramount
importance, but is in the opposite direction to that usually supposed. For even if the
attraction of the larger future income to be earned from a higher rate of interest has the
effect of diminishing the propensity to consume, nevertheless we can be certain that a rise
in the rate of interest will have the effect of reducing the amount actually saved. For
aggregate saving is governed by aggregate investment; a rise in the rate of interest (unless
it is offset by a corresponding change in the demand-schedule for investment) will
diminish investment; hence a rise in the rate of interest must have the effect of reducing
incomes to a level at which saving is decreased in the same measure as investment. Since
incomes will decrease by a greater absolute amount than investment, it is, indeed, true
that, when the rate of interest rises, the rate of consumption will decrease. But this does
not mean that there will be a wider margin for saving. On the contrary, saving and
spending will both decrease.

Thus, even if it is the case that a rise in the rate of interest would cause the community to
save more out of a given income, we can be quite sure that a rise in the rate of interest
(assuming no favourable change in the demand-schedule for investment) will decrease
the actual aggregate of savings. The same line of argument can even tell us by how much
a rise in the rate of interest will, cet. par., decrease incomes. For incomes will have to fall
(or be redistributed) by just that amount which is required, with the existing propensity to
consume to decrease savings by the same amount by which the rise in the rate of interest
will, with the existing marginal efficiency of capital, decrease investment. A detailed
examination of this aspect will occupy our next chapter.

The rise in the rate of interest might induce us to save more, if our incomes were
unchanged. But if the higher rate of interest retards investment, our incomes will not, and
cannot, be unchanged. They must necessarily fall, until the declining capacity to save has
sufficiently offset the stimulus to save given by the higher rate of interest. The more
virtuous we are, the more determinedly thrifty, the more obstinately orthodox in our
national and personal finance, the more our incomes will have to fall when interest rises
relatively to the marginal efficiency of capital. Obstinacy can bring only a penalty and no
reward. For the result is inevitable.

Thus, after all, the actual rates of aggregate saving and spending do not depend on
Precaution, Foresight, Calculation, Improvement, Independence, Enterprise, Pride or
Avarice. Virtue and vice play no part. It all depends on how far the rate of interest is
favourable to investment, after taking account of the marginal efficiency of capital[1]. No,
this is an overstatement. If the rate of interest were so governed as to maintain continuous
full employment, virtue would resume her sway;the rate of capital accumulation would
depend on the weakness of the propensity to consume. Thus, once again, the tribute that
classical economists pay to her is due to their concealed assumption that the rate of
interest always is so governed.

1. In some passages of this section we have tacitly anticipated ideas which will be introduced in Book
IV.
Chapter 10

THE MARGINAL PROPENSITY TO CONSUME AND THE

MULTIPLIER

We established in chapter 8 that employment can only increase pari passu with
investment unless there is a change in the propensity to consume. We can now carry this
line of thought a stage further. For in given circumstances a definite ratio, to be called the
multiplier, can be established between income and investment and, subject to certain
simplifications, between the total employment and the employment directly employed on
investment (which we shall call the primary employment). This further step is an integral
part of our theory of employment, since it establishes a precise relationship, given the
propensity to consume, between aggregate employment and income and the rate of
investment. The conception of the multiplier was first introduced into economic theory
by Mr R. F. Kahn in his article on 'The Relation of Home Investment to Unemployment'
(Economic Journal, June 1931). His argument in this article depended on the
fundamental notion that, if the propensity to consume in various hypothetical
circumstances is (together with certain other conditions) taken as given and we conceive
the monetary or other public authority to take steps to stimulate or to retard investment,
the change in the amount of employment will be a function of the net change in the
amount of investment; and it aimed at laying down general principles by which to
estimate the actual quantitative relationship between an increment of net investment and
the increment of aggregate employment which will be associated with it. Before coming
to the multiplier, however, it will be convenient to introduce the conception of the
marginal propensity to consume.

The fluctuations in real income under consideration in this book are those which result
from applying different quantities of employment (i.e. of labour-units) to a given capital
equipment, so that real income increases and decreases with the number of labour-units
employed. If, as we assume in general, there is a decreasing return at the margin as the
number of labour-units employed on the given capital equipment is increased, income
measured in terms of wage-units will increase more than in proportion to the amount of
employment, which, in turn, will increase more than in proportion to the amount of real
income measured (if that is possible) in terms of product. Real income measured in terms
of product and income measured in terms of wage-units will, however, increase and
decrease together (in the short period when capital equipment is virtually unchanged).
Since, therefore, real income, in terms of product, may be incapable of precise numerical
measurement, it is often convenient to regard income in terms of wage-units (Yw) as an
adequate working index of changes in real income. In certain contexts we must not
overlook the fact that, in general, Yw increases and decreases in a greater proportion than
real income; but in other contexts the fact that they always increase and decrease together
renders them virtually interchangeable.
Our normal psychological law that, when the real income of the community increases or
decreases, its consumption will increase or decrease but not so fast, can, therefore, be
translatednot, indeed, with absolute accuracy but subject to qualifications which are
obvious and can easily be stated in a formally complete fashion into the propositions that
Cw and Yw have the same sign, but Yw > Cw, where Cw is the consumption in terms
of wage-units. This is merely a repetition of the proposition already established in
Chapter 3 above. Let us define, then, dCw/dYw as the marginal propensity to consume.

This quantity is of considerable importance, because it tells us how the next increment of
output will have to be divided between consumption and investment. For Yw = Cw +
Iw, where Cw and Iw are the increments of consumption and investment; so that we can
write Yw = kIw, where 1 1/k is equal to the marginal propensity to consume.

Let us call k the investment multiplier. It tells us that, when there is an increment of
aggregate investment, income will increase by an amount which is k times the increment
of investment.

II

Mr Kahn's multiplier is a little different from this, being what we may call the
employment multiplier designated by k', since it measures the ratio of the increment of
total employment which is associated with a given increment of primary employment in
the investment industries. That is to say, if the increment of investment Iw leads to an
increment of primary employment N2 in the investment industries, the increment of total
employment N = k'N2.

There is no reason in general to suppose that k = k'. For there is no necessary presumption
that the shapes of the relevant portions of the aggregate supply functions for different
types of industry are such that the ratio of the increment of employment in the one set of
industries to the increment of demand which has stimulated it will be the same as in the
other set of industries[1]. It is easy, indeed, to conceive of cases, as, for example, where
the marginal propensity to consume is widely different from the average propensity, in
which there would be a presumption in favour of some inequality between Yw/N and
Iw/N2, since there would be very divergent proportionate changes in the demands for
consumption-goods and investment-goods respectively. If we wish to take account of
such possible differences in the shapes of the relevant portions of the aggregate supply
functions for the two groups of industries respectively, there is no difficulty in rewriting
the following argument in the more generalised form. But to elucidate the ideas involved,
it will be convenient to deal with the simplified case where k = k'.

It follows, therefore, that, if the consumption psychology of the community is such that
they will choose to consume, e.g. nine-tenths of an increment of income[2], then the
multiplier k is 10; and the total employment caused by (e.g.) increased public works will
be ten times the primary employment provided by the public works themselves, assuming
no reduction of investment in other directions. Only in the event of the community
maintaining their consumption unchanged in spite of the increase in employment and
hence in real income, will the increase of employment be restricted to the primary
employment provided by the public works. If, on the other hand, they seek to consume
the whole of any increment of income, there will be no point of stability and prices will
rise without limit. With normal psychological suppositions, an increase in employment
will only be associated with a decline in consumption if there is at the same time a
change in the propensity to consumeas the result, for instance, of propaganda in time of
war in favour of restricting individual consumption; and it is only in this event that the
increased employment in investment will be associated with an unfavourable
repercussion on employment in the industries producing for consumption.

This only sums up in a formula what should by now be obvious to the reader on general
grounds. An increment of investment in terms of wage-units cannot occur unless the
public are prepared to increase their savings in terms of wage-units. Ordinarily speaking,
the public will not do this unless their aggregate income in terms of wage-units is
increasing. Thus their effort to consume a part of their increased incomes will stimulate
output until the new level (and distribution) of incomes provides a margin of saving
sufficient to correspond to the increased investment. The multiplier tells us by how much
their employment has to be increased to yield an increase in real income sufficient to
induce them to do the necessary extra saving, and is a function of their psychological
propensities[3]. If saving is the pill and consumption is the jam, the extra jam has to be
proportioned to the size of the additional pill. Unless the psychological propensities of the
public are different from what we are supposing, we have here established the law that
increased employment for investment must necessarily stimulate the industries producing
for consumption and thus lead to a total increase of employment which is a multiple of
the primary employment required by the investment itself.

It follows from the above that, if the marginal propensity to consume is not far short of
unity, small fluctuations in investment will lead to wide fluctuations in employment; but,
at the same time, a comparatively small increment of investment will lead to full
employment. If, on the other hand, the marginal propensity to consume is not much
above zero, small fluctuations in investment will lead to correspondingly small
fluctuations in employment; but, at the same time, it may require a large increment of
investment to produce full employment. In the former case involuntary unemployment
would be an easily remedied malady, though liable to be troublesome if it is allowed to
develop. In the latter case, employment may be less variable but liable to settle down at a
low level and to prove recalcitrant to any but the most drastic remedies. In actual fact the
marginal propensity to consume seems to lie somewhere between these two extremes,
though much nearer to unity than to zero; with the result that we have, in a sense, the
worst of both worlds, fluctuations in employment being considerable and, at the same
time, the increment in investment required to produce full employment being too great to
be easily handled. Unfortunately the fluctuations have been sufficient to prevent the
nature of the malady from being obvious, whilst its severity is such that it cannot be
remedied unless its nature is understood.

When full employment is reached, any attempt to increase investment still further will set
up a tendency in money-prices to rise without limit, irrespective of the marginal
propensity to consume; i.e. we shall have reached a state of true inflation[4]. Up to this
point, however, rising prices will be associated with an increasing aggregate real income.

III

We have been dealing so far with a net increment of investment. If, therefore, we wish to
apply the above without qualification to the effect of (e.g.) increased public works, we
have to assume that there is no offset through decreased investment in other directions,
and also, of course, no associated change in the propensity of the community to consume.
Mr Kahn was mainly concerned in the article referred to above in considering what
offsets we ought to take into account as likely to be important, and in suggesting
quantitative estimates. For in an actual case there are several factors besides some
specific increase of investment of a given kind which enter into the final result. If, for
example, a government employs 100,000 additional men on public works, and if the
multiplier (as defined above) is 4, it is not safe to assume that aggregate employment will
increase by 400,000. For the new policy may have adverse reactions on investment in
other directions.

It would seem (following Mr Kahn) that the following are likely in a modern community
to be the factors which it is most important not to overlook (though the first two will not
be fully intelligible until after Book IV has been reached):

(i) The method of financing the policy and the increased working cash, required by the
increased employment and the associated rise of prices, may have the effect of increasing
the rate of interest and so retarding investment in other directions, unless the monetary
authority takes steps to the contrary; whilst, at the same time, the increased cost of capital
goods will reduce their marginal efficiency to the private investor, and this will require an
actual fall in the rate of interest to offset it.

(ii) With the confused psychology which often prevails, the government programme may,
through its effect on 'confidence', increase liquidity-preference or diminish the marginal
efficiency of capital, which, again, may retard other investment unless measures are taken
to offset it.

(iii) In an open system with foreign-trade relations, some part of the multiplier of the
increased investment will accrue to the benefit of employment in foreign countries, since
a proportion of the increased consumption will diminish our own country's favourable
foreign balance; so that, if we consider only the effect on domestic employment as
distinct from world employment, we must diminish the full figure of the multiplier. On
the other hand our own country may recover a portion of this leakage through favourable
repercussions due to the action of the multiplier in the foreign country in increasing its
economic activity.

Furthermore, if we are considering changes of a substantial amount, we have to allow for

a progressive change in the marginal propensity to consume, as the position of the margin
is gradually shifted; and hence in the multiplier. The marginal propensity to consume is
not constant for all levels of employment, and it is probable that there will be, as a rule, a
tendency for it to diminish as employment increases; when real income increases, that is
to say, the community will wish to consume a gradually diminishing proportion of it.

There are also other factors, over and above the operation of the general rule Just
mentioned, which may operate to modify the marginal propensity to consume, and hence
the multiplier; and these other factors seem likely, as a rule, to accentuate the tendency of
the general rule rather than to offset it. For, in the first place, the increase of employment
will tend, owing to the effect of diminishing returns in the short period, to increase the
proportion of aggregate income which accrues to the entrepreneurs, whose individual
marginal propensity to consume is probably less than the average for the community as a
whole. In the second place, unemployment is likely to be associated with negative saving
in certain quarters, private or public, because the unemployed may be living either on the
savings of themselves and their friends or on public relief which is partly financed out of
loans; with the result that re-employment will gradually diminish these particular acts of
negative saving and reduce, therefore, the marginal propensity to consume more rapidly
than would have occurred from an equal increase in the community's real income
accruing in different circumstances.

In any case, the multiplier is likely to be greater for a small net increment of investment
than for a large increment; so that, where substantial changes are in view, we must be
guided by the average value of the multiplier based on the average marginal propensity to
consume over the range in question.

Mr Kahn has examined the probable quantitative result of such factors as these in certain
hypothetical special cases. But, clearly, it is not possible to carry any generalisation very
far. One can only say, for example, that a typical modern community would probably
tend to consume not much less than 80 per cent of any increment of real income, if it
were a closed system with the consumption of the unemployed paid for by transfers from
the consumption of other consumers, so that the multiplier after allowing for offsets
would not be much less than 5. In a country, however, where foreign trade accounts for,
say, 20 per cent of consumption and where the unemployed receive out of loans or their
equivalent up to, say, 50 per cent of their normal consumption when in work, the
multiplier may fall as low as 2 or 3 times the employment provided by a specific new
investment. Thus a given fluctuation of investment will be associated with a much less
violent fluctuation of employment in a country in which foreign trade plays a large part
and unemployment relief is financed on a larger scale out of borrowing (as was the case,
e.g. in Great Britain in 1931), than in a country in which these factors are less important
(as in the United States in 1932)[5].

It is, however, to the general principle of the multiplier to which we have to look for an
explanation of how fluctuations in the amount of investment, which are a comparatively
small proportion of the national income, are capable of generating fluctuations in
aggregate employment and income so much greater in amplitude than themselves.
IV

The discussion has been carried on, so far, on the basis of a change in aggregate
investment which has been foreseen sufficiently in advance for the consumption
industries to advance pari passu with the capital-goods industries without more
disturbance to the price of consumption-goods than is consequential, in conditions of
decreasing returns, on an increase in the quantity which is produced.

In general, however, we have to take account of the case where the initiative comes from
an increase in the output of the capital-goods industries which was not fully foreseen. It is
obvious that an initiative of this description only produces its full effect on employment
over a period of time. I have found, however, in discussion that this obvious fact often
gives rise to some confusion between the logical theory of the multiplier, which holds
good continuously, without time-lag, at all moments of time, and the consequences of an
expansion in the capital-goods industries which take gradual effect, subject to time-lag
and only after an interval.

The relationship between these two things can be cleared up by pointing out, firstly that
an unforeseen, or imperfectly foreseen, expansion in the capital-goods industries does not
have an instantaneous effect of equal amount on the aggregate of investment but causes a
gradual increase of the latter; and, secondly, that it may cause a temporary departure of
the marginal propensity to consume away from its normal value, followed, however, by a
gradual return to it.

Thus an expansion in the capital-goods industries causes a series of increments in

aggregate investment occurring in successive periods over an interval of time, and a
series of values of the marginal propensity to consume in these successive periods which
differ both from what the values would have been if the expansion had been foreseen and
from what they will be when the community has settled down to a new steady level of
aggregate investment. But in every interval of time the theory of the multiplier holds
good in the sense that the increment of aggregate demand is equal to the product of the
increment of aggregate investment and the multiplier as determined by the marginal
propensity to consume.

The explanation of these two sets of facts can be seen most clearly by taking the extreme
case where the expansion of employment in the capital-goods industries is so entirely
unforeseen that in the first instance there is no increase whatever in the output of
consumption-goods. In this event the efforts of those newly employed in the capital-
goods industries to consume a proportion of their increased incomes will raise the prices
of consumption-goods until a temporary equilibrium between demand and supply has
been brought about partly by the high prices causing a postponement of consumption,
partly by a redistribution of income in favour of the saving classes as an effect of the
increased profits resulting from the higher prices, and partly by the higher prices causing
a depletion of stocks. So far as the balance is restored by a postponement of consumption
there is a temporary reduction of the marginal propensity to consume, i.e. of the
multiplier itself, and in so far as there is a depletion of stocks, aggregate investment
increases for the time being by less than the increment of investment in the capital-goods
industries,i.e. the thing to be multiplied does not increase by the full increment of
investment in the capital-goods industries. As time goes on, however, the consumption-
goods industries adjust themselves to the new demand, so that when the deferred
consumption is enjoyed, the marginal propensity to consume rises temporarily above its
normal level, to compensate for the extent to which it previously fell below it, and
eventually returns to its normal level; whilst the restoration of stocks to their previous
figure causes the increment of aggregate investment to be temporarily greater than the
increment of investment in the capital-goods industries (the increment of working capital
corresponding to the greater output also having temporarily the same effect).

The fact that an unforeseen change only exercises its full effect on employment over a
period of time is important in certain contexts;in particular it plays a part in the
analysis of the trade cycle (on lines such as I followed in my Treatise on Money). But it
does not in any way affect the significance of the theory of the multiplier as set forth in
this chapter; nor render it inapplicable as an indicator of the total benefit to employment
to be expected from an expansion in the capital goods industries. Moreover, except in
conditions where the consumption industries are already working almost at capacity so
that an expansion of output requires an expansion of plant and not merely the more
intensive employment of the existing plant, there is no reason to suppose that more than a
brief interval of time need elapse before employment in the consumption industries is
advancing pari passu with employment in the capital-goods industries with the multiplier
operating near its normal figure.

We have seen above that the greater the marginal propensity to consume, the greater the
multiplier, and hence the greater the disturbance to employment corresponding to a given
change in investment. This might seem to lead to the paradoxical conclusion that a poor
community in which saving is a very small proportion of income will be more subject to
violent fluctuations than a wealthy community where saving is a larger proportion of
income and the multiplier consequently smaller.

This conclusion, however, would overlook the distinction between the effects of the
marginal propensity to consume and those of the average propensity to consume. For
whilst a high marginal propensity to consume involves a larger proportionate effect from
a given percentage change in investment, the absolute effect will, nevertheless, be small
if the average propensity to consume is also high. This may be illustrated as follows by a
numerical example.

Let us suppose that a community's propensity to consume is such that, so long as its real
income does not exceed the output from employing 5,000,000 men on its existing capital
equipment, it consumes the whole of its income; that of the output of the next 100,000
additional men employed it consumes 99 per cent, of the next 100,000 after that 98 per
cent, of the third 100,000 97 per cent and so on; and that 10,000,000 men employed
represents full employment. It follows from this that, when 5,000,000 + n 100,000 men
are employed, the multiplier at the margin is 100/n, and [n(n + i)]/[2(50 + n)] per cent of
the national income is invested.

Thus when 5,200,000 men are employed the multiplier is very large, namely 50, but
investment is only a trifling proportion of current income, namely, 0.06 per cent; with the
result that if investment falls off by a large proportion, say about two-thirds, employment
will only decline to 5,100,000, i.e. by about 2 per cent. On the other hand, when
9,000,000 men are employed, the marginal multiplier is comparatively small, namely 2,
but investment is now a substantial proportion of current income, namely, 9 per cent;
with the result that if investment falls by two-thirds, employment will decline to
6,900,000, namely, by 19 per cent. In the limit where investment falls off to zero,
employment will decline by about 4 per cent in the former case, whereas in the latter case
it will decline by 44 per cent[6].

In the above example, the poorer of the two communities under comparison is poorer by
reason of under-employment. But the same reasoning applies by easy adaptation if the
poverty is due to inferior skill, technique or equipment. Thus whilst the multiplier is
larger in a poor community, the effect on employment of fluctuations in investment will
be much greater in a wealthy community, assuming that in the latter current investment
represents a much larger proportion of current output[7].

It is also obvious from the above that the employment of a given number of men on
public works will (on the assumptions made) have a much larger effect on aggregate
employment at a time when there is severe unemployment, than it will have later on when
full employment is approached. In the above example, if, at a time when employment has
fallen to 5,200,000, an additional 100,000 men are employed on public works, total
employment will rise to 6,400,000. But if employment is already 9,000,000 when the
additional 100,000 men are taken on for public works, total employment will only rise to
9,200,000. Thus public works even of doubtful utility may pay for themselves over and
over again at a time of severe unemployment, if only from the diminished cost of relief
expenditure, provided that we can assume that a smaller proportion of income is saved
when unemployment is greater; but they may become a more doubtful proposition as a
state of full employment is approached. Furthermore, if our assumption is correct that the
marginal propensity to consume falls off steadily as we approach full employment, it
follows that it will become more and more troublesome to secure a further given increase
of employment by further increasing investment. It should not be difficult to compile a
chart of the marginal propensity to consume at each stage of a trade cycle from the
statistics (if they were available) of aggregate income and aggregate investment at
successive dates. At present, however, our statistics are not accurate enough (or compiled
sufficiently with this specific object in view) to allow us to infer more than highly
approximate estimates. The best for the purpose, of which I am aware, are Mr Kuznets'
figures for the United States (already referred to, p.103 above), though they are,
nevertheless, very precarious. Taken in conjunction with estimates of national income
these suggest, for what they are worth, both a lower figure and a more stable figure for
the investment multiplier than I should have expected. If single years are taken in
isolation, the results look rather wild. But if they are grouped in pairs, the multiplier
seems to have been less than 3 and probably fairly stable in the neighbourhood of 2.5.
This suggests a marginal propensity to consume not exceeding 6o to 70 per centa
figure quite plausible for the boom, but surprisingly, and, in my judgment, improbably
low for the slump. It is possible, however, that the extreme financial conservatism of
corporate finance in the United States, even during the slump, may account for it. In other
words, if, when investment is falling heavily through a failure to undertake repairs and
replacements, financial provision is made, nevertheless, in respect of such wastage, the
effect is to prevent the rise in the marginal propensity to consume which would have
occurred otherwise. I suspect that this factor may have played a significant part in
aggravating the degree of the recent slump in the United States. On the other hand, it is
possible that the statistics somewhat overstate the decline in investment, which is alleged
to have fallen off by more than 75 per cent in 1932 compared with 1929, whilst net
'capital formation' declined by more than 95 per cent;a moderate change in these
estimates being capable of making a substantial difference to the multiplier.

VI

When involuntary unemployment exists, the marginal disutility of labour is necessarily

less than the utility of the marginal product. Indeed it may be much less. For a man who
has been long unemployed some measure of labour, instead of involving disutility, may
have a positive utility. If this is accepted, the above reasoning shows how 'wasteful' loan
expenditure[8] may nevertheless enrich the community on balance. Pyramid-building,
earthquakes, even wars may serve to increase wealth, if the education of our statesmen on
the principles of the classical economics stands in the way of anything better.

It is curious how common sense, wriggling for an escape from absurd conclusions, has
been apt to reach a preference for wholly 'wasteful' forms of loan expenditure rather than
for partly wasteful forms, which, because they are not wholly wasteful, tend to be judged
on strict 'business' principles. For example, unemployment relief financed by loans is
more readily accepted than the financing of improvements at a charge below the current
rate of interest; whilst the form of digging holes in the ground known as gold-mining,
which not only adds nothing whatever to the real wealth of the world but involves the
disutility of labour, is the most acceptable of all solutions.

If the Treasury were to fill old bottles with banknotes, bury them at suitable depths in
disused coalmines which are then filled up to the surface with town rubbish, and leave it
to private enterprise on well-tried principles of laissez-faire to dig the notes up again (the
right to do so being obtained, of course, by tendering for leases of the note-bearing
territory), there need be no more unemployment and, with the help of the repercussions,
the real income of the community, and its capital wealth also, would probably become a
good deal greater than it actually is. It would, indeed, be more sensible to build houses
and the like; but if there are political and practical difficulties in the way of this, the
above would be better than nothing.

The analogy between this expedient and the goldmines of the real world is complete. At
periods when gold is available at suitable depths experience shows that the real wealth of
the world increases rapidly; and when but little of it is so available our wealth suffers
stagnation or decline. Thus gold-mines are of the greatest value and importance to
civilisation. Just as wars have been the only form of large-scale loan expenditure which
statesmen have thought justifiable, so gold-mining is the only pretext for digging holes in
the ground which has recommended itself to bankers as sound finance; and each of these
activities has played its part in progressfailing something better. To mention a detail,
the tendency in slumps for the price of gold to rise in terms of labour and materials aids
eventual recovery, because it increases the depth at which gold-digging pays and lowers
the minimum grade of ore which is payable.

In addition to the probable effect of increased supplies of gold on the rate of interest,
gold-mining is for two reasons a highly practical form of investment, if we are precluded
from increasing employment by means which at the same time increase our stock of
useful wealth. In the first place, owing to the gambling attractions which it offers it is
carried on without too close a regard to the ruling rate of interest. In the second place the
result, namely, the increased stock of gold, does not, as in other cases, have the effect of
diminishing its marginal utility. Since the value of a house depends on its utility, every
house which is built serves to diminish the prospective rents obtainable from further
house-building and therefore lessens the attraction of further similar investment unless
the rate of interest is falling pari passu. But the fruits of gold-mining do not suffer from
this disadvantage, and a check can only come through a rise of the wage-unit in terms of
gold, which is not likely to occur unless and until employment is substantially better.
Moreover, there is no subsequent reverse effect on account of provision for user and
supplementary costs, as in the case of less durable forms of wealth.

Ancient Egypt was doubly fortunate, and doubtless owed to this its fabled wealth, in that
it possessed two activities, namely, pyramid-building as well as the search for the
precious metals, the fruits of which, since they could not serve the needs of man by being
consumed, did not stale with abundance. The Middle Ages built cathedrals and sang
dirges. Two pyramids, two masses for the dead, are twice as good as one; but not so two
railways from London to York. Thus we are so sensible, have schooled ourselves to so
close a semblance of prudent financiers, taking careful thought before we add to the
'financial' burdens of posterity by building them houses to live in, that we have no such
easy escape from the sufferings of unemployment. We have to accept them as an
inevitable result of applying to the conduct of the State the maxims which are best
calculated to 'enrich' an individual by enabling him to pile up claims to enjoyment which
he does not intend to exercise at any definite time.

1. More precisely, if ee and e'e are the elasticities of employment in industry as a whole and in the
investment industries respectively; and if N and N2 are the numbers of men employed in industry
as a whole and in the investment industries, we have

Yw = Yw/(ee.N) N

and

Iw = Iw/(e'e.N2) N2,
 so that

N = (ee/e'e)(Iw/N2)(N/Yw)k N2,

i.e.,

k' = (Iw/e'eN2)(eeN/Yw)k

If however, there is no reason to expect any material relevant difference in the shapes of the
aggregate supply functions for industry as a whole and for the investment industries respectively,
so that Iw/(ee'.N2) = Yw/(ee.N), then it follows that DYw/DN = DIw/DN2 and, therefore, that k = k'.

2. Our quantities are measured throughout in terms of wage-units.

3. Though in the more generalised case it is also a function of the physical conditions of production in
the investment and consumption industries respectively.

4. Cf. Chapter 21, p. 303, below.

5. Cf., however, below, p. 128, for an American estimate.

6. Quantity of investment is measured, above, by the number of men employed in producing it. Thus
if there are diminishing returns per unit of employment as employment increases, what is double
the quantity of investment on the above scale will be less than double on a physical (if such a scale
is available).

7. More generally, the ratio of the proportional change in total demand to the proportional change in
investment

= (Y/Y)(I/I) = (Y/Y)(Y - C)/(Y - C) = (1 - C/Y)/(1 - dC/dY)

As wealth increases dY/dY diminishes, but C/Y also diminishes. Thus the fraction increases or
diminishes according as consumption increases or diminishes in a smaller or greater proportion
than income.

8. It is often convenient to use the term loan expenditure to include both public investment
financed by borrowing from individuals and also any other current public expenditure which is so
financed. Strictly speaking, the latter should be reckoned as negative saving, but official action of
this kind is not influenced by the same sort of psychological motives as those which govern private
saying. Thus loan expenditure is a convenient expression for the net borrowings of public
authorities on all accounts, whether on capital account or to meet a budgetary deficit. The one
form of loan expenditure operates by increasing investment and the other by increasing the
propensity to consume.
Chapter 11

THE MARGINAL EFFICIENCY OF CAPITAL

When a man buys an investment or capital-asset, he purchases the right to the series of
prospective returns, which he expects to obtain from selling its output, after deducting the
running expenses of obtaining that output, during the life of the asset. This series of
annuities Q1 , Q2 , . . . Q n it is convenient to call the prospective yield of the investment.

Over against the prospective yield of the investment we have the supply price of the
capital-asset, meaning by this, not the market-price at which an asset of the type in
question can actually be purchased in the market, but the price which would just induce a
manufacturer newly to produce an additional unit of such assets, i.e. what is sometimes
called its replacement cost . The relation between the prospective yield of a capital-asset
and its supply price or replacement cost, i.e. the relation between the prospective yield of
one more unit of that type of capital and the cost of producing that unit, furnishes us with
the marginal efficiency of capital of that type. More precisely, I define the marginal
efficiency of capital as being equal to that rate of discount which would make the present
value of the series of annuities given by the returns expected from the capital-asset during
its life just equal to its supply price. This gives us the marginal efficiencies of particular
types of capital-assets. The greatest of these marginal efficiencies can then be regarded as
the marginal efficiency of capital in general.

The reader should note that the marginal efficiency of capital is here defined in terms of
the expectation of yield and of the current supply price of the capital-asset. It depends on
the rate of return expected to be obtainable on money if it were invested in a newly
produced asset; not on the historical result of what an investment has yielded on its
original cost if we look back on its record after its life is over.

If there is an increased investment in any given type of capital during any period of time,
the marginal efficiency of that type of capital will diminish as the investment in it is
increased, partly because the prospective yield will fall as the supply of that type of
capital is increased, and partly because, as a rule, pressure on the facilities for producing
that type of capital will cause its supply price to increase; the second of these factors
being usually the more important in producing equilibrium in the short run, but the longer
the period in view the more does the first factor take its place. Thus for each type of
capital we can build up a schedule, showing by how much investment in it will have to
increase within the period, in order that its marginal efficiency should fall to any given
figure. We can then aggregate these schedules for all the different types of capital, so as
to provide a schedule relating the rate of aggregate investment to the corresponding
marginal efficiency of capital in general which that rate of investment will establish. We
shall call this the investment demand-schedule; or, alternatively, the schedule of the
marginal efficiency of capital.

Now it is obvious that the actual rate of current investment will be pushed to the point
where there is no longer any class of capital-asset of which the marginal efficiency
exceeds the current rate of interest. In other words, the rate of investment will be pushed
to the point on the investment demand-schedule where the marginal efficiency of capital
in general is equal to the market rate of interest[1].

The same thing can also be expressed as follows. If Qr is the prospective yield from an
asset at time r, and dr is the present value of 1 deferred r years at the current rate of
interest, Qrdr is the demand price of the investment; and investment will be carried to
the point where Qrdr becomes equal to the supply price of the investment as defined
above. If, on the other hand, Qrdr falls short of the supply price, there will be no current
investment in the asset in question.

It follows that the inducement to invest depends partly on the investment demand-
schedule and partly on the rate of interest. Only at the conclusion of Book IV will it be
possible to take a comprehensive view of the factors determining the rate of investment in
their actual complexity. I would, however, ask the reader to note at once that neither the
knowledge of an asset's prospective yield nor the knowledge of the marginal efficiency of
the asset enables us to deduce either the rate of interest or the present value of the asset.
We must ascertain the rate of interest from some other source, and only then can we
value the asset by 'capitalising' its prospective yield.

II

How is the above definition of the marginal efficiency of capital related to common
usage? The Marginal Productivity or Yield or Efficiency or Utility of Capital are familiar
terms which we have all frequently used. But it is not easy by searching the literature of
economics to find a clear statement of what economists have usually intended by these
terms.

There are at least three ambiguities to clear up. There is, to begin with, the ambiguity
whether we are concerned with the increment of physical product per unit of time due to
the employment of one more physical unit of capital, or with the increment of value due
to the employment of one more value unit of capital. The former involves difficulties as
to the definition of the physical unit of capital, which I believe to be both insoluble and
unnecessary. It is, of course, possible to say that ten labourers will raise more wheat from
a given area when they are in a position to make use of certain additional machines; but I
know no means of reducing this to an intelligible arithmetical ratio which does not bring
in values. Nevertheless many discussions of this subject seem to be mainly concerned
with the physical productivity of capital in some sense, though the writers fail to make
themselves clear.
Secondly, there is the question whether the marginal efficiency of capital is some
absolute quantity or a ratio. The contexts in which it is used and the practice of treating it
as being of the same dimension as the rate of interest seem to require that it should be a
ratio. Yet it is not usually made clear what the two terms of the ratio are supposed to be.

Finally, there is the distinction, the neglect of which has been the main cause of
confusion and misunderstanding, between the increment of value obtainable by using an
additional quantity of capital in the existing situation, and the series of increments which
it is expected to obtain over the whole life of the additional capital asset; i.e. the
distinction between Q1 and the complete series Q1 , Q2 , . . . Qr , . . . .This involves the
whole question of the place of expectation in economic theory. Most discussions of the
marginal efficiency of capital seem to pay no attention to any member of the series
except Q1 . Yet this cannot be legitimate except in a Static theory, for which all the Q 's
are equal. The ordinary theory of distribution, where it is assumed that capital is getting
now its marginal productivity (in some sense or other), is only valid in a stationary state.
The aggregate current return to capital has no direct relationship to its marginal
efficiency; whilst its current return at the margin of production (i.e. the return to capital
which enters into the supply price of output) is its marginal user cost, which also has no
close connection with its marginal efficiency.

There is, as I have said above, a remarkable lack of any clear account of the matter. At
the same time I believe that the definition which I have given above is fairly close to
what Marshall intended to mean by the term. The phrase which Marshall himself uses is
'marginal net efficiency' of a factor of production; or, alternatively, the 'marginal utility of
capital'. The following is a summary of the most relevant passage which I can find in his
Principles (6th ed. pp. 519-520). I have run together some non-consecutive sentences to
convey the gist of what he says:

In a certain factory an extra 100 worth of machinery can be applied so as

not to involve any other extra expense, and so as to add annually 3 worth to
the net output of the factory after allowing for its own wear and tear. If the
investors of capital push it into every occupation in which it seems likely to
gain a high reward; and if, after this has been done and equilibrium has been
found, it still pays and only just pays to employ this machinery, we can infer
from this fact that the yearly rate of interest is 3 per cent. But illustrations of
this kind merely indicate part of the action of the great causes which govern
value. They cannot be made into a theory of interest, any more than into a
theory of wages, without reasoning in a circle. . . Suppose that the rate of
interest is 3 per cent. per annum on perfectly good security; and that the hat-
making trade absorbs a capital of one million pounds. This implies that the
hat-making trade can turn the whole million pounds' worth of capital to so
good account that they would pay 3 per cent. per annum net for the use of it
rather than go without any of it. There may be machinery which the trade
would have refused to dispense with if the rate of interest had been 20 per
cent. per annum. If the rate had been 10 per cent., more would have been
used; if it had been 6 per cent., still more; if 4 per cent. still more; and finally,
 the rate being 3 per cent., they use more still. When they have this amount,
the marginal utility of the machinery, i.e. the utility of that machinery which
it is only just worth their while to employ, is measured by 3 per cent.

It is evident from the above that Marshall was well aware that we are involved in a
circular argument if we try to determine along these lines what the rate of interest
actually is[2]. In this passage he appears to accept the view set forth above, that the rate of
interest determines the point to which new investment will be pushed, given the schedule
of the marginal efficiency of capital. If the rate of interest is 3 per cent, this means that no
one will pay 100 for a machine unless he hopes thereby to add 3 to his annual net
output after allowing for costs and depreciation. But we shall see in chapter 14 that in
other passages Marshall was less cautious though still drawing back when his
argument was leading him on to dubious ground.

Although he does not call it the 'marginal efficiency of capital', Professor Irving Fisher
has given in his Theory of Interest (1930) a definition of what he calls 'the rate of return
over cost' which is identical with my definition. 'The rate of return over cost', he writes[3],
'is that rate which, employed in computing the present worth of all the costs and the
present worth of all the returns, will make these two equal.' Professor Fisher explains that
the extent of investment in any direction will depend on a comparison between the rate of
return over cost and the rate of interest[4]. To induce new investment 'the rate of return
over cost must exceed the rate of interest'. 'This new magnitude (or factor) in our study
plays the central role on the investment opportunity side of interest theory[5].' Thus
Professor Fisher uses his 'rate of return over cost in the same sense and for precisely the
same purpose as I employ 'the marginal efficiency of capital'.

III

The most important confusion concerning the meaning and significance of the marginal
efficiency of capital has ensued on the failure to see that it depends on the prospective
yield of capital, and not merely on its current yield. This can be best illustrated by
pointing out the effect on the marginal efficiency of capital of an expectation of changes
in the prospective cost of production, whether these changes are expected to come from
changes in labour cost, i.e. in the wage-unit, or from inventions and new technique. The
output from equipment produced to-day will have to compete, in the course of its life,
with the output from equipment produced subsequently, perhaps at a lower labour cost,
perhaps by an improved technique, which is content with a lower price for its output and
will be increased in quantity until the price of its output has fallen to the lower figure
with which it is content. Moreover, the entrepreneur's profit (in terms of money) from
equipment, old or new, will be reduced, if all output comes to be produced more cheaply.
In so far as such developments are foreseen as probable, or even as possible, the marginal
efficiency of capital produced to-day is appropriately diminished.

This is the factor through which the expectation of changes in the value of money
influences the volume of current output. The expectation of a fall in the value of money
stimulates investment, and hence employment generally, because it raises the schedule of
the marginal efficiency of capital, i.e. the investment demand-schedule; and the
expectation of a rise in the value of money is depressing, because it lowers the schedule
of the marginal efficiency of capital.

This is the truth which lies behind Professor Irving Fisher's theory of what he originally
called 'Appreciation and Interest' the distinction between the money rate of interest
and the real rate of interest where the latter is equal to the former after correction for
changes in the value of money. It is difficult to make sense of this theory as stated,
because it is not clear whether the change in the value of money is or is not assumed to be
foreseen. There is no escape from the dilemma that, if it is not foreseen, there will be no
effect on current affairs; whilst, if it is foreseen, the prices of existing goods will be
forthwith so adjusted that the advantages of holding money and of holding goods are
again equalised, and it will be too late for holders of money to gain or to suffer a change
in the rate of interest which will offset the prospective change during the period of the
loan in the value of the money lent. For the dilemma is not successfully escaped by
Professor Pigou's expedient of supposing that the prospective change in the value of
money is foreseen by one set of people but not foreseen by another.

The mistake lies in supposing that it is the rate of interest on which prospective changes
in the value of money will directly react, instead of the marginal efficiency of a given
stock of capital. The prices of existing assets will always adjust themselves to changes in
expectation concerning the prospective value of money. The significance of such changes
in expectation lies in their effect on the readiness to produce new assets through their
reaction on the marginal efficiency of capital. The stimulating effect of the expectation of
higher prices is due, not to its raising the rate of interest (that would be a paradoxical way
of stimulating output in so far as the rate of interest rises, the stimulating effect is to
that extent offset), but to its raising the marginal efficiency of a given stock of capital. If
the rate of interest were to rise pari passu with the marginal efficiency of capital, there
would be no stimulating effect from the expectation of rising prices. For the stimulus to
output depends on the marginal efficiency of a given stock of capital rising relatively to
the rate of interest. Indeed Professor Fisher's theory could be best re-written in terms of a
'real rate of interest' defined as being the rate of interest which would have to rule,
consequently on a change in the state of expectation as to the future value of money, in
order that this change should have no effect on current output[6].

It is worth noting that an expectation of a future fall in the rate of interest will have the
effect of lowering the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital; since it means that
the output from equipment produced to-day will have to compete during part of its life
with the output from equipment which is content with a lower return. This expectation
will have no great depressing effect, since the expectations, which are held concerning
the complex of rates of interest for various terms which will rule in the future, will be
partially reflected in the complex of rates of interest which rule to-day. Nevertheless there
may be some depressing effect, since the output from equipment produced to-day, which
will emerge towards the end of the life of this equipment, may have to compete with the
output of much younger equipment which is content with a lower return because of the
lower rate of interest which rules for periods subsequent to the end of the life of
equipment produced to-day.

It is important to understand the dependence of the marginal efficiency of a given stock

of capital on changes in expectation, because it is chiefly this dependence which renders
the marginal efficiency of capital subject to the somewhat violent fluctuations which are
the explanation of the trade cycle. In chapter 22 below we shall show that the succession
of boom and slump can be described and analysed in terms of the fluctuations of the
marginal efficiency of capital relatively to the rate of interest.

IV

Two types of risk affect the volume of investment which have not commonly been
distinguished, but which it is important to distinguish. The first is the entrepreneur's or
borrower's risk and arises out of doubts in his own mind as to the probability of his
actually earning the prospective yield for which he hopes. If a man is venturing his own
money, this is the only risk which is relevant.

But where a system of borrowing and lending exists, by which I mean the ranting of
loans with a margin of real or personal security, a second type of risk is relevant which
we may call the lender's risk. This may be due either to moral hazard, i.e. voluntary
default or other means of escape, possibly lawful, from the fulfilment of the obligation, or
to the possible insufficiency of the margin of security, i.e. involuntary default due to the
disappointment of expectation. A third source of risk might be added, namely, a possible
adverse change in the value of the monetary standard which renders a money-loan to this
extent less secure than a real asset; though all or most of this should be already reflected,
and therefore absorbed, in the price of durable real assets.

Now the first type of risk is, in a sense, a real social cost, though susceptible to
diminution by averaging as well as by an increased accuracy of foresight. The second,
however, is a pure addition to the cost of investment which would not exist if the
borrower and lender were the same person. Moreover, it involves in part a duplication of
a proportion of the entrepreneur's risk, which is added twice to the pure rate of interest to
give the minimum prospective yield which will induce the investment. For if a venture is
a risky one, the borrower will require a wider margin between his expectation of yield
and the rate of interest at which he will think it worth his while to borrow; whilst the very
same reason will lead the lender to require a wider margin between what he charges and
the pure rate of interest in order to induce him to lend (except where the borrower is so
strong and wealthy that he is in a position to offer an exceptional margin of security). The
hope of a very favourable outcome, which may balance the risk in the mind of the
borrower, is not available to solace the lender.

This duplication of allowance for a portion of the risk has not hitherto been emphasised,
so far as I am aware; but it may be important in certain circumstances. During a boom the
popular estimation of the magnitude of both these risks, both borrower's risk and lender's
risk, is apt to become unusually and imprudently low.
V

The schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital is of fundamental importance because

it is mainly through this factor (much more than through the rate of interest) that the
expectation of the future influences the present. The mistake of regarding the marginal
efficiency of capital primarily in terms of the current yield of capital equipment, which
would be correct only in the static state where there is no changing future to influence the
present, has had the result of breaking the theoretical link between to-day and to-morrow.
Even the rate of interest is, virtually[7], a current phenomenon; and if we reduce the
marginal efficiency of capital to the same status, we cut ourselves off from taking any
direct account of the influence of the future in our analysis of the existing equilibrium.

The fact that the assumptions of the static state often underlie present-day economic
theory, imports into it a large element of unreality. But the introduction of the concepts of
user cost and of the marginal efficiency of capital, as defined above, will have the effect,
I think, of bringing it back to reality, whilst reducing to a minimum the necessary degree
of adaptation.

It is by reason of the existence of durable equipment that the economic future is linked to
the present. It is, therefore, consonant with, and agreeable to, our broad principles of
thought, that the expectation of the future should affect the present through the demand
price for durable equipment.

1. For the sake of simplicity of statement I have slurred the point that we are dealing with complexes
of rates of interest and discount corresponding to the different lengths of time which will elapse
before the various prospective returns from the asset are realised. But it is not difficult to re-state
the argument so as to cover this point.

2. But was he not wrong in supposing that the marginal productivity theory of wages is equally
circular?

3. Op. cit. p. 168.

4. Op. cit. p. 159.

5. Op. cit. p. 155.

6. Cf. Mr. Robertsons article on Industrial Fluctuations and the Natural Rate of Interest,
Economic Journal, December 1934.

7. Not completely; for its value partly reflects the uncertainty of the future. Moreover, the relation
between rates of interest for different terms depends on expectations.
Chapter 12

THE STATE OF LONG-TERM EXPECTATION

We have seen in the previous chapter that the scale of investment depends on the relation
between the rate of interest and the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital
corresponding to different scales of current investment, whilst the marginal efficiency of
capital depends on the relation between the supply price of a capital-asset and its
prospective yield. In this chapter we shall consider in more detail some of the factors
which determine the prospective yield of an asset.

The considerations upon which expectations of prospective yields are based are partly
existing facts which we can assume to be known more or less for certain, and partly
future events which can only be forecasted with more or less confidence. Amongst the
first may be mentioned the existing stock of various types of capital-assets and of capital-
assets in general and the strength of the existing consumers' demand for goods which
require for their efficient production a relatively larger assistance from capital. Amongst
the latter are future changes in the type and quantity of the stock of capital-assets and in
the tastes of the consumer, the strength of effective demand from time to time during the
life of the investment under consideration, and the changes in the wage-unit in terms of
money which may occur during its life. We may sum up the state of psychological
expectation which covers the latter as being the state of long-term expectation;as
distinguished from the short-term expectation upon the basis of which a producer
estimates what he will get for a product when it is finished if he decides to begin
producing it to-day with the existing plant, which we examined in chapter 5.

II

It would be foolish, in forming our expectations, to attach great weight to matters which
are very uncertain[1]. It is reasonable, therefore, to be guided to a considerable degree by
the facts about which we feel somewhat confident, even though they may be less
decisively relevant to the issue than other facts about which our knowledge is vague and
scanty. For this reason the facts of the existing situation enter, in a sense
disproportionately, into the formation of our long-term expectations; our usual practice
being to take the existing situation and to project it into the future, modified only to the
extent that we have more or less definite reasons for expecting a change.

The state of long-term expectation, upon which our decisions are based, does not solely
depend, therefore, on the most probable forecast we can make. It also depends on the
confidence with which we make this forecaston how highly we rate the likelihood of
our best forecast turning out quite wrong. If we expect large changes but are very
uncertain as to what precise form these changes will take, then our confidence will be
weak.

The state of confidence, as they term it, is a matter to which practical men always pay the
closest and most anxious attention. But economists have not analysed it carefully and
have been content, as a rule, to discuss it in general terms. In particular it has not been
made clear that its relevance to economic problems comes in through its important
influence on the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital. There are not two separate
factors affecting the rate of investment, namely, the schedule of the marginal efficiency
of capital and the state of confidence. The state of confidence is relevant because it is one
of the major factors determining the former, which is the same thing as the investment
demand-schedule.

There is, however, not much to be said about the state of confidence a priori. Our
conclusions must mainly depend upon the actual observation of markets and business
psychology. This is the reason why the ensuing digression is on a different level of
abstraction from most of this book.

For convenience of exposition we shall assume in the following discussion of the state of
confidence that there are no changes in the rate of interest; and we shall write, throughout
the following sections, as if changes in the values of investments were solely due to
changes in the expectation of their prospective yields and not at all to changes in the rate
of interest at which these prospective yields are capitalised. The effect of changes in the
rate of interest is, however, easily superimposed on the effect of changes in the state of
confidence.

III

The outstanding fact is the extreme precariousness of the basis of knowledge on which
our estimates of prospective yield have to be made. Our knowledge of the factors which
will govern the yield of an investment some years hence is usually very slight and often
negligible. If we speak frankly, we have to admit that our basis of knowledge for
estimating the yield ten years hence of a railway, a copper mine, a textile factory, the
goodwill of a patent medicine, an Atlantic liner, a building in the City of London
amounts to little and sometimes to nothing; or even five years hence. In fact, those who
seriously attempt to make any such estimate are often so much in the minority that their
behaviour does not govern the market.

In former times, when enterprises were mainly owned by those who undertook them or
by their friends and associates, investment depended on a sufficient supply of individuals
of sanguine temperament and constructive impulses who embarked on business as a way
of life, not really relying on a precise calculation of prospective profit. The affair was
partly a lottery, though with the ultimate result largely governed by whether the abilities
and character of the managers were above or below the average. Some would fail and
some would succeed. But even after the event no one would know whether the average
results in terms of the sums invested had exceeded, equalled or fallen short of the
prevailing rate of interest; though, if we exclude the exploitation of natural resources and
monopolies, it is probable that the actual average results of investments, even during
periods of progress and prosperity, have disappointed the hopes which prompted them.
Business men play a mixed game of skill and chance, the average results of which to the
players are not known by those who take a hand. If human nature felt no temptation to
take a chance, no satisfaction (profit apart) in constructing a factory, a railway, a mine or
a farm, there might not be much investment merely as a result of cold calculation.

Decisions to invest in private business of the old-fashioned type were, however, decisions
largely irrevocable, not only for the community as a whole, but also for the individual.
With the separation between ownership and management which prevails to-day and with
the development of organised investment markets, a new factor of great importance has
entered in, which sometimes facilitates investment but sometimes adds greatly to the
instability of the system. In the absence of security markets, there is no object in
frequently attempting to revalue an investment to which we are committed. But the Stock
Exchange revalues many investments every day and the revaluations give a frequent
opportunity to the individual (though not to the community as a whole) to revise his
commitments. It is as though a farmer, having tapped his barometer after breakfast, could
decide to remove his capital from the farming business between 10 and II in the morning
and reconsider whether he should return to it later in the week. But the daily revaluations
of the Stock Exchange, though they are primarily made to facilitate transfers of old
investments between one individual and another, inevitably exert a decisive influence on
the rate of current investment. For there is no sense in building up a new enterprise at a
cost greater than that at which a similar existing enterprise can be purchased; whilst there
is an inducement to spend on a new project what may seem an extravagant sum, if it can
be floated off on the Stock Exchange at an immediate profit[2]. Thus certain classes of
investment are governed by the average expectation of those who deal on the Stock
Exchange as revealed in the price of shares, rather than by the genuine expectations of the
professional entrepreneur[3]. How then are these highly significant daily, even hourly,
revaluations of existing investments carried out in practice?

IV

In practice we have tacitly agreed, as a rule, to fall back on what is, in truth, a convention.
The essence of this conventionthough it does not, of course, work out quite so
simplylies in assuming that the existing state of affairs will continue indefinitely,
except in so far as we have specific reasons to expect a change. This does not mean that
we really believe that the existing state of affairs will continue indefinitely. We know
from extensive experience that this is most unlikely. The actual results of an investment
over a long term of years very seldom agree with the initial expectation. Nor can we
rationalise our behaviour by arguing that to a man in a state of ignorance errors in either
direction are equally probable, so that there remains a mean actuarial expectation based
on equi-probabilities. For it can easily be shown that the assumption of arithmetically
equal probabilities based on a state of ignorance leads to absurdities. We are assuming, in
effect, that the existing market valuation, however arrived at, is uniquely correct in
relation to our existing knowledge of the facts which will influence the yield of the
investment, and that it will only change in proportion to changes in this knowledge;
though, philosophically speaking, it cannot be uniquely correct, since our existing
knowledge does not provide a sufficient basis for a calculated mathematical expectation.
In point of fact, all sorts of considerations enter into the market valuation which are in no
way relevant to the prospective yield.

Nevertheless the above conventional method of calculation will be compatible with a

considerable measure of continuity and stability in our affairs, so long as we can rely on
the maintenance of the convention.

For if there exist organised investment markets and if we can rely on the maintenance of
the convention, an investor can legitimately encourage himself with the idea that the only
risk he runs is that of a genuine change in the news over the near future, as to the
likelihood of which he can attempt to form his own judgment, and which is unlikely to be
very large. For, assuming that the convention holds good, it is only these changes which
can affect the value of his investment, and he need not lose his sleep merely because he
has not any notion what his investment will be worth ten years hence. Thus investment
becomes reasonably 'safe' for the individual investor over short periods, and hence over a
succession of short periods however many, if he can fairly rely on there being no
breakdown in the convention and on his therefore having an opportunity to revise his
judgment and change his investment, before there has been time for much to happen.
Investments which are 'fixed' for the community are thus made 'liquid' for the individual.

It has been, I am sure, on the basis of some such procedure as this that our leading
investment markets have been developed. But it is not surprising that a convention, in an
absolute view of things so arbitrary, should have its weak points. It is its precariousness
which creates no small part of our contemporary problem of securing sufficient
investment.

Some of the factors which accentuate this precariousness may be briefly mentioned.

(1) As a result of the gradual increase in the proportion of the equity in the community's
aggregate capital investment which is owned by persons who do not manage and have no
special knowledge of the circumstances, either actual or prospective, of the business in
question, the element of real knowledge in the valuation of investments by whose who
own them or contemplate purchasing them has seriously declined.

(2) Day-to-day fluctuations in the profits of existing investments, which are obviously of
an ephemeral and non-significant character, tend to have an altogether excessive, and
even an absurd, influence on the market. It is said, for example, that the shares of
American companies which manufacture ice tend to sell at a higher price in summer
when their profits are seasonally high than in winter when no one wants ice. The
recurrence of a bank-holiday may raise the market valuation of the British railway system
by several million pounds.
(3) A conventional valuation which is established as the outcome of the mass psychology
of a large number of ignorant individuals is liable to change violently as the result of a
sudden fluctuation of opinion due to factors which do not really make much difference to
the prospective yield; since there will be no strong roots of conviction to hold it steady. In
abnormal times in particular, when the hypothesis of an indefinite continuance of the
existing state of affairs is less plausible than usual even though there are no express
grounds to anticipate a definite change, the market will be subject to waves of optimistic
and pessimistic sentiment, which are unreasoning and yet in a sense legitimate where no
solid basis exists for a reasonable calculation.

(4) But there is one feature in particular which deserves our attention. It might have been
supposed that competition between expert professionals, possessing judgment and
knowledge beyond that of the average private investor, would correct the vagaries of the
ignorant individual left to himself. It happens, however, that the energies and skill of the
professional investor and speculator are mainly occupied otherwise. For most of these
persons are, in fact, largely concerned, not with making superior long-term forecasts of
the probable yield of an investment over its whole life, but with foreseeing changes in the
conventional basis of valuation a short time ahead of the general public. They are
concerned, not with what an investment is really worth to a man who buys it 'for keeps',
but with what the market will value it at, under the influence of mass psychology, three
months or a year hence. Moreover, this behaviour is not the outcome of a wrong-headed
propensity. It is an inevitable result of an investment market organised along the lines
described. For it is not sensible to pay 25 for an investment of which you believe the
prospective yield to justify a value of 30, if you also believe that the market will value it
at 20 three months hence.

Thus the professional investor is forced to concern himself with the anticipation of
impending changes, in the news or in the atmosphere, of the kind by which experience
shows that the mass psychology of the market is most influenced. This is the inevitable
result of investment markets organised with a view to so-called 'liquidity'. Of the maxims
of orthodox finance none, surely, is more anti-social than the fetish of liquidity, the
doctrine that it is a positive virtue on the part of investment institutions to concentrate
their resources upon the holding of 'liquid' securities. It forgets that there is no such thing
as liquidity of investment for the community as a whole. The social object of skilled
investment should be to defeat the dark forces of time and ignorance which envelop our
future. The actual, private object of the most skilled investment to-day is 'to beat the gun',
as the Americans so well express it, to outwit the crowd, and to pass the bad, or
depreciating, half-crown to the other fellow.

This battle of wits to anticipate the basis of conventional valuation a few months hence,
rather than the prospective yield of an investment over a long term of years, does not
even require gulls amongst the public to feed the maws of the professional;it can be
played by professionals amongst themselves. Nor is it necessary that anyone should keep
his simple faith in the conventional basis of valuation having any genuine long-term
validity. For it is, so to speak, a game of Snap, of Old Maid, of Musical Chairsa
pastime in which he is victor who says Snap neither too soon nor too late, who passed the
Old Maid to his neighbour before the game is over, who secures a chair for himself when
the music stops. These games can be played with zest and enjoyment, though all the
players know that it is the Old Maid which is circulating, or that when the music stops
some of the players will find themselves unseated.

Or, to change the metaphor slightly, professional investment may be likened to those
newspaper competitions in which the competitors have to pick out the six prettiest faces
from a hundred photographs, the prize being awarded to the competitor whose choice
most nearly corresponds to the average preferences of the competitors as a whole; so that
each competitor has to pick, not those faces which he himself finds prettiest, but those
which he thinks likeliest to catch the fancy of the other competitors, all of whom are
looking at the problem from the same point of view. It is not a case of choosing those
which, to the best of one's judgment, are really the prettiest, nor even those which
average opinion genuinely thinks the prettiest. We have reached the third degree where
we devote our intelligences to anticipating what average opinion expects the average
opinion to be. And there are some, I believe, who practise the fourth, fifth and higher
degrees.

If the reader interjects that there must surely be large profits to be gained from the other
players in the long run by a skilled individual who, unperturbed by the prevailing pastime,
continues to purchase investments on the best genuine long-term expectations he can
frame, he must be answered, first of all, that there are, indeed, such serious-minded
individuals and that it makes a vast difference to an investment market whether or not
they predominate in their influence over the game-players. But we must also add that
there are several factors which jeopardise the predominance of such individuals in
modern investment markets. Investment based on genuine long-term expectation is so
difficult to-day as to be scarcely practicable. He who attempts it must surely lead much
more laborious days and run greater risks than he who tries to guess better than the crowd
how the crowd will behave; and, given equal intelligence, he may make more disastrous
mistakes. There is no clear evidence from experience that the investment policy which is
socially advantageous coincides with that which is most profitable. It needs more
intelligence to defeat the forces of time and our ignorance of the future than to beat the
gun. Moreover, life is not long enough;human nature desires quick results, there is a
peculiar zest in making money quickly, and remoter gains are discounted by the average
man at a very high rate. The game of professional investment is intolerably boring and
over-exacting to anyone who is entirely exempt from the gambling instinct; whilst he
who has it must pay to this propensity the appropriate toll. Furthermore, an investor who
proposes to ignore near-term market fluctuations needs greater resources for safety and
must not operate on so large a scale, if at all, with borrowed moneya further reason for
the higher return from the pastime to a given stock of intelligence and resources. Finally
it is the long-term investor, he who most promotes the public interest, who will in
practice come in for most criticism, wherever investment funds are managed by
committees or boards or banks[4]. For it is in the essence of his behaviour that he should
be eccentric, unconventional and rash in the eyes of average opinion. If he is successful,
that will only confirm the general belief in his rashness; and if in the short run he is
unsuccessful, which is very likely, he will not receive much mercy. Worldly wisdom
teaches that it is better for reputation to fail conventionally than to succeed
unconventionally.

(5) So far we have had chiefly in mind the state of confidence of the speculator or
speculative investor himself and may have seemed to be tacitly assuming that, if he
himself is satisfied with the prospects, he has unlimited command over money at the
market rate of interest. This is, of course, not the case. Thus we must also take account of
the other facet of the state of confidence, namely, the confidence of the lending
institutions towards those who seek to borrow from them, sometimes described as the
state of credit. A collapse in the price of equities, which has had disastrous reactions on
the marginal efficiency of capital, may have been due to the weakening either of
speculative confidence or of the state of credit. But whereas the weakening of either is
enough to cause a collapse, recovery requires the revival of both. For whilst the
weakening of credit is sufficient to bring about a collapse, its strengthening, though a
necessary condition of recovery, is not a sufficient condition.

VI

These considerations should not lie beyond the purview of the economist. But they must
be relegated to their right perspective. If I may be allowed to appropriate the term
speculation for the activity of forecasting the psychology of the market, and the term
enterprise for the activity of forecasting the prospective yield of assets over their whole
life, it is by no means always the case that speculation predominates over enterprise. As
the organisation of investment markets improves, the risk of the predominance of
speculation does, however, increase. In one of the greatest investment markets in the
world, namely, New York, the influence of speculation (in the above sense) is enormous.
Even outside the field of finance, Americans are apt to be unduly interested in
discovering what average opinion believes average opinion to be; and this national
weakness finds its nemesis in the stock market. It is rare, one is told, for an American to
invest, as many Englishmen still do, 'for income'; and he will not readily purchase an
investment except in the hope of capital appreciation. This is only another way of saying
that, when he purchases an investment, the American is attaching his hopes, not so much
to its prospective yield, as to a favourable change in the conventional basis of valuation,
i.e. that he is, in the above sense, a speculator. Speculators may do no harm as bubbles on
a steady stream of enterprise. But the position is serious when enterprise becomes the
bubble on a whirlpool of speculation. When the capital development of a country
becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. The
measure of success attained by Wall Street[5], regarded as an institution of which the
proper social purpose is to direct new investment into the most profitable channels in
terms of future yield, cannot be claimed as one of the outstanding triumphs of laissez-
faire capitalismwhich is not surprising, if I am right in thinking that the best brains of
Wall Street have been in fact directed towards a different object.

These tendencies are a scarcely avoidable outcome of our having successfully organised
'liquid' investment markets. It is usually agreed that casinos should, in the public interest,
be inaccessible and expensive. And perhaps the same is true of stock exchanges. That the
sins of the London Stock Exchange are less than those of Wall Street may be due, not so
much to differences in national character, as to the fact that to the average Englishman
Throgmorton Street is, compared with Wall Street to the average American, inaccessible
and very expensive. The jobber's 'turn', the high brokerage charges and the heavy transfer
tax payable to the Exchequer, which attend dealings on the London Stock Exchange,
sufficiently diminish the liquidity of the market (although the practice of fortnightly
accounts operates the other way) to rule out a large proportion of the transaction
characteristic of Wall Street. The introduction of a substantial government transfer tax on
all transactions might prove the most serviceable reform available, with a view to
mitigating the predominance of speculation over enterprise in the United States.

The spectacle of modern investment markets has sometimes moved me towards the
conclusion that to make the purchase of an investment permanent and indissoluble, like
marriage, except by reason of death or other grave cause, might be a useful remedy for
our contemporary evils. For this would force the investor to direct his mind to the long-
term prospects and to those only. But a little consideration of this expedient brings us up
against a dilemma, and shows us how the liquidity of investment markets often facilitates,
though it sometimes impedes, the course of new investment. For the fact that each
individual investor flatters himself that his commitment is 'liquid' (though this cannot be
true for all investors collectively) calms his nerves and makes him much more willing to
run a risk. If individual purchases of investments were rendered illiquid, this might
seriously impede new investment, so long as alternative ways in which to hold his
savings are available to the individual. This is the dilemma. So long as it is open to the
individual to employ his wealth in hoarding or lending money, the alternative of
purchasing actual capital assets cannot be rendered sufficiently attractive (especially to
the man who does not manage the capital assets and knows very little about them), except
by organising markets wherein these assets can be easily realised for money.

The only radical cure for the crises of confidence which afflict the economic life of the
modern world would be to allow the individual no choice between consuming his income
and ordering the production of the specific capital-asset which, even though it be on
precarious evidence, impresses him as the most promising investment available to him. It
might be that, at times when he was more than usually assailed by doubts concerning the
future, he would turn in his perplexity towards more consumption and less new
investment. But that would avoid the disastrous, cumulative and far-reaching
repercussions of its being open to him, when thus assailed by doubts, to spend his income
neither on the one nor on the other.

Those who have emphasised the social dangers of the hoarding of money have, of course,
had something similar to the above in mind. But they have overlooked the possibility that
the phenomenon can occur without any change, or at least any commensurate change, in
the hoarding of money.
VII

Even apart from the instability due to speculation, there is the instability due to the
characteristic of human nature that a large proportion of our positive activities depend on
spontaneous optimism rather than on a mathematical expectation, whether moral or
hedonistic or economic. Most, probably, of our decisions to do something positive, the
full consequences of which will be drawn out over many days to come, can only be taken
as a result of animal spiritsof a spontaneous urge to action rather than inaction, and not
as the outcome of a weighted average of quantitative benefits multiplied by quantitative
probabilities. Enterprise only pretends to itself to be mainly actuated by the statements in
its own prospectus, however candid and sincere. Only a little more than an expedition to
the South Pole, is it based on an exact calculation of benefits to come. Thus if the animal
spirits are dimmed and the spontaneous optimism falters, leaving us to depend on nothing
but a mathematical expectation, enterprise will fade and die;though fears of loss may
have a basis no more reasonable than hopes of profit had before.

It is safe to say that enterprise which depends on hopes stretching into the future benefits
the community as a whole. But individual initiative will only be adequate when
reasonable calculation is supplemented and supported by animal spirits, so that the
thought of ultimate loss which often overtakes pioneers, as experience undoubtedly tells
us and them, is put aside as a healthy man puts aside the expectation of death.

This means, unfortunately, not only that slumps and depressions are exaggerated in
degree, but that economic prosperity is excessively dependent on a political and social
atmosphere which is congenial to the average business man. If the fear of a Labour
Government or a New Deal depresses enterprise, this need not be the result either of a
reasonable calculation or of a plot with political intent;it is the mere consequence of
upsetting the delicate balance of spontaneous optimism. In estimating the prospects of
investment, we must have regard, therefore, to the nerves and hysteria and even the
digestions and reactions to the weather of those upon whose spontaneous activity it
largely depends.

We should not conclude from this that everything depends on waves of irrational
psychology. On the contrary, the state of long-term expectation is often steady, and, even
when it is not, the other factors exert their compensating effects. We are merely
reminding ourselves that human decisions affecting the future, whether personal or
political or economic, cannot depend on strict mathematical expectation, since the basis
for making such calculations does not exist; and that it is our innate urge to activity which
makes the wheels go round, our rational selves choosing between the alternatives as best
we are able, calculating where we can, but often falling back for our motive on whim or
sentiment or chance.

VIII

There are, moreover, certain important factors which somewhat mitigate in practice the
effects of our ignorance of the future. Owing to the operation of compound interest
combined with the likelihood of obsolescence with the passage of time, there are many
individual investments of which the prospective yield is legitimately dominated by the
returns of the comparatively near future. In the case of the most important class of very
long-term investments, namely buildings, the risk can be frequently transferred from the
investor to the occupier, or at least shared between them, by means of long-term contracts,
the risk being outweighed in the mind of the occupier by the advantages of continuity and
security of tenure. In the case of another important class of long-term investments,
namely public utilities, a substantial proportion of the prospective yield is practically
guaranteed by monopoly privileges coupled with the right to charge such rates as will
provide a certain stipulated margin. Finally there is a growing class of investments
entered upon by, or at the risk of; public authorities, which are frankly influenced in
making the investment by a general presumption of there being prospective social
advantages from the investment, whatever its commercial yield may prove to be within a
wide range, and without seeking to be satisfied that the mathematical expectation of the
yield is at least equal to the current rate of interest,though the rate which the public
authority has to pay may still play a decisive part in determining the scale of investment
operations which it can afford.

Thus after giving full weight to the importance of the influence of short-period changes in
the state of long-term expectation as distinct from changes in the rate of interest, we are
still entitled to return to the latter as exercising, at any rate, in normal circumstances, a
great, though not a decisive, influence on the rate of investment. Only experience,
however, can show how far management of the rate of interest is capable of continuously
stimulating the appropriate volume of investment.

For my own part I am now somewhat sceptical of the success of a merely monetary
policy directed towards influencing the rate of interest. I expect to see the State, which is
in a position to calculate the marginal efficiency of capital-goods on long views and on
the basis of the general social advantage, taking an ever greater responsibility for directly
organising investment; since it seems likely that the fluctuations in the market estimation
of the marginal efficiency of different types of capital, calculated on the principles I have
described above, will be too great to be offset by any practicable changes in the rate of
interest.

1. By very uncertain I do not mean the same thing as improbable. Cf. my Treatise on Probability,
chap. 6, on The Weight of Arguments.

2. In my Treatise on Money (vol. ii. p. 195) I pointed out that when a companys shares are quoted
very high so that it can raise more capital by issuing more shares on favourable terms, this has the
same effect as if it could borrow at a low rate of interest. I should now describe this by saying that
a high quotation for existing equities involves an increase in the marginal efficiency of the
corresponding type of capital and therefore has the same effect (since investment depends on a
comparison between the marginal efficiency of capital and the rate of interest) as a fall in the rate
of interest.

3. This does not apply, of course, to classes of enterprise which are not readily marketable or to
which no negotiable instrument closely corresponds. The categories failing within this exception
were formerly extensive. But measured as a proportion of the total value of new investment they
are rapidly declining in importance.
4. The practice, usually considered prudent, by which an investment trust or an insurance office
frequently calculates not only the income from its investment portfolio but also its capital
valuation in the market, may also tend to direct too much attention to short-term fluctuations in
the latter.

5. It is said that, when Wall Street is active, at least a half of the purchases or sales of investments are
entered upon with an intention on the part of the speculator to reverse them the same day. This is
often true of the commodity exchanges also.
Chapter 13

THE GENERAL THEORY OF THE RATE OF INTEREST

We have shown in chapter 11 that, whilst there are forces causing the rate of investment
to rise or fall so as to keep the marginal efficiency of capital equal to the rate of interest,
yet the marginal efficiency of capital is, in itself; a different thing from the ruling rate of
interest. The schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital may be said to govern the
terms on which loanable funds are demanded for the purpose of new investment; whilst
the rate of interest governs the terms on which funds are being currently supplied. To
complete our theory, therefore, we need to know what determines the rate of interest.

In chapter 14 and its Appendix we shall consider the answers to this question which have
been given hitherto. Broadly speaking, we shall find that they make the rate of interest to
depend on the interaction of the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital with the
psychological propensity to save. But the notion that the rate of interest is the balancing
factor which brings the demand for saving in the shape of new investment forthcoming at
a given rate of interest into equality with the supply of saving which results at that rate of
interest from the community's psychological propensity to save, breaks down as soon as
we perceive that it is impossible to deduce the rate of interest merely from a knowledge
of these two factors. What, then, is our own answer to this question?

II

The psychological time-preferences of an individual require two distinct sets of decisions

to carry them out completely. The first is concerned with that aspect of time-preference
which I have called the propensity to consume, which, operating under the influence of
the various motives set forth in Book III, determines for each individual how much of his
income he will consume and how much he will reserve in some form of command over
future consumption.

But this decision having been made, there is a further decision which awaits him, namely,
in what form he will hold the command over future consumption which he has reserved,
whether out of his current income or from previous savings. Does he want to hold it in
the form of immediate, liquid command (i.e. in money or its equivalent)? Or is he
prepared to part with immediate command for a specified or indefinite period, leaving it
to future market conditions to determine on what terms he can, if necessary, convert
deferred command over specific goods into immediate command over goods in general?
In other words, what is the degree of his liquidity-preferencewhere an individual's
liquidity-preference is given by a schedule of the amounts of his resources, valued in
terms of money or of wage-units, which he will wish to retain in the form of money in
different sets of circumstances?
We shall find that the mistake in the accepted theories of the rate of interest lies in their
attempting to derive the rate of interest from the first of these two constituents of
psychological time-preference to the neglect of the second; and it is this neglect which we
must endeavour to repair.

It should be obvious that the rate of interest cannot be a return to saving or waiting as
such. For if a man hoards his savings in cash, he earns no interest, though he saves just as
much as before. On the contrary, the mere definition of the rate of interest tells us in so
many words that the rate of interest is the reward for parting with liquidity for a specified
period. For the rate of interest is, in itself; nothing more than the inverse proportion
between a sum of money and what can be obtained for parting with control over the
money in exchange for a debt[1] for a stated period of time[2].

Thus the rate of interest at any time, being the reward for parting with liquidity, is a
measure of the unwillingness of those who possess money to part with their liquid control
over it. The rate of interest is not the 'price' which brings into equilibrium the demand for
resources to invest with the readiness to abstain from present consumption. It is the 'price'
which equilibrates the desire to hold wealth in the form of cash with the available
quantity of cash;which implies that if the rate of interest were lower, i.e. if the reward
for parting with cash were diminished, the aggregate amount of cash which the public
would wish to hold would exceed the available supply, and that if the rate of interest were
raised, there would be a surplus of cash which no one would be willing to hold. If this
explanation is correct, the quantity of money is the other factor, which, in conjunction
with liquidity-preference, determines the actual rate of interest in given circumstances.
Liquidity-preference is a potentiality or functional tendency, which fixes the quantity of
money which the public will hold when the rate of interest is given; so that if r is the rate
of interest, M the quantity of money and L the function of liquidity-preference, we have
M = L(r). This is where, and how, the quantity of money enters into the economic
scheme.

At this point, however, let us turn back and consider why such a thing as liquidity-
preference exists. In this connection we can usefully employ the ancient distinction
between the use of money for the transaction of current business and its use as a store of
wealth. As regards the first of these two uses, it is obvious that up to a point it is worth
while to sacrifice a certain amount of interest for the convenience of liquidity. But, given
that the rate of interest is never negative, why should anyone prefer to hold his wealth in
a form which yields little or no interest to holding it in a form which yields interest
(assuming, of course, at this stage, that the risk of default is the same in respect of a bank
balance as of a bond)? A full explanation is complex and must wait for chapter 15. There
is, however, a necessary condition failing which the existence of a liquidity-preference
for money as a means of holding wealth could not exist.

This necessary condition is the existence of uncertainty as to the future of the rate of
interest, i.e. as to the complex of rates of interest for varying maturities which will rule at
future dates. For if the rates of interest ruling at all future times could be foreseen with
certainty, all future rates of interest could be inferred from the present rates of interest for
debts of different maturities, which would be adjusted to the knowledge of the future
rates. For example, if 1dr is the value in the present year 1 of 1 deferred r years and it is
known that ndr will be the value in the year n of 1 deferred r years from that date, we
have

1dn + r
ndr = ;
1dn

whence it follows that the rate at which any debt can be turned into cash n years hence is
given by two out of the complex of current rates of interest. If the current rate of interest
is positive for debts of every maturity, it must always be more advantageous to purchase
a debt than to hold cash as a store of wealth.

If, on the contrary, the future rate of interest is uncertain we cannot safely infer that ndr
will prove to be equal to 1dn + r / 1dn when the time comes. Thus if a need for liquid cash
may conceivably arise before the expiry of n years, there is a risk of a loss being incurred
in purchasing a long-term debt and subsequently turning it into cash, as compared with
holding cash. The actuarial profit or mathematical expectation of gain calculated in
accordance with the existing probabilitiesif it can be so calculated, which is doubtful
must be sufficient to compensate for the risk of disappointment.

There is, moreover, a further ground for liquidity-preference which results from the
existence of uncertainty as to the future of the rate of interest, provided that there is an
organised market for dealing in debts. For different people will estimate the prospects
differently and anyone who differs from the predominant opinion as expressed in market
quotations may have a good reason for keeping liquid resources in order to profit, if he is
right, from its turning out in due course that the 1dr's were in a mistaken relationship to
one another[3].

This is closely analogous to what we have already discussed at some length in connection
with the marginal efficiency of capital. Just as we found that the marginal efficiency of
capital is fixed, not by the 'best' opinion, but by the market valuation as determined by
mass psychology, so also expectations as to the future of the rate of interest as fixed by
mass psychology have their reactions on liquidity-preference;but with this addition that
the individual, who believes that future rates of interest will be above the rates assumed
by the market, has a reason for keeping actual liquid cash[4], whilst the individual who
differs from the market in the other direction will have a motive for borrowing money for
short periods in order to purchase debts of longer term. The market price will be fixed at
the point at which the sales of the 'bears' and the purchases of the 'bulls' are balanced.

The three divisions of liquidity-preference which we have distinguished above may be

defined as depending on (i) the transactions-motive, i.e. the need of cash for the current
transaction of personal and business exchanges; (ii) the precautionary-motive, i.e. the
desire for security as to the future cash equivalent of a certain proportion of total
resources; and (iii) the speculative-motive, i.e. the object of securing profit from knowing
better than the market what the future will bring forth. As when we were discussing the
marginal efficiency of capital, the question of the desirability of having a highly
organised market for dealing with debts presents us with a dilemma. For, in the absence
of an organised market, liquidity-preference due to the precautionary-motive would be
greatly increased; whereas the existence of an organised market gives an opportunity for
wide fluctuations in liquidity-preference due to the speculative-motive.

It may illustrate the argument to point out that, if the liquidity-preferences due to the
transactions-motive and the precautionary-motive are assumed to absorb a quantity of
cash which is not very sensitive to changes in the rate of interest as such and apart from
its reactions on the level of income, so that the total quantity of money, less this quantity,
is available for satisfying liquidity-preferences due to the speculative-motive, the rate of
interest and the price of bonds have to be fixed at the level at which the desire on the part
of certain individuals to hold cash (because at that level they feel 'bearish' of the future of
bonds) is exactly equal to the amount of cash available for the speculative-motive. Thus
each increase in the quantity of money must raise the price of bonds sufficiently to
exceed the expectations of some 'bull' and so influence him to sell his bond for cash and
join the 'bear' brigade. If, however, there is a negligible demand for cash from the
speculative-motive except for a short transitional interval, an increase in the quantity of
money will have to lower the rate of interest almost forthwith, in whatever degree is
necessary to raise employment and the wage-unit sufficiently to cause the additional cash
to be absorbed by the transactions-motive and the precautionary-motive.

As a rule, we can suppose that the schedule of liquidity-preference relating the quantity
of money to the rate of interest is given by a smooth curve which shows the rate of
interest falling as the quantity of money is increased. For there are several different
causes all leading towards this result.

In the first place, as the rate of interest falls, it is likely, cet. par., that more money will be
absorbed by liquidity-preferences due to the transactions-motive. For if the fall in the rate
of interest increases the national income, the amount of money which it is convenient to
keep for transactions will be increased more or less proportionately to the increase in
income; whilst, at the same time, the cost of the convenience of plenty of ready cash in
terms of loss of interest will be diminished. Unless we measure liquidity-preference in
terms of wage-units rather than of money (which is convenient in some contexts), similar
results follow if the increased employment ensuing on a fall in the rate of interest leads to
an increase of wages, i.e. to an increase in the money value of the wage-unit. In the
second place, every fall in the rate of interest may, as we have just seen, increase the
quantity of cash which certain individuals will wish to hold because their views as to the
future of the rate of interest differ from the market views.

Nevertheless, circumstances can develop in which even a large increase in the quantity of
money may exert a comparatively small influence on the rate of interest. For a large
increase in the quantity of money may cause so much uncertainty about the future that
liquidity-preferences due to the precautionary-motive may be strengthened; whilst
opinion about the future of the rate of interest may be so unanimous that a small change
in present rates may cause a mass movement into cash. It is interesting that the stability
of the system and its sensitiveness to changes in the quantity of money should be so
dependent on the existence of a variety of opinion about what is uncertain. Best of all that
we should know the future. But if not, then, if we are to control the activity of the
economic system by changing the quantity of money, it is important that opinions should
differ Thus this method of control is more precarious in the United States, where
everyone tends to hold the same opinion at the same time, than in England where
differences of opinion are more usual.

III

We have now introduced money into our causal nexus for the first time, and we are able
to catch a first glimpse of the way in which changes in the quantity of money work their
way into the economic system. If, however, we are tempted to assert that money is the
drink which stimulates the system to activity, we must remind ourselves that there may
be several slips between the cup and the lip. For whilst an increase in the quantity of
money may be expected, cet. par., to reduce the rate of interest, this will not happen if the
liquidity-preferences of the public are increasing more than the quantity of money; and
whilst a decline in the rate of interest may be expected, cet. par., to increase the volume
of investment, this will not happen if the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital is
falling more rapidly than the rate of interest; and whilst an increase in the volume of
investment may be expected, cet. par., to increase employment, this may not happen if
the propensity to consume is falling off. Finally, if employment increases, prices will rise
in a degree partly governed by the shapes of the physical supply functions, and partly by
the liability of the wage-unit to rise in terms of money. And when output has increased
and prices have risen, the effect of this on liquidity-preference will be to increase the
quantity of money necessary to maintain a given rate of interest.

IV

Whilst liquidity-preference due to the speculative-motive corresponds to what in my

Treatise on Money I called 'the state of bearishness', it is by no means the same thing. For
'bearishness' is there defined as the functional relationship, not between the rate of
interest (or price of debts) and the quantity of money, but between the price of assets and
debts, taken together, and the quantity of money. This treatment, however, involved a
confusion between results due to a change in the rate of interest and those due to a change
in the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital, which I hope I have here avoided.

The concept of hoarding may be regarded as a first approximation to the concept of

liquidity-preference. Indeed if we were to substitute 'propensity to hoard' for 'hoarding', it
would come to substantially the same thing. But if we mean by 'hoarding' an actual
increase in cash-holding, it is an incomplete ideaand seriously misleading if it causes
us to think of 'hoarding' and 'not-hoarding' as simple alternatives. For the decision to
hoard is not taken absolutely or without regard to the advantages offered for parting with
liquidity;it results from a balancing of advantages, and we have, therefore, to know
what lies in the other scale. Moreover it is impossible for the actual amount of hoarding
to change as a result of decisions on the part of the public, so long as we mean by
'hoarding' the actual holding of cash. For the amount of hoarding must be equal to the
quantity of money (oron some definitionsto the quantity of money minus what is
required to satisfy the transactions-motive); and the quantity of money is not determined
by the public. All that the propensity of the public towards hoarding can achieve is to
determine the rate of interest at which the aggregate desire to hoard becomes equal to the
available cash. The habit of overlooking the relation of the rate of interest to hoarding
may be a part of the explanation why interest has been usually regarded as the reward of
not-spending, whereas in fact it is the reward of not-hoarding.

1. Without disturbance to this definition, we can draw the line between money and debts at
whatever point is most convenient for handling a particular problem. For example, we can treat as
money any command over general purchasing power which the owner has not parted with for a
period in excess of three months, and as debt what cannot be recovered for a longer period than
this; or we can substitute for three months one month or three days or three hours or any other
period; or we can exclude from money whatever is not legal tender on the spot. It is often
convenient in practice to include in money time-deposits with banks and, occasionally, even such
instruments as (e.g.) treasury bills. As a rule, I shall, as in my Treatise on Money, assume that
money is coextensive with bank deposits.

2. In general discussion, as distinct from specific problems where the period of the debt is expressly
specified, it is convenient to mean by the rate of interest the complex of the various rates of
interest current for different periods of time, i.e. for debts of different maturities.

3. This is the same point as I discussed in my Treatise on Money under the designation of the two
views and the bull-bear position.

4. It might be thought that, in the same way, an individual, who believed that the prospective yield of
investments will be below what the market is expecting, will have a sufficient reason for holding
liquid cash. But this is not the case. He has a sufficient reason for holding cash or debts in
preference to equities; but the purchase of debts will be a preferable alternative to holding cash,
unless he also believes that the future rate of interest will prove to be higher than the market is
supposing.
Chapter 14

THE CLASSICAL THEORY OF THE RATE OF INTEREST

What is the classical theory of the rate of interest? It is something upon which we have all
been brought up and which we have accepted without much reserve until recently. Yet I
find it difficult to state it precisely or to discover an explicit account of it in the leading
treatises of the modern classical school[1].

It is fairly clear, however, that this tradition has regarded the rate of interest as the factor
which brings the demand for investment and the willingness to save into equilibrium with
one another. Investment represents the demand for investible resources and saving
represents the supply, whilst the rate of interest is the 'price' of investible resources at
which the two are equated. Just as the price of a commodity is necessarily fixed at that
point where the demand for it is equal to the supply, so the rate of interest necessarily
comes to rest under the play of market forces at the point where the amount of investment
at that rate of interest is equal to the amount of saving at that rate.

The above is not to be found in Marshall's Principles in so many words. Yet his theory
seems to be this, and it is what I myself was brought up on and what I taught for many
years to others. Take, for example, the following passage from his Principles: 'Interest,
being the price paid for the use of capital in any market, tends towards an equilibrium
level such that the aggregate demand for capital in that market, at that rate of interest, is
equal to the aggregate stock forthcoming at that rate'[2]. Or again in Professor Cassel's
Nature and Necessity of Interest it is explained that investment constitutes the 'demand
for waiting' and saving the 'supply of waiting', whilst interest is a 'price' which serves, it
is implied, to equate the two, though here again I have not found actual words to quote.
Chapter vi of Professor Carver's Distribution of Wealth clearly envisages interest as the
factor which brings into equilibrium the marginal disutility of waiting with the marginal
productivity of capital[3]. Sir Alfred Flux (Economic Principles, p. 95) writes: 'If there is
justice in the contentions of our general discussion, it must be admitted that an automatic
adjustment takes place between saving and the opportunities for employing capital
profitably... Saving will not have exceeded its possibilities of usefulness. . . so long as the
rate of net interest is in excess of zero.' Professor Taussig (Principles, vol. ii. p. 29) draws
a supply curve of saving and a demand curve representing 'the diminishing
productiveness of the several instalments of capital', having previously stated (p.20) that
'the rate of interest settles at a point where the marginal productivity of capital suffices to
bring out the marginal instalment of saving'[4]. Walras, in Appendix I (III) of his lments
d'conomie pure, where he deals with 'l'change d'pargnes contre capitaux neufs',
argues expressly that, corresponding to each possible rate of interest, there is a sum which
individuals will save and also a sum which they will invest in new capital assets, that
these two aggregates tend to equality with one another, and that the rate of interest is the
variable which brings them to equality; so that the rate of interest is fixed at the point
where saving, which represents the supply of new capital, is equal to the demand for it.
Thus he is strictly in the classical tradition.

Certainly the ordinary manbanker, civil servant or politicianbrought up on the

traditional theory, and the trained economist also, has carried away with him the idea that
whenever an individual performs an act of saving he has done something which
automatically brings down the rate of interest, that this automatically stimulates the
output of capital, and that the fall in the rate of interest is just so much as is necessary to
stimulate the output of capital to an extent which is equal to the increment of saving; and,
further, that this is a self-regulatory process of adjustment which takes place without the
necessity for any special intervention or grandmotherly care on the part of the monetary
authority. Similarlyand this is an even more general belief, even to-dayeach
additional act of investment will necessarily raise the rate of interest, if it is not offset by
a change in the readiness to save.

Now the analysis of the previous chapters will have made it plain that this account of the
matter must be erroneous. In tracing to its source the reason for the difference of opinion,
let us, however, begin with the matters which are agreed.

Unlike the neo-classical school, who believe that saving and investment can be actually
unequal, the classical school proper has accepted the view that they are equal. Marshall,
for example, surely believed, although he did not expressly say so, that aggregate saving
and aggregate investment are necessarily equal. Indeed, most members of the classical
school carried this belief much too far; since they held that every act of increased saving
by an individual necessarily brings into existence a corresponding act of increased
investment. Nor is there any material difference, relevant in this context, between my
schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital or investment demand-schedule and the
demand curve for capital contemplated by some of the classical writers who have been
quoted above. When we come to the propensity to consume and its corollary the
propensity to save, we are nearer to a difference of opinion, owing to the emphasis which
they have placed on the influence of the rate of interest on the propensity to save. But
they would, presumably, not wish to deny that the level of income also has an important
influence on the amount saved; whilst I, for my part, would not deny that the rate of
interest may perhaps have an influence (though perhaps not of the kind which they
suppose) on the amount saved out of a given income. All these points of agreement can
be summed up in a proposition which the classical school would accept and I should not
dispute; namely, that, if the level of income is assumed to be given, we can infer that the
current rate of interest must lie at the point where the demand curve for capital
corresponding to different rates of interest cuts the curve of the amounts saved out of the
given income corresponding to different rates of interest.

But this is the point at which definite error creeps into the classical theory. If the classical
school merely inferred from the above proposition that, given the demand curve for
capital and the influence of changes in the rate of interest on the readiness to save out of
given incomes, the level of income and the rate of interest must be uniquely correlated,
there would be nothing to quarrel with. Moreover, this proposition would lead naturally
to another proposition which embodies an important truth; namely, that, if the rate of
interest is given as well as the demand curve for capital and the influence of the rate of
interest on the readiness to save out of given levels of income, the level of income must
be the factor which brings the amount saved to equality with the amount invested. But, in
fact, the classical theory not merely neglects the influence of changes in the level of
income, but involves formal error.

For the classical theory, as can be seen from the above quotations, assumes that it can
then proceed to consider the effect on the rate of interest of (e.g.) a shift in the demand
curve for capital, without abating or modifying its assumption as to the amount of the
given income out of which the savings are to be made. The independent variables of the
classical theory of the rate of interest are the demand curve for capital and the influence
of the rate of interest on the amount saved out of a given income; and when (e.g.) the
demand curve for capital shifts, the new rate of interest, according to this theory, is given
by the point of intersection between the new demand curve for capital and the curve
relating the rate of interest to the amounts which will be saved out of the given income.
The classical theory of the rate of interest seems to suppose that, if the demand curve for
capital shifts or if the curve relating the rate of interest to the amounts saved out of a
given income shifts or if both these curves shift, the new rate of interest will be given by
the point of intersection of the new positions of the two curves. But this is a nonsense
theory. For the assumption that income is constant is inconsistent with the assumption
that these two curves can shift independently of one another. If either of them shift, then,
in general, income will change; with the result that the whole schematism based on the
assumption of a given income breaks down. The position could only be saved by some
complicated assumption providing for an automatic change in the wage-unit of an amount
just sufficient in its effect on liquidity-preference to establish a rate of interest which
would just offset the supposed shift, so as to leave output at the same level as before. In
fact, there is no hint to be found in the above writers as to the necessity for any such
assumption; at the best it would be plausible only in relation to long-period equilibrium
and could not form the basis of a short-period theory; and there is no ground for
supposing it to hold even in the long-period. In truth, the classical theory has not been
alive to the relevance of changes in the level of income or to the possibility of the level of
income being actually a function of the rate of the investment.

The above can be illustrated by a diagram[5] as follows:

In this diagram the amount of investment (or saving) I is measured vertically, and the rate
of interest r horizontally. X1X1' is the first position of the investment demand-schedule,
and X2X2' is a second position of this curve. The curve Y1 relates the amounts saved out of
an income Y1 to various levels of the rate of interest, the curves Y2, Y3, etc., being the
corresponding curves for levels of income Y2, Y3, etc. Let us suppose that the curve Y1 is
the Y-curve consistent with an investment demand-schedule X1X1' and a rate of interest r1.
Now if the investment demand-schedule shifts from X1X1' to X2X2', income will, in
general, shift also. But the above diagram does not contain enough data to tell us what its
new value will be; and, therefore, not knowing which is the appropriate Y-curve, we do
not know at what point the new investment demand-schedule will cut it. If, however, we
introduce the state of liquidity-preference and the quantity of money and these between
them tell us that the rate of interest is r2, then the whole position becomes determinate.
For the Y-curve which intersects X2X2' at the point vertically above r2, namely, the curve
Y2, will be the appropriate curve. Thus the X-curve and the Y-curves tell us nothing about
the rate of interest. They only tell us what income will be, if from some other source we
can say what the rate of interest is. If nothing has happened to the state of liquidity-
preference and the quantity of money, so that the rate of interest is unchanged, then the
curve Y2' which intersects the new investment demand-schedule vertically below the
point where the curve Y1 intersected the old investment demand-schedule will be the
appropriate Y-curve, and Y2' will be the new level of income.

Thus the functions used by the classical theory, namely, the response of investment and
the response of the amount saved out of a given income to change in the rate of interest,
do not furnish material for a theory of the rate of interest; but they could be used to tell us
what the level of income will be, given (from some other source) the rate of interest; and,
alternatively, what the rate of interest will have to be, if the level of income is to be
maintained at a given figure (e.g. the level corresponding to full employment).

The mistake originates from regarding interest as the reward for waiting as such, instead
of as the reward for not-hoarding; just as the rates of return on loans or investments
involving different degrees of risk, are quite properly regarded as the reward, not of
waiting as such, but of running the risk. There is, in truth, no sharp line between these
and the so-called 'pure' rate of interest, all of them being the reward for running the risk
of uncertainty of one kind or another. Only in the event of money being used solely for
transactions and never as a store of value, would a different theory become appropriate[6].

There are, however, two familiar points which might, perhaps, have warned the classical
school that something was wrong. In the first place, it has been agreed, at any rate since
the publication of Professor Cassel's Nature and Necessity of Interest, that it is not certain
that the sum saved out of a given income necessarily increases when the rate of interest is
increased; whereas no one doubts that the investment demand-schedule falls with a rising
rate of interest. But if the Y-curves and the X-curves both fall as the rate of interest rises,
there is no guarantee that a given Y-curve will intersect a given X-curve anywhere at all.
This suggests that it cannot be the Y-curve and the X-curve alone which determine the
rate of interest.

In the second place, it has been usual to suppose that an increase in the quantity of money
has a tendency to reduce the rate of interest, at any rate in the first instance and in the
short period. Yet no reason has been given why a change in the quantity of money should
affect either the investment demand-schedule or the readiness to save out of a given
income. Thus the classical school have had quite a different theory of the rate of interest
in volume I dealing with the theory of value from what they have had in volume II
dealing with the theory of money. They have seemed undisturbed by the conflict and
have made no attempt, so far as I know, to build a bridge between the two theories. The
classical school proper, that is to say; since it is the attempt to build a bridge on the part
of the neo-classical school which has led to the worst muddles of all. For the latter have
inferred that there must be two sources of supply to meet the investment demand-
schedule; namely, savings proper, which are the savings dealt with by the classical school,
plus the sum made available by any increase in the quantity of money (this being
balanced by some species of levy on the public, called 'forced saving' or the like). This
leads on to the idea that there is a 'natural' or 'neutral'[7] or equilibrium' rate of interest,
namely, that rate of interest which equates investment to classical savings proper without
any addition from 'forced savings'; and finally to what, assuming they are on the right
track at the start, is the most obvious solution of all, namely, that, if the quantity of
money could only be kept constant in all circumstances, none of these complications
would arise, since the evils supposed to result from the supposed excess of investment
over savings proper would cease to be possible. But at this point we are in deep water.
'The wild duck has dived down to the bottomas deep as she can getand bitten fast
hold of the weed and tangle and all the rubbish that is down there, and it would need an
extraordinarily clever dog to dive after and fish her up again.'

Thus the traditional analysis is faulty because it has failed to isolate correctly the
independent variables of the system. Saving and investment are the determinates of the
system, not the determinants. They are the twin results of the system's determinants,
namely, the propensity to consume, the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital and
the rate of interest. These determinants are, indeed, themselves complex and each is
capable of being affected by prospective changes in the others. But they remain
independent in the sense that their values cannot be inferred from one another. The
traditional analysis has been aware that saving depends on income but it has overlooked
the fact that income depends on investment, in such fashion that, when investment
changes, income must necessarily change in just that degree which is necessary to make
the change in saving equal to the change in investment.

Nor are those theories more successful which attempt to make the rate of interest depend
on 'the marginal efficiency of capital'. It is true that in equilibrium the rate of interest will
be equal to the marginal efficiency of capital, since it will be profitable to increase (or
decrease) the current scale of investment until the point of equality has been reached. But
to make this into a theory of the rate of interest or to derive the rate of interest from it
involves a circular argument, as Marshall discovered after he had got half-way into
giving an account of the rate of interest along these lines[8]. For the 'marginal efficiency of
capital' partly depends on the scale of current investment, and we must already know the
rate of interest before we can calculate what this scale will be. The significant conclusion
is that the output of new investment will be pushed to the point at which the marginal
efficiency of capital becomes equal to the rate of interest; and what the schedule of the
marginal efficiency of capital tells us, is, not what the rate of interest is, but the point to
which the output of new investment will be pushed, given the rate of interest.

The reader will readily appreciate that the problem here under discussion is a matter of
the most fundamental theoretical significance and of overwhelming practical importance.
For the economic principle, on which the practical advice of economists has been almost
invariably based, has assumed, in effect, that, cet. par., a decrease in spending will tend
to lower the rate of interest and an increase in investment to raise it. But if what these two
quantities determine is, not the rate of interest, but the aggregate volume of employment,
then our outlook on the mechanism of the economic system will be profoundly changed.
A decreased readiness to spend will be looked on in quite a different light If, instead of
being regarded as a factor which will, cet. par., increase investment, it is seen as a factor
which will, cet. par., diminish employment.

1. See the Appendix to this Chapter for an abstract of what I have been able to find.

2. Cf. Appendix p. 186 below for a further discussion of this passage.

3. Prof. Carvers discussion of Interest is difficult to follow (1) through his inconsistency a to whether
he means by marginal productivity of capital quantity of marginal product or value of marginal
product, and (2) through his making no attempt to define quantity of capital.

4. In a very recent discussion of these problems (Capital, Time and the Interest Rate, by Prof. F. H.
Knight, Economica, August 1932), a discussion which contains many interesting and profound
observations on the nature of capital, and confirms the soundness of the Marshallian tradition as
to the uselessness of the Bhm-Bawerkian analysis, the theory of interest is given precisely in the
traditional, classical mould. Equilibrium in the field of capital production means, according to
Prof. Knight, such a rate of interest that savings flow into the market at precisely the same time-
rate or speed as they flow into investment producing the same net rate of return as that which is
paid savers for their use.
5. This diagram was suggested to me by Mr. R. F. Harrod. Cf. also a partly similar schematism by
Mr. D. H. Robertson, Economic Journal, December 1934, p. 652.

6. Cf. Chapter 17 below.

7. The neutral rate of interest of contemporary economists is different both from the natural
rate of Bhm-Bawerk and from the natural rate of Wicksell.

8. See the Appendix to this Chapter.

APPENDIX ON THE RATE OF INTEREST IN MARSHALL'S
PRINCIPLES OF ECONOMICS, RICARDO'S PRINCIPLES OF
POLITICAL ECONOMY, AND ELSEWHERE

There is no consecutive discussion of the rate of interest in the works of Marshall,

Edgeworth or Professor Pigou,nothing more than a few obiter dicta. Apart from the
passage already quoted above (p. 139) the only important clues to Marshall's position on
the rate of interest are to be found in his Principles of Economics (6th edn.), Book VI.
p. 534 and p. 593, the gist of which is given by the following quotations:

'Interest, being the price paid for the use of capital in any market, tends towards an
equilibrium level such that the aggregate demand for capital in that market, at that rate of
interest, is equal to the aggregate stock[1] forthcoming there at that rate. If the market,
which we are considering, is a small onesay a single town, or a single trade in a
progressive countryan increased demand for capital in it will be promptly met by an
increased supply drawn from surrounding districts or trades. But if we are considering the
whole world, or even the whole of a large country, as one market for capital, we cannot
regard the aggregate supply of it as altered quickly and to a considerable extent by a
change in the rate of interest. For the general fund of capital is the product of labour and
waiting; and the extra work[2], and the extra waiting, to which a rise in the rate of interest
would act as an incentive, would not quickly amount to much, as compared with the work
and waiting, of which the total existing stock of capital is the result. An extensive
increase in the demand for capital in general will therefore be met for a time not so much
by an increase of supply, as by a rise in the rate of interest[3]; which will cause capital to
withdraw itself partially from those uses in which its marginal utility is lowest. It is only
slowly and gradually that the rise in the rate of interest will increase the total stock of
capital' (p.534).

'It cannot be repeated too often that the phrase "the rate of interest" is applicable to old
investments of capital only in a very limited sense[4]. For instance, we may perhaps
estimate that a trade capital of some seven thousand millions is invested in the different
trades of this country at about 3 per cent net interest. But such a method of speaking,
though convenient and justifiable for many purposes, is not accurate. What ought to be
said is that, taking the rate of net interest on the investments of new capital in each of
those trades [i.e. on marginal investments] to be about 3 per cent; then the aggregate net
income rendered by the whole of the trade-capital invested in the various trades is such
that, if capitalised at 33 years' purchase (that is, on the basis of interest at 3 per cent), it
would amount to some seven thousand million pounds. For the value of the capital
already invested in improving land or erecting a building, in making a railway or a
machine, is the aggregate discounted value of its estimated future net incomes [or quasi-
rents]; and if its prospective income-yielding power should diminish, its value would fall
accordingly and would be the capitalised value of that smaller income after allowing for
depreciation' (p.593).

In his Economics of Welfare (3rd edn.), p. 163, Professor Pigou writes: 'The nature of the
service of "waiting" has been much misunderstood. Sometimes it has been supposed to
consist in the provision of money, sometimes in the provision of time, and, on both
suppositions, it has been argued that no contribution whatever is made by it to the
dividend. Neither supposition is correct. "Waiting" simply means postponing
consumption which a person has power to enjoy immediately, thus allowing resources,
which might have been destroyed, to assume the form of production instruments[5]. The
unit of "waiting" is, therefore, the use of a given quantity of resources[6] for example,
labour or machineryfor a given time... In more general terms we may say that the unit
of waiting is a year-value-unit, or, in the simpler, if less accurate, language of Dr Cassel,
a year-pound... A caution may be added against the common view that the amount of
capital accumulated in any year is necessarily equal to the amount of "savings" made in it.
This is not so, even when savings are interpreted to mean net savings, thus eliminating
the savings of one man that are lent to increase the consumption of another, and when
temporary accumulations of unused claims upon services in the form of bank-money are
ignored; for many savings which are meant to become capital in fact fail of their purpose
through misdirection into wasteful uses.'[7]

Professor Pigou's only significant reference to what determines the rate of interest is, I
think, to be found in his Industrial Fluctuations (1st edn.), pp. 2513, where he
controverts the view that the rate of interest, being determined by the general conditions
of demand and supply of real capital, lies outside the central or any other bank's control.
Against this view he argues that: 'When bankers create more credit for business men, they
make, in their interest, subject to the explanations given in chapter XIII. of part I[8], a
forced levy of real things from the public, thus increasing the stream of real capital
available for them, and causing a fall in the real rate of interest on long and short loans
alike. It is true, in short, that the bankers' rate for money is bound by a mechanical tie to
the real rate of interest on long loans; but it is not true that this real rate is determined by
conditions wholly outside bankers' control.'

My running comments on the above have been made in the footnotes. The perplexity
which I find in Marshall's account of the matter is fundamentally due, I think, to the
incursion of the concept 'interest', which belongs to a monetary economy, into a treatise
which takes no account of money. 'Interest' has really no business to turn up at all in
Marshall's Principles of Economics,it belongs to another branch of the subject.

Professor Pigou, conformably with his other tacit assumptions, leads us (in his Economics
of Welfare) to infer that the unit of waiting is the same as the unit of current investment
and that the reward of waiting is quasi-rent, and practically never mentions interest,
which is as it should be. Nevertheless these writers are not dealing with a non-monetary
economy (if there is such a thing). They quite clearly presume that money is used and
that there is a banking system. Moreover, the rate of interest scarcely plays a larger part
in Professor Pigou's Industrial Fluctuations (which is mainly a study of fluctuations in
the marginal efficiency of capital) or in his Theory of Unemployment (which is mainly a
study of what determines changes in the volume of employment, assuming that there is
no involuntary unemployment) than in his Economics of Welfare.

II

The following from his Principles of Political Economy (p. 511) puts the substance of
Ricardo's theory of the rate of interest:

'The interest of money is not regulated by the rate at which the Bank will lend, whether it
be 5, 3 or 2 per cent., but by the rate of profit which can be made by the employment of
capital, and which is totally independent of the quantity or of the value of money.
Whether the Bank lent one million, ten millions, or a hundred millions, they would not
permanently alter the market rate of interest; they would alter only the value of the
money which they thus issued. In one case, ten or twenty times more money might be
required to carry on the same business than what might be required in the other. The
applications to the Bank for money, then, depend on the comparison between the rate of
profits that may be made by the employment of it, and the rate at which they are willing
to lend it. If they charge less than the market rate of interest, there is no amount of money
which they might not lend;if they charge more than that rate, none but spendthrifts and
prodigals would be found to borrow of them.'

This is so clear-cut that it affords a better starting-point for a discussion than the phrases
of later writers who, without really departing from the essence of the Ricardian doctrine,
are nevertheless sufficiently uncomfortable about it to seek refuge in haziness. The above
is, of course, as always with Ricardo, to be interpreted as a long-period doctrine, with the
emphasis on the word 'permanently' half-way through the passage; and it is interesting to
consider the assumptions required to validate it.

Once again the assumption required is the usual classical assumption, that there is always
full employment; so that, assuming no change in the supply curve of labour in terms of
product, there is only one possible level of employment in long-period equilibrium. On
this assumption with the usual ceteris paribus, i.e. no change in psychological
propensities and expectations other than those arising out of a change in the quantity of
money, the Ricardian theory is valid, in the sense that on these suppositions there is only
one rate of interest which will be compatible with full employment in the long period.
Ricardo and his successors overlook the fact that even in the long period the volume of
employment is not necessarily full but is capable of varying, and that to every banking
policy there corresponds a different long-period level of employment; so that there are a
number of positions of long-period equilibrium corresponding to different conceivable
interest policies on the part of the monetary authority.

If Ricardo had been content to present his argument solely as applying to any given
quantity of money created by the monetary authority, it would still have been correct on
the assumption of flexible money-wages. If, that is to say, Ricardo had argued that it
would make no permanent alteration to the rate of interest whether the quantity of money
was fixed by the monetary authority at ten millions or at a hundred millions, his
conclusion would hold. But if by the policy of the monetary authority we mean the terms
on which it will increase or decrease the quantity of money, i.e. the rate of interest at
which it will, either by a change in the volume of discounts or by open-market operations,
increase or decrease its assetswhich is what Ricardo expressly does mean in the above
quotationthen it is not the case either that the policy of the monetary authority is
nugatory or that only one policy is compatible with long-period equilibrium; though in
the extreme case where money-wages are assumed to fall without limit in face of
involuntary unemployment through a futile competition for employment between the
unemployed labourers, there will, it is true, be only two possible long-period positions
full employment and the level of employment corresponding to the rate of interest at
which liquidity-preference becomes absolute (in the event of this being less than full
employment). Assuming flexible money-wages, the quantity of money as such is, indeed,
nugatory in the long period; but the terms on which the monetary authority will change
the quantity of money enters as a real determinant into the economic scheme.

It is worth adding that the concluding sentences of the quotation suggest that Ricardo was
overlooking the possible changes in the marginal efficiency of capital according to the
amount invested. But this again can be interpreted as another example of his greater
internal consistency compared with his successors. For if the quantity of employment and
the psychological propensities of the community are taken as given, there is in fact only
one possible rate of accumulation of capital and, consequently, only one possible value
for the marginal efficiency of capital. Ricardo offers us the supreme intellectual
achievement, unattainable by weaker spirits, of adopting a hypothetical world remote
from experience as though it were the world of experience and then living in it
consistently. With most of his successors common sense cannot help breaking inwith
injury to their logical consistency.

III

A peculiar theory of the rate of interest has been propounded by Professor von Mises and
adopted from him by Professor Hayek and also, I think, by Professor Robbins; namely,
that changes in the rate of interest can be identified with changes in the relative price
levels of consumption-goods and capital-goods[9]. It is not clear how this conclusion is
reached. But the argument seems to run as follows. By a somewhat drastic simplification
the marginal efficiency of capital is taken as measured by the ratio of the supply price of
new consumers' goods to the supply price of new producers' goods[10]. This is then
identified with the rate of interest. The fact is called to notice that a fall in the rate of
interest is favourable to investment. Ergo, a fall in the ratio of the price of consumers'
goods to the price of producer's goods is favourable to investment.

By this means a link is established between increased saving by an individual and

increased aggregate investment. For it is common ground that increased individual saving
will cause a fall in the price of consumers' goods, and, quite possibly, a greater fall than
in the price of producers' goods; hence, according to the above reasoning, it means a
reduction in the rate of interest which will stimulate investment. But, of course, a
lowering of the marginal efficiency of particular capital assets, and hence a lowering of
the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital in general, has exactly the opposite
effect to what the above argument assumes. For investment is stimulated either by a
raising of the schedule of the marginal efficiency or by a lowering of the rate of interest.
As a result of confusing the marginal efficiency of capital with the rate of interest,
Professor von Mises and his disciples have got their conclusions exactly the wrong way
round. A good example of a confusion along these lines is given by the following passage
by Professor Alvin Hansen[11]: 'It has been suggested by some economists that the net
effect of reduced spending will be a lower price level of consumers' goods than would
otherwise have been the case, and that, in consequence, the stimulus to investment in
fixed capital would thereby tend to be minimised. This view is, however, incorrect and is
based on a confusion of the effect on capital formation of (i) higher or lower prices of
consumers' goods, and (2) a change in the rate of interest. It is true that in consequence of
the decreased spending and increased saving, consumers' prices would be low relative to
the prices of producers' goods. But this, in effect, means a lower rate of interest, and a
lower rate of interest stimulates an expansion of capital investment in fields which at
higher rates would be unprofitable.'

1. It is to be noticed that Marshall uses the word capital not money and the word stock not
loans; interest is a payment for borrowing money, and demand for capital in this context
should mean demand for loans of money for the purpose of buying a stock of capital-goods. But
the equality between the stock of capital-goods offered and the stock demanded will be brought
about by the prices of capital-goods, not by the rate of interest. It is equality between the demand
and supply of loans of money, i.e. of debts, which is brought about by the rate of interest.

2. This assumes that income is not constant. But it is not obvious in what way a rise in the rate of
interest will lead to extra work. Is the suggestion that a rise in the rate of interest is to be
regarded, by reason of its increasing the attractiveness of working in order to save, as constituting
a sort of increase in real wages which will induce the factors of production to work for a lower
wage? This is, I think, in Mr. D. H. Robertsons mind in a similar context. Certainly this would
not quickly amount to much; and an attempt to explain the actual fluctuations in the amount of
investment by means of this factor would be most implausible, indeed absurd. My rewriting of the
latter half of this sentence would be: and if an extensive increase in the demand for capital in
general, due to an increase in the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital, is not offset by a
rise in the rate of interest, the extra employment and the higher level of income, which will ensue
as a result of the increased production of capital-goods, will lead to an amount of extra waiting
which in terms of money will be exactly equal to the value of the current increment of capital-
goods and will, therefore, precisely provide for it.

3. Why not by a rise in the supply price of capital-goods? Suppose, for example, that the extensive
increase in the demand for capital in general is due to a fall in the rate of interest. I would suggest
that the sentence should be rewritten: In so far, therefore, as the extensive increase in the
demand for capital-goods cannot be immediately met by an increase in the total stock, it will have
to be held in check for the time being by a rise in the supply price of capital-goods sufficient to
keep the marginal efficiency of capital in equilibrium with the rate of interest without there being
any material change in the scale of investment; meanwhile (as always) the factors of production
adapted for the output of capital-goods will be used in producing those capital-goods of which the
marginal efficiency is greatest in the new conditions.
4. In fact we cannot speak of it at all. We can only properly speak of the rate of interest on money
borrowed for the purpose of purchasing investments of capital, new or old (or for any other
purpose).

5. Here the wording is ambiguous as to whether we are to infer that the postponement of
consumption necessarily has this effect, or whether it merely releases resources which are then
either unemployed or used for investment according to circumstances.

6. Not, be it noted, the amount of money which the recipient of income might, but does not, spend on
consumption; so that the reward of waiting is not interest but quasi-rent. This sentence seems to
imply that the released resources are necessarily used. For what is the reward of waiting if the
released sources are left unemployed?

7. We are not told in this passage whether net savings would or would not be equal to the increment
of capital, if we were to ignore misdirected investment but were to take account of temporary
accumulations of unused claims upon services in the form of bank-money. But in Industrial
Fluctuations (p. 22) Prof. Pigou makes it clear that such accumulations have no effect on what he
calls real savings.

8. This reference (op. cit. pp. 129-134) contains Prof. Pigous view as to the amount by which a new
credit creation by the banks increases the stream of real capital available for entrepreneurs. In
effect he attempts to deduct from the floating credit handed over to business men through credit
creations the floating capital which would have been contributed in other ways if the banks had
not been there. After these deductions have been made, the argument is one of deep obscurity. To
begin with, the rentiers have an income of 1500, of which they consume 500 and save 1000; the act
of credit creation reduces their income to 1300, of which they consume 500 - x and save 800 + x;
and x, Prof. Pigou concludes, represents the net increase of capital made available by the act of
credit creation. Is the entrepreneurs income supposed to be swollen by the amount which they
borrow from the banks (after making the above deductions)? Or is it swollen by the amount, i.e.
200, by which the rentiers income is reduced? In either case, are they supposed to save the whole
of it? Is the increased investment equal to the credit creations minus the deductions? Or is it equal
to x? The argument seems to stop just where it should begin.

9. The Theory of Money and Credit, p. 339 et passim, particularly p. 363.

10. If we are in long-period equilibrium, special assumptions might be devised on which this could be
justified. But when the prices in question are the prices prevailing in slump conditions, the
simplification of supposing that the entrepreneur will, in forming his expectations, assume these
prices to be permanent, is certain to be misleading. Moreover, if he does, the prices of the existing
stock of producers goods will fall in the same proportion as the prices of consumers goods.

11. Economic Reconstruction, p. 233.

Chapter 15

THE PSYCHOLOGICAL AND BUSINESS INCENTIVES TO

LIQUIDITY

We must now develop in more detail the analysis of the motives to liquidity-preference
which were introduced in a preliminary way in chapter 13. The subject is substantially
the same as that which has been sometimes discussed under the heading of the demand
for money. It is also closely connected with what is called the income-velocity of
money;for the income-velocity of money merely measures what proportion of their
incomes the public chooses to hold in cash, so that an increased income-velocity of
money may be a symptom of a decreased liquidity-preference. It is not the same thing,
however, since it is in respect of his stock of accumulated savings, rather than of his
income, that the individual can exercise his choice between liquidity and illiquidity. And,
anyhow, the term 'income-velocity of money' carries with it the misleading suggestion of
a presumption in favour of the demand for money as a whole being proportional, or
having some determinate relation, to income, whereas this presumption should apply, as
we shall see, only to a portion of the public's cash holdings; with the result that it
overlooks the part played by the rate of interest.

In my Treatise on Money I studied the total demand for money under the headings of
income-deposits, business-deposits, and savings-deposits, and I need not repeat here the
analysis which I gave in chapter 3 of that book. Money held for each of the three
purposes forms, nevertheless, a single pool, which the holder is under no necessity to
segregate into three water-tight compartments; for they need not be sharply divided even
in his own mind, and the same sum can be held primarily for one purpose and secondarily
for another. Thus we canequally well, and, perhaps, betterconsider the individual's
aggregate demand for money in given circumstances as a single decision, though the
composite result of a number of different motives.

In analysing the motives, however, it is still convenient to classify them under certain
headings, the first of which broadly corresponds to the former classification of income-
deposits and business-deposits, and the two latter to that of savings-deposits. These I
have briefly introduced in chapter 13 under the headings of the transactions-motive,
which can be further classified as the income-motive and the business-motive, the
precautionary-motive and the speculative-motive.

(i) The Income-motive. One reason for holding cash is to bridge the interval between the
receipt of income and its disbursement. The strength of this motive in inducing a decision
to hold a given aggregate of cash will chiefly depend on the amount of income and the
normal length of the interval between its receipt and its disbursement. It is in this
connection that the concept of the income-velocity of money is strictly appropriate.
(ii) The Business-motive. Similarly, cash is held to bridge the interval between the time of
incurring business costs and that of the receipt of the sale-proceeds; cash held by dealers
to bridge the interval between purchase and realisation being included under this heading.
The strength of this demand will chiefly depend on the value of current output (and hence
on current income), and on the number of hands through which output passes.

(iii) The Precautionary-motive. To provide for contingencies requiring sudden

expenditure and for unforeseen opportunities of advantageous purchases, and also to hold
an asset of which the value is fixed in terms of money to meet a subsequent liability fixed
in terms of money, are further motives for holding cash.

The strength of all these three types of motive will partly depend on the cheapness and
the reliability of methods of obtaining cash, when it is required, by some form of
temporary borrowing, in particular by overdraft or its equivalent. For there is no necessity
to hold idle cash to bridge over intervals if it can be obtained without difficulty at the
moment when it is actually required. Their strength will also depend on what we may
term the relative cost of holding cash. If the cash can only be retained by forgoing the
purchase of a profitable asset, this increases the cost and thus weakens the motive
towards holding a given amount of cash. If deposit interest is earned or if bank charges
are avoided by holding cash, this decreases the cost and strengthens the motive. It may be,
however, that this is likely to be a minor factor except where large changes in the cost of
holding cash are in question.

(iv) There remains the Speculative-motive. This needs a more detailed examination than
the others, both because it is less well understood and because it is particularly important
in transmitting the effects of a change in the quantity of money.

In normal circumstances the amount of money required to satisfy the transactions-motive

and the precautionary-motive is mainly a resultant of the general activity of the economic
system and of the level of money-income. But it is by playing on the speculative-motive
that monetary management (or, in the absence of management, chance changes in the
quantity of money) is brought to bear on the economic system. For the demand for money
to satisfy the former motives is generally irresponsive to any influence except the actual
occurrence of a change in the general economic activity and the level of incomes;
whereas experience indicates that the aggregate demand for money to satisfy the
speculative-motive usually shows a continuous response to gradual changes in the rate of
interest, i.e. there is a continuous curve relating changes in the demand for money to
satisfy the speculative motive and changes in the rate of interest as given by changes in
the prices of bonds and debts of various maturities.

Indeed, if this were not so, 'open market operations' would be impracticable. I have said
that experience indicates the continuous relationship stated above, because in normal
circumstances the banking system is in fact always able to purchase (or sell) bonds in
exchange for cash by bidding the price of bonds up (or down) in the market by a modest
amount; and the larger the quantity of cash which they seek to create (or cancel) by
purchasing (or selling) bonds and debts, the greater must be the fall (or rise) in the rate of
interest. Where, however, (as in the United States, 19331934) open-market operations
have been limited to the purchase of very short-dated securities, the effect may, of course,
be mainly confined to the very short-term rate of interest and have but little reaction on
the much more important long-term rates of interest.

In dealing with the speculative-motive it is, however, important to distinguish between

the changes in the rate of interest which are due to changes in the supply of money
available to satisfy the speculative-motive, without there having been any change in the
liquidity function, and those which are primarily due to changes in expectation affecting
the liquidity function itself. Open-market Operations may, indeed, influence the rate of
interest through both channels; since they may not only change the volume of money, but
may also give rise to changed expectations concerning the future policy of the central
bank or of the government. Changes in the liquidity function itself; due to a change in the
news which causes revision of expectations, will often be discontinuous, and will,
therefore, give rise to a corresponding discontinuity of change in the rate of interest. Only,
indeed, in so far as the change in the news is differently interpreted by different
individuals or affects individual interests differently will there be room for any increased
activity of dealing in the bond market. If the change in the news affects the judgment and
the requirements of everyone in precisely the same way, the rate of interest (as indicated
by the prices of bonds and debts) will be adjusted forthwith to the new situation without
any market transactions being necessary.

Thus, in the simplest case, where everyone is similar and similarly placed, a change in
circumstances or expectations will not be capable of causing any displacement of money
whatever;it will simply change the rate of interest in whatever degree is necessary to
offset the desire of each individual, felt at the previous rate, to change his holding of cash
in response to the new circumstances or expectations; and, since everyone will change his
ideas as to the rate which would induce him to alter his holdings of cash in the same
degree, no transactions will result. To each set of circumstances and expectations there
will correspond an appropriate rate of interest, and there will never be any question of
anyone changing his usual holdings of cash.

In general, however, a change in circumstances or expectations will cause some

realignment in individual holdings of money;since, in fact, a change will influence the
ideas of different individuals differently by reasons partly of differences in environment
and the reason for which money is held and partly of differences in knowledge and
interpretation of the new situation. Thus the new equilibrium rate of interest will be
associated with a redistribution of money-holdings. Nevertheless it is the change in the
rate of interest, rather than the redistribution of cash, which deserves our main attention.
The latter is incidental to individual differences, whereas the essential phenomenon is
that which occurs in the simplest case. Moreover, even in the general case, the shift in the
rate of interest is usually the most prominent part of the reaction to a change in the news.
The movement in bond-prices is, as the newspapers are accustomed to say, 'out of all
proportion to the activity of dealing';which is as it should be, in view of individuals
being much more similar than they are dissimilar in their reaction to news.
II

Whilst the amount of cash which an individual decides to hold to satisfy the transactions-
motive and the precautionary-motive is not entirely independent of what he is holding to
satisfy the speculative-motive, it is a safe first approximation to regard the amounts of
these two sets of cash-holdings as being largely independent of one another. Let us,
therefore, for the purposes of our further analysis, break up our problem in this way. Let
the amount of cash held to satisfy the transactions- and precautionary-motives be M1, and
the amount held to satisfy the speculative-motive be M2. Corresponding to these two
compartments of cash, we then have two liquidity functions L1 and L2. L1 mainly depends
on the level of income, whilst L2 mainly depends on the relation between the current rate
of interest and the state of expectation. Thus

M = M1 + M2 = L1( Y) + L2(r),

where L1 is the liquidity function corresponding to an income Y, which determines M1,

and L2 is the liquidity function of the rate of interest r, which determines M2. It follows
that there are three matters to investigate: (i) the relation of changes in M to Y and r, (ii)
what determines the shape of L1, (iii) what determines the shape of L2.

(i) The relation of changes in M to Y and r depends, in the first instance, on the way in
which changes in M come about. Suppose that M consists of gold coins and that changes
in M can only result from increased returns to the activities of gold-miners who belong to
the economic system under examination. In this case changes in M are, in the first
instance, directly associated with changes in Y, since the new gold accrues as someone's
income. Exactly the same conditions hold if changes in M are due to the government
printing money wherewith to meet its current expenditure;in this case also the new
money accrues as someone's income. The new level of income, however, will not
continue sufficiently high for the requirements of M1 to absorb the whole of the increase
in M; and some portion of the money will seek an outlet in buying securities or other
assets until r has fallen so as to bring about an increase in the magnitude of M2 and at the
same time to stimulate a rise in Y to such an extent that the new money is absorbed either
in M2 or in the M1 which corresponds to the rise in Y caused by the fall in r. Thus at one
remove this case comes to the same thing as the alternative case, where the new money
can only be issued in the first instance by a relaxation of the conditions of credit by the
banking system, so as to induce someone to sell the banks a debt or a bond in exchange
for the new cash.

It will, therefore, be safe for us to take the latter case as typical. A change in M can be
assumed to operate by changing r, and a change in r will lead to a new equilibrium partly
by changing M2 and partly by changing Y and therefore M1. The division of the increment
of cash between M1 and M2 in the new position of equilibrium will depend on the
responses of investment[1] to a reduction in the rate of interest and of income to an
increase in investment. Since Y partly depends on r, it follows that a given change in M
has to cause a sufficient change in r for the resultant changes in M1 and M2 respectively
to add up to the given change in M.
(ii) It is not always made clear whether the income-velocity of money is defined as the
ratio of Y to M or as the ratio of Y to M1. I propose, however, to take it in the latter sense.
Thus if V is the income-velocity of money,

Y
L1(Y) = = M1
V

There is, of course, no reason for supposing that V is constant. Its value will depend on
the character of banking and industrial organisation, on social habits, on the distribution
of income between different classes and on the effective cost of holding idle cash.
Nevertheless, if we have a short period of time in view and can safely assume no material
change in any of these factors, we can treat V as nearly enough constant.

(iii) Finally there is the question of the relation between M2 and r. We have seen in
chapter 13 that uncertainty as to the future course of the rate of interest is the sole
intelligible explanation of the type of liquidity-preference L2 which leads to the holding
of cash M2. It follows that a given M2 will not have a definite quantitative relation to a
given rate of interest of r;what matters is not the absolute level of r but the degree of
its divergence from what is considered a fairly safe level of r, having regard to those
calculations of probability which are being relied on. Nevertheless, there are two reasons
for expecting that, in any given state of expectation, a fall in r will be associated with an
increase in M2. In the first place, if the general view as to what is a safe level of r is
unchanged, every fall in r reduces the market rate relatively to the 'safe' rate and therefore
increases the risk of illiquidity; and, in the second place, every fall in r reduces the
current earnings from illiquidity, which are available as a sort of insurance premium to
offset the risk of loss on capital account, by an amount equal to the difference between
the squares of the old rate of interest and the new. For example, if the rate of interest on a
long-term debt is 4 per cent, it is preferable to sacrifice liquidity unless on a balance of
probabilities it is feared that the long-term rate of interest may rise faster than by 4 per
cent of itself per annum, i.e. by an amount greater than 0.16 per cent per annum. If,
however, the rate of interest is already as low as 2 per cent, the running yield will only
offset a rise in it of as little as 0.04 per cent per annum. This, indeed, is perhaps the chief
obstacle to a fall in the rate of interest to a very low level. Unless reasons are believed to
exist why future experience will be very different from past experience, a long-term rate
of interest of (say) 2 per cent leaves more to fear than to hope, and offers, at the same
time, a running yield which is only sufficient to offset a very small measure of fear.

It is evident, then, that the rate of interest is a highly psychological phenomenon. We

shall find, indeed, in Book V that it cannot be in equilibrium at a level below the rate
which corresponds to full employment; because at such a level a state of true inflation
will be produced, with the result that M1 will absorb ever-increasing quantities of cash.
But at a level above the rate which corresponds to full employment, the long-term
market-rate of interest will depend, not only on the current policy of the monetary
authority, but also on market expectations concerning its future policy. The short-term
rate of interest is easily controlled by the monetary authority, both because it is not
difficult to produce a conviction that its policy will not greatly change in the very near
future, and also because the possible loss is small compared with the running yield
(unless it is approaching vanishing point). But the long-term rate may be more
recalcitrant when once it has fallen to a level which, on the basis of past experience and
present expectations of future monetary policy, is considered 'unsafe' by representative
opinion. For example, in a country linked to an international gold standard, a rate of
interest lower than prevails elsewhere will be viewed with a justifiable lack of
confidence; yet a domestic rate of interest dragged up to a parity with the highest rate
(highest after allowing for risk) prevailing in any country belonging to the international
system may be much higher than is consistent with domestic full employment.

Thus a monetary policy which strikes public opinion as being experimental in character
or easily liable to change may fail in its objective of greatly reducing the long-term rate
of interest, because M2 may tend to increase almost without limit in response to a
reduction of r below a certain figure. The same policy, on the other hand, may prove
easily successful if it appeals to public opinion as being reasonable and practicable and in
the public interest, rooted in strong conviction, and promoted by an authority unlikely to
be superseded.

It might be more accurate, perhaps, to say that the rate of interest is a highly conventional,
rather than a highly psychological, phenomenon. For its actual value is largely governed
by the prevailing view as to what its value is expected to be. Any level of interest which is
accepted with sufficient conviction as likely to be durable will be durable; subject, of
course, in a changing society to fluctuations for all kinds of reasons round the expected
normal. In particular, when M1 is increasing faster than M, the rate of interest will rise,
and vice versa. But it may fluctuate for decades about a level which is chronically too
high for full employment;particularly if it is the prevailing opinion that the rate of
interest is self-adjusting, so that the level established by convention is thought to be
rooted in objective grounds much stronger than convention, the failure of employment to
attain an optimum level being in no way associated, in the minds either of the public or of
authority, with the prevalence of an inappropriate range of rates of interest.

The difficulties in the way of maintaining effective demand at a level high enough to
provide full employment, which ensue from the association of a conventional and fairly
stable long-term rate of interest with a fickle and highly unstable marginal efficiency of
capital, should be, by now, obvious to the reader.

Such comfort as we can fairly take from more encouraging reflections must be drawn
from the hope that, precisely because the convention is not rooted in secure knowledge, it
will not be always unduly resistant to a modest measure of persistence and consistency of
purpose by the monetary authority. Public opinion can be fairly rapidly accustomed to a
modest fall in the rate of interest and the conventional expectation of the future may be
modified accordingly; thus preparing the way for a further movementup to a point. The
fall in the long-term rate of interest in Great Britain after her departure from the gold
standard provides an interesting example of this;the major movements were effected
by a series of discontinuous jumps, as the liquidity function of the public, having become
accustomed to each successive reduction, became ready to respond to some new
incentive in the news or in the policy of the authorities.

III

We can sum up the above in the proposition that in any given state of expectation there is
in the minds of the public a certain potentiality towards holding cash beyond what is
required by the transactions-motive or the precautionary-motive, which will realise itself
in actual cash-holdings in a degree which depends on the terms on which the monetary
authority is willing to create cash. It is this potentiality which is summed up in the
liquidity function L2. Corresponding to the quantity of money created by the monetary
authority, there will, therefore, be cet. par. a determinate rate of interest or, more strictly,
a determinate complex of rates of interest for debts of different maturities. The same
thing, however, would be true of any other factor in the economic system taken
separately. Thus this particular analysis will only be useful and significant in so far as
there is some specially direct or purposive connection between changes in the quantity of
money and changes in the rate of interest. Our reason for supposing that there is such a
special connection arises from the fact that, broadly speaking, the banking system and the
monetary authority are dealers in money and debts and not in assets or consumables.

If the monetary authority were prepared to deal both ways on specified terms in debts of
all maturities, and even more so if it were prepared to deal in debts of varying degrees of
risk, the relationship between the complex of rates of interest and the quantity of money
would be direct. The complex of rates of interest would simply be an expression of the
terms on which the banking system is prepared to acquire or part with debts; and the
quantity of money would be the amount which can find a home in the possession of
individuals whoafter taking account of all relevant circumstancesprefer the control
of liquid cash to parting with it in exchange for a debt on the terms indicated by the
market rate of interest. Perhaps a complex offer by the central bank to buy and sell at
stated prices gilt-edged bonds of all maturities, in place of the single bank rate for short-
term bills, is the most important practical improvement which can be made in the
technique of monetary management.

To-day, however, in actual practice, the extent to which the price of debts as fixed by the
banking system is 'effective' in the market, in the sense that it governs the actual market-
price, varies in different systems. Sometimes the price is more effective in one direction
than in the other; that is to say, the banking system may undertake to purchase debts at a
certain price but not necessarily to sell them at a figure near enough to its buying-price to
represent no more than a dealer's turn, though there is no reason why the price should not
be made effective both ways with the aid of open-market operations. There is also the
more important qualification which arises out of the monetary authority not being, as a
rule, an equally willing dealer in debts of all maturities. The monetary authority often
tends in practice to concentrate upon short-term debts and to leave the price of long-term
debts to be influenced by belated and imperfect reactions from the price of short-term
debts;though here again there is no reason why they need do so. Where these
qualifications operate, the directness of the relation between the rate of interest and the
quantity of money is correspondingly modified. In Great Britain the field of deliberate
control appears to be widening. But in applying this theory in any particular case
allowance must be made for the special characteristics of the method actually employed
by the monetary authority. If the monetary authority deals only in short-term debts, we
have to consider what influence the price, actual and prospective, of short-term debts
exercises on debts of longer maturity.

Thus there are certain limitations on the ability of the monetary authority to establish any
given complex of rates of interest for debts of different terms and risks, which can be
summed up as follows:

(1) There are those limitations which arise out of the monetary authority's own practices
in limiting its willingness to deal to debts of a particular type.

(2) There is the possibility, for the reasons discussed above, that, after the rate of interest
has fallen to a certain level, liquidity-preference may become virtually absolute in the
sense that almost everyone prefers cash to holding a debt which yields so low a rate of
interest. In this event the monetary authority would have lost effective control over the
rate of interest. But whilst this limiting case might become practically important in future,
I know of no example of it hitherto. Indeed, owing to the unwillingness of most monetary
authorities to deal boldly in debts of long term, there has not been much opportunity for a
test. Moreover, if such a situation were to arise, it would mean that the public authority
itself could borrow through the banking system on an unlimited scale at a nominal rate of
interest.

(3) The most striking examples of a complete breakdown of stability in the rate of interest,
due to the liquidity function flattening out in one direction or the other, have occurred in
very abnormal circumstances. In Russia and Central Europe after the war a currency
crisis or flight from the currency was experienced, when no one could be induced to
retain holdings either of money or of debts on any terms whatever, and even a high and
rising rate of interest was unable to keep pace with the marginal efficiency of capital
(especially of stocks of liquid goods) under the influence of the expectation of an ever
greater fall in the value of money; whilst in the United States at certain dates in 1932
there was a crisis of the opposite kinda financial crisis or crisis of liquidation, when
scarcely anyone could be induced to part with holdings of money on any reasonable
terms.

(4) There is, finally, the difficulty discussed in section IV of chapter 11, p. 144, in the
way of bringing the effective rate of interest below a certain figure, which may prove
important in an era of low interest-rates; namely the intermediate costs of bringing the
borrower and the ultimate lender together, and the allowance for risk, especially for
moral risk, which the lender requires over and above the pure rate of interest. As the pure
rate of interest declines it does not follow that the allowances for expense and risk decline
pari passu. Thus the rate of interest which the typical borrower has to pay may decline
more slowly than the pure rate of interest, and may be incapable of being brought, by the
methods of the existing banking and financial organisation, below a certain minimum
figure. This is particularly important if the estimation of moral risk is appreciable. For
where the risk is due to doubt in the mind of the lender concerning the honesty of the
borrower, there is nothing in the mind of a borrower who does not intend to be dishonest
to offset the resultant higher charge. It is also important in the case of short-term loans
(e.g. bank loans) where the expenses are heavy;a bank may have to charge its
customers 1 to 2 per cent., even if the pure rate of interest to the lender is nil.

IV

At the cost of anticipating what is more properly the subject of chapter 21 below it may
be interesting briefly at this stage to indicate the relationship of the above to the quantity
theory of money.

In a static society or in a society in which for any other reason no one feels any
uncertainty about the future rates of interest, the liquidity function L2, or the propensity to
hoard (as we might term it), will always be zero in equilibrium. Hence in equilibrium
M2 = 0 and M = M1; so that any change in M will cause the rate of interest to fluctuate
until income reaches a level at which the change in M1 is equal to the supposed change in
M. Now M1 V = Y, where V is the income-velocity of money as defined above and Y is
the aggregate income. Thus if it is practicable to measure the quantity, O, and the price, P,
of current output, we have Y = OP, and, therefore, MV = OP; which is much the same
as the quantity theory of money in its traditional form[2].

For the purposes of the real world it is a great fault in the quantity theory that it does not
distinguish between changes in prices which are a function of changes in output, and
those which are a function of changes in the wage-unit[3]. The explanation of this
omission is, perhaps, to be found in the assumptions that there is no propensity to hoard
and that there is always full employment. For in this case, O being constant and M2 being
zero, it follows, if we can take V also as constant, that both the wage-unit and the price-
level will be directly proportional to the quantity of money.

1. We must postpone to Book V. the question of what will determine the character of the new
equilibrium.

2. If we had defined V, not as equal to Y/M, but as equal to Y/M, then, of course, the Quantity
Theory is a truism which holds in all circumstances, though without significance.

3. This point will be further developed in Chapter 21 below.

Chapter 16

SUNDRY OBSERVATIONS ON THE NATURE OF CAPITAL

An act of individual saving meansso to speaka decision not to have dinner to-day.
But it does not necessitate a decision to have dinner or to buy a pair of boots a week
hence or a year hence or to consume any specified thing at any specified date. Thus it
depresses the business of preparing to-day's dinner without stimulating the business of
making ready for some future act of consumption. It is not a substitution of future
consumption-demand for present consumption-demand,it is a net diminution of such
demand. Moreover, the expectation of future consumption is so largely based on current
experience of present consumption that a reduction in the latter is likely to depress the
former, with the result that the act of saving will not merely depress the price of
consumption-goods and leave the marginal efficiency of existing capital unaffected, but
may actually tend to depress the latter also. In this event it may reduce present
investment-demand as well as present consumption-demand.

If saving consisted not merely in abstaining from present consumption but in placing
simultaneously a specific order for future consumption, the effect might indeed be
different. For in that case the expectation of some future yield from investment would be
improved, and the resources released from preparing for present consumption could be
turned over to preparing for the future consumption. Not that they necessarily would be,
even in this case, on a scale equal to the amount of resources released; since the desired
interval of delay might require a method of production so inconveniently 'roundabout' as
to have an efficiency well below the current rate of interest, with the result that the
favourable effect on employment of the forward order for consumption would eventuate
not at once but at some subsequent date, so that the immediate effect of the saving would
still be adverse to employment. In any case, however, an individual decision to save does
not, in actual fact, involve the placing of any specific forward order for consumption, but
merely the cancellation of a present order. Thus, since the expectation of consumption is
the only raison d'tre of employment, there should be nothing paradoxical in the
conclusion that a diminished propensity to consume has cet. par. a depressing effect on
employment.

The trouble arises, therefore, because the act of saving implies, not a substitution for
present consumption of some specific additional consumption which requires for its
preparation just as much immediate economic activity as would have been required by
present consumption equal in value to the sum saved, but a desire for 'wealth' as such,
that is for a potentiality of consuming an unspecified article at an unspecified time. The
absurd, though almost universal, idea that an act of individual saving is just as good for
effective demand as an act of individual consumption, has been fostered by the fallacy,
much more specious than the conclusion derived from it, that an increased desire to hold
wealth, being much the same thing as an increased desire to hold investments, must, by
increasing the demand for investments, provide a stimulus to their production; so that
current investment is promoted by individual saving to the same extent as present
consumption is diminished.

It is of this fallacy that it is most difficult to disabuse men's minds. It comes from
believing that the owner of wealth desires a capital-asset as such, whereas what he really
desires is its prospective yield. Now, prospective yield wholly depends on the expectation
of future effective demand in relation to future conditions of supply. If, therefore, an act
of saving does nothing to improve prospective yield, it does nothing to stimulate
investment. Moreover, in order that an individual saver may attain his desired goal of the
ownership of wealth, it is not necessary that a new capital-asset should be produced
wherewith to satisfy him. The mere act of saving by one individual, being two-sided as
we have shown above, forces some other individual to transfer to him some article of
wealth old or new. Every act of saving involves a 'forced' inevitable transfer of wealth to
him who saves, though he in his turn may suffer from the saving of others. These
transfers of wealth do not require the creation of new wealthindeed, as we have seen,
they may be actively inimical to it. The creation of new wealth wholly depends on the
prospective yield of the new wealth reaching the standard set by the current rate of
interest. The prospective yield of the marginal new investment is not increased by the fact
that someone wishes to increase his wealth, since the prospective yield of the marginal
new investment depends on the expectation of a demand for a specific article at a specific
date.

Nor do we avoid this conclusion by arguing that what the owner of wealth desires is not a
given prospective yield but the best available prospective yield, so that an increased
desire to own wealth reduces the prospective yield with which the producers of new
investment have to be content. For this overlooks the fact that there is always an
alternative to the ownership of real capital-assets, namely the ownership of money and
debts; so that the prospective yield with which the producers of new investment have to
be content cannot fall below the standard set by the current rate of interest. And the
current rate of interest depends, as we have seen, not on the strength of the desire to hold
wealth, but on the strengths of the desires to hold it in liquid and in illiquid forms
respectively, coupled with the amount of the supply of wealth in the one form relatively
to the supply of it in the other. If the reader still finds himself perplexed, let him ask
himself why, the quantity of money being unchanged, a fresh act of saving should
diminish the sum which it is desired to keep in liquid form at the existing rate of interest.

Certain deeper perplexities, which may arise when we try to probe still further into the
whys and wherefores, will be considered in the next chapter.

II

It is much preferable to speak of capital as having a yield over the course of its life in
excess of its original cost, than as being productive. For the only reason why an asset
offers a prospect of yielding during its life services having an aggregate value greater
than its initial supply price is because it is scarce; and it is kept scarce because of the
competition of the rate of interest on money. If capital becomes less scarce, the excess
yield will diminish, without its having become less productiveat least in the physical
sense.

I sympathise, therefore, with the pre-classical doctrine that everything is produced by

labour, aided by what used to be called art and is now called technique, by natural
resources which are free or cost a rent according to their scarcity or abundance, and by
the results of past labour, embodied in assets, which also command a price according to
their scarcity or abundance. It is preferable to regard labour, including, of course, the
personal services of the entrepreneur and his assistants, as the sole factor of production,
operating in a given environment of technique, natural resources, capital equipment and
effective demand. This partly explains why we have been able to take the unit of labour
as the sole physical unit which we require in our economic system, apart from units of
money and of time.

It is true that some lengthy or roundabout processes are physically efficient. But so are
some short processes. Lengthy processes are not physically efficient because they are
long. Some, probably most, lengthy processes would be physically very inefficient, for
there are such things as spoiling or wasting with time[1]. With a given labour force there is
a definite limit to the quantity of labour embodied in roundabout processes which can be
used to advantage. Apart from other considerations, there must be a due proportion
between the amount of labour employed in making machines and the amount which will
be employed in using them. The ultimate quantity of value will not increase indefinitely,
relatively to the quantity of labour employed, as the processes adopted become more and
more roundabout, even if their physical efficiency is still increasing. Only if the desire to
postpone consumption were strong enough to produce a situation in which full
employment required a volume of investment so great as to involve a negative marginal
efficiency of capital, would a process become advantageous merely because it was
lengthy; in which event we should employ physically inefficient processes, provided they
were sufficiently lengthy for the gain from postponement to outweigh their inefficiency.
We should in fact have a situation in which short processes would have to be kept
sufficiently scarce for their physical efficiency to outweigh the disadvantage of the early
delivery of their product. A correct theory, therefore, must be reversible so as to be able
to cover the eases of the marginal efficiency of capital corresponding either to a positive
or to a negative rate of interest; and it is, I think, only the scarcity theory outlined above
which is capable of this.

Moreover there are all sorts of reasons why various kinds of services and facilities are
scarce and therefore expensive relatively to the quantity of labour involved. For example,
smelly processes command a higher reward, because people will not undertake them
otherwise. So do risky processes. But we do not devise a productivity theory of smelly or
risky processes as such. In short, not all labour is accomplished in equally agreeable
attendant circumstances; and conditions of equilibrium require that articles produced in
less agreeable attendant circumstances (characterised by smelliness, risk or the lapse of
time) must be kept sufficiently scarce to command a higher price. But if the lapse of time
becomes an agreeable attendant circumstance, which is a quite possible case and already
holds for many individuals, then, as I have said above, it is the short processes which
must be kept sufficiently scarce.

Given the optimum amount of roundaboutness, we shall, of course, select the most
efficient roundabout processes which we can find up to the required aggregate. But the
optimum amount itself should be such as to provide at the appropriate dates for that part
of consumers' demand which it is desired to defer. In optimum conditions, that is to say,
production should be so organised as to produce in the most efficient manner compatible
with delivery at the dates at which consumers' demand is expected to become effective. It
is no use to produce for delivery at a different date from this, even though the physical
output could be increased by changing the date of delivery;except in so far as the
prospect of a larger meal, so to speak, induces the consumer to anticipate or postpone the
hour of dinner. If, after hearing full particulars of the meals he can get by fixing dinner at
different hours, the consumer is expected to decide in favour of 8 o'clock, it is the
business of the cook to provide the best dinner he can for service at that hour, irrespective
of whether 7.30, 8 o'clock or 8.30 is the hour which would suit him best if time counted
for nothing, one way or the other, and his only task was to produce the absolutely best
dinner. In some phases of society it may be that we could get physically better dinners by
dining later than we do; but it is equally conceivable in other phases that we could get
better dinners by dining earlier. Our theory must, as I have said above, be applicable to
both contingencies.

If the rate of interest were zero, there would be an optimum interval for any given article
between the average date of input and the date of consumption, for which labour cost
would be a minimum;a shorter process of production would be less efficient
technically, whilst a longer process would also be less efficient by reason of storage costs
and deterioration. If, however, the rate of interest exceeds zero, a new element of cost is
introduced which increases with the length of the process, so that the optimum interval
will be shortened, and the current input to provide for the eventual delivery of the article
will have to be curtailed until the prospective price has increased sufficiently to cover the
increased costa cost which will be increased both by the interest charges and also by
the diminished efficiency of the shorter method of production. Whilst if the rate of
interest falls below zero (assuming this to be technically possible), the opposite is the
case. Given the prospective consumers' demand, current input to-day has to compete, so
to speak, with the alternative of starting input at a later date; and, consequently, current
input will only be worth while when the greater cheapness, by reason of greater technical
efficiency or prospective price changes, of producing later on rather than now, is
insufficient to offset the smaller return from negative interest. In the case of the great
majority of articles it would involve great technical inefficiency to start up their input
more than a very modest length of time ahead of their prospective consumption. Thus
even if the rate of interest is zero, there is a strict limit to the proportion of prospective
consumers' demand which it is profitable to begin providing for in advance; and, as the
rate of interest rises, the proportion of the prospective consumers' demand for which it
pays to produce to-day shrinks pari passu.
III

We have seen that capital has to be kept scarce enough in the long-period to have a
marginal efficiency which is at least equal to the rate of interest for a period equal to the
life of the capital, as determined by psychological and institutional conditions. What
would this involve for a society which finds itself so well equipped with capital that its
marginal efficiency is zero and would be negative with any additional investment; yet
possessing a monetary system, such that money will 'keep' and involves negligible costs
of storage and safe custody, with the result that in practice interest cannot be negative;
and, in conditions of full employment, disposed to save?

If, in such circumstances, we start from a position of full employment, entrepreneurs will
necessarily make losses if they continue to offer employment on a scale which will utilise
the whole of the existing stock of capital. Hence the stock of capital and the level of
employment will have to shrink until the community becomes so impoverished that the
aggregate of saving has become zero, the positive saving of some individuals or groups
being offset by the negative saving of others. Thus for a society such as we have
supposed, the position of equilibrium, under conditions of laissez-faire, will be one in
which employment is low enough and the standard of life sufficiently miserable to bring
savings to zero. More probably there will be a cyclical movement round this equilibrium
position. For if there is still room for uncertainty about the future, the marginal efficiency
of capital will occasionally rise above zero leading to a 'boom', and in the succeeding
'slump' the stock of capital may fall for a time below the level which will yield a marginal
efficiency of zero in the long run. Assuming correct foresight, the equilibrium stock of
capital which will have a marginal efficiency of precisely zero will, of course, be a
smaller stock than would correspond to full employment of the available labour; for it
will be the equipment which corresponds to that proportion of unemployment which
ensures zero saving.

The only alternative position of equilibrium would be given by a situation in which a

stock of capital sufficiently great to have a marginal efficiency of zero also represents an
amount of wealth sufficiently great to satiate to the full the aggregate desire on the part of
the public to make provision for the future, even with full employment, in circumstances
where no bonus is obtainable in the form of interest. It would, however, be an unlikely
coincidence that the propensity to save in conditions of full employment should become
satisfied just at the point where the stock of capital reaches the level where its marginal
efficiency is zero. If, therefore, this more favourable possibility comes to the rescue, it
will probably take effect, not just at the point where the rate of interest is vanishing, but
at some previous point during the gradual decline of the rate of interest.

We have assumed so far an institutional factor which prevents the rate of interest from
being negative, in the shape of money which has negligible carrying costs. In fact,
however, institutional and psychological factors are present which set a limit much above
zero to the practicable decline in the rate of interest. In particular the costs of bringing
borrowers and lenders together and uncertainty as to the future of the rate of interest,
which we have examined above, set a lower limit, which in present circumstances may
perhaps be as high as 2 or 2 per cent on long term. If this should prove correct, the
awkward possibilities of an increasing stock of wealth, in conditions where the rate of
interest can fall no further under laissez-faire, may soon be realised in actual experience
Moreover if the minimum level to which it is practicable to bring the rate of interest is
appreciably above zero, there is less likelihood of the aggregate desire to accumulate
wealth being satiated before the rate of interest has reached its minimum level.

The post-war experiences of Great Britain and the United States are, indeed, actual
examples of how an accumulation of wealth, so large that its marginal efficiency has
fallen more rapidly than the rate of interest can fall in the face of the prevailing
institutional and psychological factors, can interfere, in conditions mainly of laissez-faire,
with a reasonable level of employment and with the standard of life which the technical
conditions of production are capable of furnishing.

It follows that of two equal communities, having the same technique but different stocks
of capital, the community with the smaller stocks of capital may be able for the time
being to enjoy a higher standard of life than the community with the larger stock; though
when the poorer community has caught up the richas, presumably, it eventually will
then both alike will suffer the fate of Midas. This disturbing conclusion depends, of
course, on the assumption that the propensity to consume and the rate of investment are
not deliberately controlled in the social interest but are mainly left to the influences of
laissez-faire.

Iffor whatever reasonthe rate of interest cannot fall as fast as the marginal efficiency
of capital would fall with a rate of accumulation corresponding to what the community
would choose to save at a rate of interest equal to the marginal efficiency of capital in
conditions of full employment, then even a diversion of the desire to hold wealth towards
assets, which will in fact yield no economic fruits whatever, will increase economic well-
being. In so far as millionaires find their satisfaction in building mighty mansions to
contain their bodies when alive and pyramids to shelter them after death, or, repenting of
their sins, erect cathedrals and endow monasteries or foreign missions, the day when
abundance of capital will interfere with abundance of output may be postponed. 'To dig
holes in the ground', paid for out of savings, will increase, not only employment, but the
real national dividend of useful goods and services. It is not reasonable, however, that a
sensible community should be content to remain dependent on such fortuitous and often
wasteful mitigations when once we understand the influences upon which effective
demand depends.

IV

Let us assume that steps are taken to ensure that the rate of interest is consistent with the
rate of investment which corresponds to full employment. Let us assume, further, that
State action enters in as a balancing factor to provide that the growth of capital equipment
shall be such as to approach saturation-point at a rate which does not put a
disproportionate burden on the standard of life of the present generation.
On such assumptions I should guess that a properly run community equipped with
modern technical resources, of which the population is not increasing rapidly, ought to be
able to bring down the marginal efficiency of capital in equilibrium approximately to
zero within a single generation; so that we should attain the conditions of a quasi-
stationary community where change and progress would result only from changes in
technique, taste, population and institutions, with the products of capital selling at a price
proportioned to the labour, etc., embodied in them on just the same principles as govern
the prices of consumption-goods into which capital-charges enter in an insignificant
degree.

If I am right in supposing it to be comparatively easy to make capital-goods so abundant

that the marginal efficiency of capital is zero, this may be the most sensible way of
gradually getting rid of many of the objectionable features of capitalism. For a little
reflection will show what enormous social changes would result from a gradual
disappearance of a rate of return on accumulated wealth. A man would still be free to
accumulate his earned income with a view to spending it at a later date. But his
accumulation would not grow. He would simply be in the position of Pope's father, who,
when he retired from business, carried a chest of guineas with him to his villa at
Twickenham and met his household expenses from it as required.

Though the rentier would disappear, there would still be room, nevertheless, for
enterprise and skill in the estimation of prospective yields about which opinions could
differ. For the above relates primarily to the pure rate of interest apart from any
allowance for risk and the like, and not to the gross yield of assets including the return in
respect of risk. Thus unless the pure rate of interest were to be held at a negative figure,
there would still be a positive yield to skilled investment in individual assets having a
doubtful prospective yield. Provided there was some measurable unwillingness to
undertake risk, there would also be a positive net yield from the aggregate of such assets
over a period of time. But it is not unlikely that, in such circumstances, the eagerness to
obtain a yield from doubtful investments might be such that they would show in the
aggregate a negative net yield.

1. Cf. Marshalls note on Bhm-Bawerk, Principles, p. 593.

Chapter 17

THE ESSENTIAL PROPERTIES OF INTEREST AND MONEY

It seems, then, that the rate of interest on money plays a peculiar part in setting a limit to
the level of employment, since it sets a standard to which the marginal efficiency of a
capital-asset must attain if it is to be newly produced. That this should be so, is, at first
sight, most perplexing. It is natural to enquire wherein the peculiarity of money lies as
distinct from other assets, whether it is only money which has a rate of interest, and what
would happen in a non-monetary economy. Until we have answered these questions, the
full significance of our theory will not be clear.

The money-rate of interestwe may remind the readeris nothing more than the
percentage excess of a sum of money contracted for forward delivery, e.g. a year hence,
over what we may call the 'spot' or cash price of the sum thus contracted for forward
delivery. It would seem, therefore, that for every kind of capital-asset there must be an
analogue of the rate of interest on money. For there is a definite quantity of (e.g.) wheat
to be delivered a year hence which has the same exchange value to-day as 100 quarters of
wheat for 'spot' delivery. If the former quantity is 105 quarters, we may say that the
wheat-rate of interest is 5 per cent per annum; and if it is 95 quarters, that it is minus 5
per cent per annum. Thus for every durable commodity we have a rate of interest in terms
of itself;a wheat-rate of interest, a copper-rate of interest, a house-rate of interest, even
a steel-plant-rate of interest.

The difference between the 'future' and 'spot' contracts for a commodity, such as wheat,
which are quoted in the market, bears a definite relation to the wheat-rate of interest, but,
since the future contract is quoted in terms of money for forward delivery and not in
terms of wheat for spot delivery, it also brings in the money-rate of interest. The exact
relationship is as follows:

Let us suppose that the spot price of wheat is 100 per 100 quarters, that the price of the
'future' contract for wheat for delivery a year hence is 107 per 100 quarters, and that the
money-rate of interest is 5 per cent; what is the wheat-rate of interest? 100 spot will buy
105 for forward delivery, and 105 for forward delivery will buy 105/107 100 ( = 98)
quarters for forward delivery. Alternatively 100 spot will buy 100 quarters of wheat for
spot delivery. Thus 100 quarters of wheat for spot delivery will buy 98 quarters for
forward delivery. It follows that the wheat-rate of interest is minus 2 per cent per annum[1].

It follows from this that there is no reason why their rates of interest should be the same
for different commodities,why the wheat-rate of interest should be equal to the copper-
rate of interest. For the relation between the 'spot' and 'future' contracts, as quoted in the
market, is notoriously different for different commodities. This, we shall find, will lead
us to the clue we are seeking. For it may be that it is the greatest of the own-rates of
interest (as we may call them) which rules the roost (because it is the greatest of these
rates that the marginal efficiency of a capital-asset must attain if it is to be newly
produced); and that there are reasons why it is the money-rate of interest which is often
the greatest (because, as we shall find, certain forces, which operate to reduce the own-
rates of interest of other assets, do not operate in the case of money).

It may be added that, just as there are differing commodity-rates of interest at any time,
so also exchange dealers are familiar with the fact that the rate of interest is not even the
same in terms of two different moneys, e.g. sterling and dollars. For here also the
difference between the 'spot' and 'future' contracts for a foreign money in terms of sterling
are not, as a rule, the same for different foreign moneys.

Now each of these commodity standards offers us the same facility as money for
measuring the marginal efficiency of capital. For we can take any commodity we choose,
e.g. wheat; calculate the wheat-value of the prospective yields of any capital asset; and
the rate of discount which makes the present value of this series of wheat annuities equal
to the present supply price of the asset in terms of wheat gives us the marginal efficiency
of the asset in terms of wheat. If no change is expected in the relative value of two
alternative standards, then the marginal efficiency of a capital-asset will be the same in
whichever of the two standards it is measured, since the numerator and denominator of
the fraction which leads up to the marginal efficiency will be changed in the same
proportion. If, however, one of the alternative standards is expected to change in value in
terms of the other, the marginal efficiencies of capital-assets will be changed by the same
percentage, according to which standard they are measured in. To illustrate this let us
take the simplest case where wheat, one of the alternative standards, is expected to
appreciate at a steady rate of a per cent per annum in terms of money; the marginal
efficiency of an asset, which is x per cent in terms of money, will then be x a per cent in
terms of wheat. Since the marginal efficiencies of all capital-assets will be altered by the
same amount, it follows that their order of magnitude will be the same irrespective of the
standard which is selected.

If there were some composite commodity which could be regarded strictly speaking as
representative, we could regard the rate of interest and the marginal efficiency of capital
in terms of this commodity as being, in a sense, uniquely the rate of interest and the
marginal efficiency of capital. But there are, of course, the same obstacles in the way of
this as there are to setting up a unique standard of value.

So far, therefore, the money-rate of interest has no uniqueness compared with other rates
of interest, but is on precisely the same footing. Wherein, then, lies the peculiarity of the
money-rate of interest which gives it the predominating practical importance attributed to
it in the preceding chapters? Why should the volume of output and employment be more
intimately bound up with the money-rate of interest than with the wheat-rate of interest or
the house-rate of interest?
II

Let us consider what the various commodity-rates of interest over a period of (say) a year
are likely to be for different types of assets. Since we are taking each commodity in turn
as the standard, the returns on each commodity must be reckoned in this context as being
measured in terms of itself.

There are three attributes which different types of assets possess in different degrees;
namely, as follows:

(i) Some assets produce a yield or output q, measured in terms of themselves, by assisting
some process of production or supplying services to a consumer.

(ii) Most assets, except money, suffer some wastage or involve some cost through the
mere passage of time (apart from any change in their relative value), irrespective of their
being used to produce a yield; i.e. they involve a carrying cost c measured in terms of
themselves. It does not matter for our present purpose exactly where we draw the line
between the costs which we deduct before calculating q and those which we include in c,
since in what follows we shall be exclusively concerned with q c.

(iii) Finally, the power of disposal over an asset during a period may offer a potential
convenience or security, which is not equal for assets of different kinds, though the assets
themselves are of equal initial value. There is, so to speak, nothing to show for this at the
end of the period in the shape of output; yet it is something for which people are ready to
pay something. The amount (measured in terms of itself) which they are willing to pay
for the potential convenience or security given by this power of disposal (exclusive of
yield or carrying cost attaching to the asset), we shall call its liquidity-premium l.

It follows that the total return expected from the ownership of an asset over a period is
equal to its yield minus its carrying cost plus its liquidity-premium, i.e. to q c + l. That
is to say, q c + l is the own-rate of interest of any commodity, where q, c and l are
measured in terms of itself as the standard.

It is characteristic of instrumental capital (e.g. a machine) or of consumption capital (e.g.

a house) which is in use, that its yield should normally exceed its carrying cost, whilst its
liquidity-premium is probably negligible; of a stock of liquid goods or of surplus laid-up
instrumental or consumption capital that it should incur a carrying cost in terms of itself
without any yield to set off against it, the liquidity-premium in this case also being
usually negligible as soon as stocks exceed a moderate level, though capable of being
significant in special circumstances; and of money that its yield is nil and its carrying cost
negligible, but its liquidity-premium substantial. Different commodities may, indeed,
have differing degrees of liquidity-premium amongst themselves, and money may incur
some degree of carrying costs, e.g. for safe custody. But it is an essential difference
between money and all (or most) other assets that in the case of money its liquidity-
premium much exceeds its carrying cost, whereas in the case of other assets their
carrying cost much exceeds their liquidity-premium. Let us, for purposes of illustration,
assume that on houses the yield is q1 and the carrying cost and liquidity-premium
negligible; that on wheat the carrying cost is c2 and the yield and liquidity-premium
negligible; and that on money the liquidity-premium is l3 and the yield and carrying cost
negligible. That is to say, q1 is the house-rate of interest, c2 the wheat-rate of interest,
and l3 the money-rate of interest.

To determine the relationships between the expected returns on different types of assets
which are consistent with equilibrium, we must also know what the changes in relative
values during the year are expected to be. Taking money (which need only be a money of
account for this purpose, and we could equally well take wheat) as our standard of
measurement, let the expected percentage appreciation (or depreciation) of houses be a1
and of wheat a2. q1, c2 and l3 we have called the own-rates of interest of houses, wheat
and money in terms of themselves as the standard of value; i.e. q1 is the house-rate of
interest in terms of houses, c2 is the wheat-rate of interest in terms of wheat, and l3 is
the money-rate of interest in terms of money. It will also be useful to call a1 + q1, a2 c2
and l3, which stand for the same quantities reduced to money as the standard of value, the
house-rate of money-interest, the wheat-rate of money-interest and the money-rate of
money-interest respectively. With this notation it is easy to see that the demand of
wealth-owners will be directed to houses, to wheat or to money, according as a1 + q1 or
a2 c2 or l3 is greatest. Thus in equilibrium the demand-prices of houses and wheat in
terms of money will be such that there is nothing to choose in the way of advantage
between the alternatives;i.e. a1 + q1, a2 c2 and l3 will be equal. The choice of the
standard of value will make no difference to this result because a shift from one standard
to another will change all the terms equally, i.e. by an amount equal to the expected rate
of appreciation (or depreciation) of the new standard in terms of the old.

Now those assets of which the normal supply-price is less than the demand-price will be
newly produced; and these will be those assets of which the marginal efficiency would be
greater (on the basis of their normal supply-price) than the rate of interest (both being
measured in the same standard of value whatever it is). As the stock of the assets, which
begin by having a marginal efficiency at least equal to the rate of interest, is increased,
their marginal efficiency (for reasons, sufficiently obvious, already given) tends to fall.
Thus a point will come at which it no longer pays to produce them, unless the rate of
interest falls pari passu. When there is no asset of which the marginal efficiency reaches
the rate of interest, the further production of capital-assets will come to a standstill.

Let us suppose (as a mere hypothesis at this stage of the argument) that there is some
asset (e.g. money) of which the rate of interest is fixed (or declines more slowly as output
increases than does any other commodity's rate of interest); how is the position adjusted?
Since a1 + q1, a2 c2 and l3 are necessarily equal, and since l3 by hypothesis is either
fixed or falling more slowly than q1 or c2, it follows that a1 and a2 must be rising. In
other words, the present money-price of every commodity other than money tends to fall
relatively to its expected future price. Hence, if q1 and c2 continue to fall, a point comes
at which it is not profitable to produce any of the commodities, unless the cost of
production at some future date is expected to rise above the present cost by an amount
which will cover the cost of carrying a stock produced now to the date of the prospective
higher price.

It is now apparent that our previous statement to the effect that it is the money-rate of
interest which sets a limit to the rate of output, is not strictly correct. We should have said
that it is that asset's rate of interest which declines most slowly as the stock of assets in
general increases, which eventually knocks out the profitable production of each of the
others,except in the contingency, just mentioned, of a special relationship between the
present and prospective costs of production. As output increases, own-rates of interest
decline to levels at which one asset after another falls below the standard of profitable
production;until, finally, one or more own-rates of interest remain at a level which is
above that of the marginal efficiency of any asset whatever.

If by money we mean the standard of value, it is clear that it is not necessarily the money-
rate of interest which makes the trouble. We could not get out of our difficulties (as some
have supposed) merely by decreeing that wheat or houses shall be the standard of value
instead of gold or sterling. For, it now appears that the same difficulties will ensue if
there continues to exist any asset of which the own-rate of interest is reluctant to decline
as output increases. It may be, for example, that gold will continue to fill this r6le in a
country which has gone over to an inconvertible paper standard.

III

In attributing, therefore, a peculiar significance to the money-rate of interest, we have

been tacitly assuming that the kind of money to which we are accustomed has some
special characteristics which lead to its own-rate of interest in terms of itself as standard
being more reluctant to fall as the stock of assets in general increases than the own-rates
of interest of any other assets in terms of themselves. Is this assumption justified?
Reflection shows, I think, that the following peculiarities, which commonly characterise
money as we know it, are capable of justifying it. To the extent that the established
standard of value has these peculiarities, the summary statement, that it is the money-rate
of interest which is the significant rate of interest, will hold good.

(i) The first characteristic which tends towards the above conclusion is the fact that
money has, both in the long and in the short period, a zero, or at any rate a very small,
elasticity of production, so far as the power of private enterprise is concerned, as distinct
from the monetary authority;elasticity of production meaning[2], in this context, the
response of the quantity of labour applied to producing it to a rise in the quantity of
labour which a unit of it will command. Money, that is to say, cannot be readily
produced;labour cannot be turned on at will by entrepreneurs to produce money in
increasing quantities as its price rises in terms of the wage-unit. In the case of an
inconvertible managed currency this condition is strictly satisfied. But in the case of a
gold-standard currency it is also approximately so, in the sense that the maximum
proportional addition to the quantity of labour which can be thus employed is very small,
except indeed in a country of which gold-mining is the major industry.
Now, in the case of assets having an elasticity of production, the reason why we assumed
their own-rate of interest to decline was because we assumed the stock of them to
increase as the result of a higher rate of output. In the case of money, however
postponing, for the moment, our consideration of the effects of reducing the wage-unit or
of a deliberate increase in its supply by the monetary authoritythe supply is fixed. Thus
the characteristic that money cannot be readily produced by labour gives at once some
prima facie presumption for the view that its own-rate of interest will be relatively
reluctant to fall; whereas if money could be grown like a crop or manufactured like a
motor-car, depressions would be avoided or mitigated because, if the price of other assets
was tending to fall in terms of money, more labour would be diverted into the production
of money;as we see to be the case in gold-mining countries, though for the world as a
whole the maximum diversion in this way is almost negligible.

(ii) Obviously, however, the above condition is satisfied, not only by money, but by all
pure rent-factors, the production of which is completely inelastic. A second condition,
therefore, is required to distinguish money from other rent elements.

The second differentia of money is that it has an elasticity of substitution equal, or nearly
equal, to zero which means that as the exchange value of money rises there is no
tendency to substitute some other factor for it;except, perhaps, to some trifling extent,
where the money-commodity is also used in manufacture or the arts. This follows from
the peculiarity of money that its utility is solely derived from its exchange-value, so that
the two rise and fall pari passu, with the result that as the exchange value of money rises
there is no motive or tendency, as in the case of rent-factors, to substitute some other
factor for it.

Thus, not only is it impossible to turn more labour on to producing money when its
labour-price rises, but money is a bottomless sink for purchasing power, when the
demand for it increases, since there is no value for it at which demand is divertedas in
the case of other rent-factorsso as to slop over into a demand for other things.

The only qualification to this arises when the rise in the value of money leads to
uncertainty as to the future maintenance of this rise; in which event, a1 and a2 are
increased, which is tantamount to an increase in the commodity-rates of money-interest
and is, therefore, stimulating to the output of other assets.

(iii) Thirdly, we must consider whether these conclusions are upset by the fact that, even
though the quantity of money cannot be increased by diverting labour into pro4ucing it,
nevertheless an assumption that its effective supply is rigidly fixed would be inaccurate.
In particular, a reduction of the wage-unit will release cash from its other uses for the
satisfaction of the liquidity-motive; whilst, in addition to this, as money-values fall, the
stock of money will bear a higher proportion to the total wealth of the community.

It is not possible to dispute on purely theoretical grounds that this reaction might be
capable of allowing an adequate decline in the money-rate of interest. There are, however,
several reasons, which taken in combination are of compelling force, why in an economy
of the type to which we are accustomed it is very probable that the money-rate of interest
will often prove reluctant to decline adequately:

(a) We have to allow, first of all, for the reactions of a fall in the wage-unit on the
marginal efficiencies of other assets in terms of money;for it is the difference between
these and the money-rate of interest with which we are concerned. If the effect of the fall
in the wage-unit is to produce an expectation that it will subsequently rise again, the
result will be wholly favourable. If, on the contrary, the effect is to produce an
expectation of a further fall, the reaction on the marginal efficiency of capital may offset
the decline in the rate of interest[3].

(b) The fact that wages tend to be sticky in terms of money, the money-wage being more
stable than the real wage, tends to limit the readiness of the wage-unit to fall in terms of
money. Moreover, if this were not so, the position might be worse rather than better;
because, if money-wages were to fall easily, this might often tend to create an expectation
of a further fall with unfavourable reactions on the marginal efficiency of capital[4].

Furthermore, if wages were to be fixed in terms of some other commodity, e.g. wheat, it
is improbable that they would continue to be sticky. It is because of money's other
characteristicsthose, especially, which make it liquidthat wages, when fixed in terms
of it, tend to be sticky.

(c) Thirdly, we come to what is the most fundamental consideration in this context,
namely, the characteristics of money which satisfy liquidity-preference. For, in certain
circumstances such as will often occur, these will cause the rate of interest to be
insensitive, particularly below a certain figure[5], even to a substantial increase in the
quantity of money in proportion to other forms of wealth. In other words, beyond a
certain point money's yield from liquidity does not fall in response to an increase in its
quantity to anything approaching the extent to which the yield from other types of assets
falls when their quantity is comparably increased.

In this connection the low (or negligible) carrying-costs of money play an essential part.
For if its carrying costs were material, they would offset the effect of expectations as to
the prospective value of money at future dates. The readiness of the public to increase
their stock of money in response to a comparatively small stimulus is due to the
advantages of liquidity (real or supposed) having no offset to contend with in the shape of
carrying-costs mounting steeply with the lapse of time. In the case of a commodity other
than money a modest stock of it may offer some convenience to users of the commodity.
But even though a larger stock might have some attractions as representing a store of
wealth of stable value, this would be offset by its carrying-costs in the shape of storage,
wastage, etc.

Hence, after a certain point is reached, there is necessarily a loss in holding a greater
stock.
In the case of money, however, this, as we have seen, is not so,and for a variety of
reasons, namely, those which constitute money as being, in the estimation of the public,
par excellence 'liquid'. Thus those reformers, who look for a remedy by creating artificial
carrying-costs for money through the device of requiring legal-tender currency to be
periodically stamped at a prescribed cost in order to retain its quality as money, or in
analogous ways, have been on the right track; and the practical value of their proposals
deserves consideration.

The significance of the money-rate of interest arises, therefore, out of the combination of
the characteristics that, through the working of the liquidity-motive, this rate of interest
may be somewhat unresponsive to a change in the proportion which the quantity of
money bears to other forms of wealth measured in money, and that money has (or may
have) zero (or negligible) elasticities both of production and of substitution. The first
condition means that demand may be predominantly directed to money, the second that
when this occurs labour cannot be employed in producing more money, and the third that
there is no mitigation at any point through some other factor being capable, if it is
sufficiently cheap, of doing money's duty equally well. The only reliefapart from
changes in the marginal efficiency of capitalcan come (so long as the propensity
towards liquidity is unchanged) from an increase in the quantity of money, orwhich is
formally the same thinga rise in the value of money which enables a given quantity to
provide increased money-services.

Thus a rise in the money-rate of interest retards the output of all the objects of which the
production is elastic without being capable of stimulating the output of money (the
production of which is, by hypothesis, perfectly inelastic). The money-rate of interest, by
setting the pace for all the other commodity-rates of interest, holds back investment in the
production of these other commodities without being capable of stimulating investment
for the production of money, which by hypothesis cannot be produced. Moreover, owing
to the elasticity of demand for liquid cash in terms of debts, a small change in the
conditions governing this demand may not much alter the money-rate of interest, whilst
(apart from official action) it is also impracticable, owing to the inelasticity of the
production of money, for natural forces to bring the money-rate of interest down by
affecting the supply side. In the case of an ordinary commodity, the inelasticity of the
demand for liquid stocks of it would enable small changes on the demand side to bring its
rate of interest up or down with a rush, whilst the elasticity of its supply would also tend
to prevent a high premium on spot over forward delivery. Thus with other commodities
left to themselves, 'natural forces,' i.e. the ordinary forces of the market, would tend to
bring their rate of interest down until the emergence of full employment had brought
about for commodities generally the inelasticity of supply which we have postulated as a
normal characteristic of money. Thus in the absence of money and in the absencewe
must, of course, also supposeof any other commodity with the assumed characteristics
of money, the rates of interest would only reach equilibrium when there is full
employment. Unemployment develops, that is to say, because people want the moon;
men cannot be employed when the object of desire (i.e. money) is something which
cannot be produced and the demand for which cannot be readily choked off. There is no
remedy but to persuade the public that green cheese is practically the same thing and to
have a green cheese factory (i.e. a central bank) under public control.

It is interesting to notice that the characteristic which has been traditionally supposed to
render gold especially suitable for use as the standard of value, namely, its inelasticity of
supply, turns out to be precisely the characteristic which is at the bottom of the trouble.

Our conclusion can be stated in the most general form (taking the propensity to consume
as given) as follows. No further increase in the rate of investment is possible when the
greatest amongst the own-rates of own-interest of all available assets is equal to the
greatest amongst the marginal efficiencies of all assets, measured in terms of the asset
whose own-rate of own-interest is greatest.

In a position of full employment this condition is necessarily satisfied. But it may also be
satisfied before full employment is reached, if there exists some asset, having zero (or
relatively small) elasticities of production and substitution[6], whose rate of interest
declines more closely, as output increases, than the marginal efficiencies of capital-assets
measured in terms of it.

IV

We have shown above that for a commodity to be the standard of value is not a sufficient
condition for that commodity's rate of interest to be the significant rate of interest. It is,
however, interesting to consider how far those characteristics of money as we know it,
which make the money-rate of interest the significant rate, are bound up with money
being the standard in which debts and wages are usually fixed. The matter requires
consideration under two aspects.

In the first place, the fact that contracts are fixed, and wages are usually somewhat stable,
in terms of money unquestionably plays a large part in attracting to money so high a
liquidity-premium. The convenience of holding assets in the same standard as that in
which future liabilities may fall due and in a standard in terms of which the future cost of
living is expected to be relatively stable, is obvious. At the same time the expectation of
relative stability in the future money-cost of output might not be entertained with much
confidence if the standard of value were a commodity with a high elasticity of production.
Moreover, the low carrying-costs of money as we know it play quite as large a part as a
high liquidity-premium in making the money-rate of interest the significant rate. For what
matters is the difference between the liquidity-premium and the carrying-costs; and in the
case of most commodities, other than such assets as gold and silver and bank-notes, the
carrying-costs are at least as high as the liquidity-premium ordinarily attaching to the
standard in which contracts and wages are fixed, so that, even if the liquidity-premium
now attaching to (e.g.) sterling-money were to be transferred to(e.g.) wheat, the wheat-
rate of interest would still be unlikely to rise above zero. It remains the case, therefore,
that, whilst the fact of contracts and wages being fixed in terms of money considerably
enhances the significance of the money-rate of interest, this circumstance is, nevertheless,
probably insufficient by itself to produce the observed characteristics of the money-rate
of interest.

The second point to be considered is more subtle. The normal expectation that the value
of output will be more stable in terms of money than in terms of any other commodity,
depends of course, not on wages being arranged in terms of money, but on wages being
relatively sticky in terms of money. What, then, would the position be if wages were
expected to be more sticky (i.e. more stable) in terms of some one or more commodities
other than money, than in terms of money itself? Such an expectation requires, not only
that the costs of the commodity in question are expected to be relatively constant in terms
of the wage-unit for a greater or smaller scale of output both in the short and in the long
period, but also that any surplus over the current demand at cost-price can be taken into
stock without cost, i.e. that its liquidity-premium exceeds its carrying-costs (for,
otherwise, since there is no hope of profit from a higher price, the carrying of a stock
must necessarily involve a loss). If a commodity can be found to satisfy these conditions,
then, assuredly, it might be set up as a rival to money. Thus it is not logically impossible
that there should be a commodity in terms of which the value of output is expected to be
more stable than in terms of money. But it does not seem probable that any such
commodity exists.

I conclude, therefore, that the commodity, in terms of which wages are expected to be
most sticky, cannot be one whose elasticity of production is not least, and for which the
excess of carrying-costs over liquidity-premium is not least. In other words, the
expectation of a relative stickiness of wages in terms of money is a corollary of the
excess of liquidity-premium over carrying-costs being greater for money than for any
other asset.

Thus we see that the various characteristics, which combine to make the money-rate of
interest significant, interact with one another in a cumulative fashion. The fact that
money has low elasticities of production and substitution and low carrying-costs tends to
raise the expectation that money-wages will be relatively stable; and this expectation
enhances money's liquidity-premium and prevents the exceptional correlation between
the money-rate of interest and the marginal efficiencies of other assets which might, if it
could exist, rob the money-rate of interest of its sting.

Professor Pigou (with others) has been accustomed to assume that there is a presumption
in favour of real wages being more stable than money-wages. But this could only be the
case if there were a presumption in favour of stability of employment. Moreover, there is
also the difficulty that wage-goods have a high carrying-cost. If, indeed, some attempt
were made to stabilise real wages by fixing wages in terms of wage-goods, the effect
could only be to cause a violent oscillation of money-prices. For every small fluctuation
in the propensity to consume and the inducement to invest would cause money-prices to
rush violently between zero and infinity. That money-wages should be more stable than
real wages is a condition of the system possessing inherent stability. Thus the attribution
of relative stability to real wages is not merely a mistake in fact and experience. It is also
a mistake in logic, if we are supposing that the system in view is stable, in the sense that
small changes in the propensity to consume and the inducement to invest do not produce
violent effects on prices.

As a footnote to the above, it may be worth emphasising what has been already stated
above, namely, that 'liquidity' and 'carrying-costs' are both a matter of degree; and that it
is only in having the former high relatively to the latter that the peculiarity of 'money'
consists.

Consider, for example, an economy in which there is no asset for which the liquidity-
premium is always in excess of the carrying-costs; which is the best definition I can give
of a so-called 'non-monetary' economy. There exists nothing, that is to say, but particular
consumables and particular capital equipments more or less differentiated according to
the character of the consumables which they can yield up, or assist to yield up, over a
greater or a shorter period of time; all of which, unlike cash, deteriorate or involve
expense, if they are kept in stock, to a value in excess of any liquidity-premium which
may attach to them.

In such an economy capital equipments will differ from one another (a) in the variety of
the consumables in the production of which they are capable of assisting, (b) in the
stability of value of their output (in the sense in which the value of bread is more stable
through time than the value of fashionable novelties), and (c) in the rapidity with which
the wealth embodied in them can become 'liquid', in the sense of producing output, the
proceeds of which can be re-embodied if desired in quite a different form.

The owners of wealth will then weigh the lack of 'liquidity' of different capital
equipments in the above sense as a medium in which to hold wealth against the best
available actuarial estimate of their prospective yields after allowing for risk. The
liquidity-premium, it will be observed, is partly similar to the risk-premium, but partly
different;the difference corresponding to the difference between the best estimates we
can make of probabilities and the confidence with which we make them[7]. When we were
dealing, in earlier chapters, with the estimation of prospective yield, we did not enter into
detail as to how the estimation is made: and to avoid complicating the argument, we did
not distinguish differences in liquidity from differences in risk proper. It is evident,
however, that in calculating the own-rate of interest we must allow for both.

There is, clearly, no absolute standard of 'liquidity' but merely a scale of liquiditya
varying premium of which account has to be taken, in addition to the yield of use and the
carrying-costs, in estimating the comparative attractions of holding different forms of
wealth. The conception of what contributes to 'liquidity' is a partly vague one, changing
from time to time and depending on social practices and institutions. The order of
preference in the minds of owners of wealth in which at any given time they express their
feelings about liquidity is, however, definite and is all we require for our analysis of the
behaviour of the economic system.
It may be that in certain historic environments the possession of land has been
characterised by a high liquidity-premium in the minds of owners of wealth; and since
land resembles money in that its elasticities of production and substitution may be very
low[8], it is conceivable that there have been occasions in history in which the desire to
hold land has played the same role in keeping up the rate of interest at too high a level
which money has played in recent times. It is difficult to trace this influence
quantitatively owing to the absence of a forward price for land in terms of itself which is
strictly comparable with the rate of interest on a money debt. We have, however,
something which has, at times, been closely analogous, in the shape of high rates of
interest on mortgages[9]. The high rates of interest from mortgages on land, often
exceeding the probable net yield from cultivating the land, have been a familiar feature of
many agricultural economies. Usury laws have been directed primarily against
encumbrances of this character. And rightly so. For in earlier social organisation where
long-term bonds in the modern sense were non-existent, the competition of a high
interest-rate on mortgages may well have had the same effect in retarding the growth of
wealth from current investment in newly produced capital-assets, as high interest rates on
long-term debts have had in more recent times.

That the world after several millennia of steady individual saving, is so poor as it is in
accumulated capital-assets, is to be explained, in my opinion, neither by the improvident
propensities of mankind, nor even by the destruction of war, but by the high liquidity-
premiums formerly attaching to the ownership of land and now attaching to money. I
differ in this from the older view as expressed by Marshall with an unusual dogmatic
force in his Principles of Economics, p. 581:

Everyone is aware that the accumulation of wealth is held in check, and

the rate of interest so far sustained, by the preference which the great mass
of humanity have for present over deferred gratifications, or, in other
words, by their unwillingness to 'wait'.

VI

In my Treatise on Money I defined what purported to be a unique rate of interest, which I

called the natural rate of interestnamely, the rate of interest which, in the terminology
of my Treatise, preserved equality between the rate of saving (as there defined) and the
rate of investment. I believed this to be a development and clarification of Wicksell's
'natural rate of interest', which was, according to him, the rate which would preserve the
stability of some, not quite clearly specified, price-level.

I had, however, overlooked the fact that in any given society there is, on this definition, a
different natural rate of interest for each hypothetical level of employment. And, similarly,
for every rate of interest there is a level of employment for which that rate is the 'natural'
rate, in the sense that the system will be in equilibrium with that rate of interest and that
level of employment. Thus it was a mistake to speak of the natural rate of interest or to
suggest that the above definition would yield a unique value for the rate of interest
irrespective of the level of employment. I had not then understood that, in certain
conditions, the system could be in equilibrium with less than full employment.

I am now no longer of the opinion that the concept of a 'natural' rate of interest, which
previously seemed to me a most promising idea, has anything very useful or significant to
contribute to our analysis. It is merely the rate of interest which will preserve the status
quo; and, in general, we have no predominant interest in the status quo as such.

If there is any such rate of interest, which is unique and significant, it must be the rate
which we might term the neutral rate of interest[10], namely, the natural rate in the above
sense which is consistent with full employment, given the other parameters of the system;
though this rate might be better described, perhaps, as the optimum rate.

The neutral rate of interest can be more strictly defined as the rate of interest which
prevails in equilibrium when output and employment are such that the elasticity of
employment as a whole is zero[11].

The above gives us, once again, the answer to the question as to what tacit assumption is
required to make sense of the classical theory of the rate of interest. This theory assumes
either that the actual rate of interest is always equal to the neutral rate of interest in the
sense in which we have just defined the latter, or alternatively that the actual rate of
interest is always equal to the rate of interest which will maintain employment at some
specified constant level. If the traditional theory is thus interpreted, there is little or
nothing in its practical conclusions to which we need take exception. The classical theory
assumes that the banking authority or natural forces cause the market-rate of interest to
satisfy one or other of the above conditions; and it investigates what laws will govern the
application and rewards of the community's productive resources subject to this
assumption. With this limitation in force, the volume of output depends solely on the
assumed constant level of employment in conjunction with the current equipment and
technique; and we are safely ensconced in a Ricardian world.

1. This relationship was first pointed out by Mr. Sraffa, Economic Journal, March 1932, p. 50.

2. See Chapter 20.

3. This is a matter which will be examined in greater detail in Chapter 19 below.

4. If wages (and contracts) were fixed in terms of wheat, it might be that wheat would acquire some
of moneys liquidity-premium; we will return to this question in (IV) below.

5. See p. 172 above.

6. A zero elasticity is a more stringent condition than is necessarily required.

7. Cf. the footnote to p. 148 above.

8. The attribute of liquidity is by no means independent of the presence of these two characteristics.
For it is unlikely that an asset, of which the supply can be easily increased or the desire for which
 can be easily diverted by a change in relative price, will possess the attribute of liquidity in the
minds of owners of wealth. Money itself rapidly loses the attribute of liquidity if its future
supply is expected to undergo sharp changes.

9. A mortgage and the interest thereon are, indeed, fixed in terms of money. But the fact that the
mortgagor has the option to deliver the land itself in discharge of the debt and must so deliver it
if he cannot find the money on demand has sometimes made the mortgage system approximate
to a contract of land for future delivery against land for spot delivery. There have been sales of
lands to tenants against mortgages effected by them, which, in fact, came very near to being
transactions of this character.

10. This definition does not correspond to any of the various definitions of neutral money given by
recent writers; though it may, perhaps, have some relation to the objective which these writers
have had in mind.

11. Cf. Chapter 20 below.

Chapter 18

THE GENERAL THEORY OF EMPLOYMENT RE-STATED

We have now reached a point where we can gather together the threads of our argument.
To begin with, it may be useful to make clear which elements in the economic system we
usually take as given, which are the independent variables of our system and which are
the dependent variables.

We take as given the existing skill and quantity of available labour, the existing quality
and quantity of available equipment, the existing technique, the degree of competition,
the tastes and habits of the consumer, the disutility of different intensities of labour and of
the activities of supervision and organisation, as well as the social structure including the
forces, other than our variables set forth below, which determine the distribution of the
national income. This does not mean that we assume these factors to be constant; but
merely that, in this place and context, we are not considering or taking into account the
effects and consequences of changes in them.

Our independent variables are, in the first instance, the propensity to consume, the
schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital and the rate of interest, though, as we have
already seen, these are capable of further analysis.

Our dependent variables are the volume of employment and the national income (or
national dividend) measured in wage-units.

The factors, which we have taken as given, influence our independent variables, but do
not completely determine them. For example, the schedule of the marginal efficiency of
capital depends partly on the existing quantity of equipment which is one of the given
factors, but partly on the state of long-term expectation which cannot be inferred from the
given factors. But there are certain other elements which the given factors determine so
completely that we can treat these derivatives as being themselves given. For example,
the given factors allow us to infer what level of national income measured in terms of the
wage-unit will correspond to any given level of employment; so that, within the
economic framework which we take as given, the national income depends on the volume
of employment, i.e. on the quantity of effort currently devoted to production, in the sense
that there is a unique correlation between the two[1]. Furthermore, they allow us to infer
the shape of the aggregate supply functions, which embody the physical conditions of
supply, for different types of products;that is to say, the quantity of employment which
will be devoted to production corresponding to any given level of effective demand
measured in terms of wage-units. Finally, they furnish us with the supply function of
labour (or effort); so that they tell us inter alia at what point the employment function[2]
for labour as a whole will cease to be elastic.
The schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital depends, however, partly on the given
factors and partly on the prospective yield of capital-assets of different kinds; whilst the
rate of interest depends partly on the state of liquidity-preference (i.e. on the liquidity
function) and partly on the quantity of money measured in terms of wage-units. Thus we
can sometimes regard our ultimate independent variables as consisting of (i) the three
fundamental psychological factors, namely, the psychological propensity to consume, the
psychological attitude to liquidity and the psychological expectation of future yield from
capital-assets, (2) the wage-unit as determined by the bargains reached between
employers and employed, and (3) the quantity of money as determined by the action of
the central bank; so that, if we take as given the factors specified above, these variables
determine the national income (or dividend) and the quantity of employment. But these
again would be capable of being subjected to further analysis, and are not, so to speak,
our ultimate atomic independent elements.

The division of the determinants of the economic system into the two groups of given
factors and independent variables is, of course, quite arbitrary from any absolute
standpoint. The division must be made entirely on the basis of experience, so as to
correspond on the one hand to the factors in which the changes seem to be so slow or so
little relevant as to have only a small and comparatively negligible short-term influence
on our quaesitum; and on the other hand to those factors in which the changes are found
in practice to exercise a dominant influence on our quaesitum. Our present object is to
discover what determines at any time the national income of a given economic system
and (which is almost the same thing) the amount of its employment; which means in a
study so complex as economics, in which we cannot hope to make completely accurate
generalisations, the factors whose changes mainly determine our quaesitum. Our final
task might be to select those variables which can be deliberately controlled or managed
by central authority in the kind of system in which we actually live.

II

Let us now attempt to summarise the argument of the previous chapters; taking the
factors in the reverse order to that in which we have introduced them.

There will be an inducement to push the rate of new investment to the point which forces
the supply-price of each type of capital-asset to a figure which, taken in conjunction with
its prospective yield, brings the marginal efficiency of capital in general to approximate
equality with the rate of interest. That is to say, the physical conditions of supply in the
capital-goods industries, the state of confidence concerning the prospective yield, the
psychological attitude to liquidity and the quantity of money (preferably calculated in
terms of wage-units) determine, between them, the rate of new investment.

But an increase (or decrease) in the rate of investment will have to carry with it an
increase (or decrease) in the rate of consumption; because the behaviour of the public is,
in general, of such a character that they are only willing to widen (or narrow) the gap
between their income and their consumption if their income is being increased (or
diminished). That is to say, changes in the rate of consumption are, in general, in the
same direction (though smaller in amount) as changes in the rate of income. The relation
between the increment of consumption which has to accompany a given increment of
saving is given by the marginal propensity to consume. The ratio, thus determined,
between an increment of investment and the corresponding increment of aggregate
income, both measured in wage-units, is given by the investment multiplier.

Finally, if we assume (as a first approximation) that the employment multiplier is equal to
the investment multiplier, we can, by applying the multiplier to the increment (or
decrement) in the rate of investment brought about by the factors first described, infer the
increment of employment.

An increment (or decrement) of employment is liable, however, to raise (or lower) the
schedule of liquidity-preference; there being three ways in which it will tend to increase
the demand for money, inasmuch as the value of output will rise when employment
increases even if the wage-unit and prices (in terms of the wage-unit) are unchanged, but,
in addition, the wage-unit itself will tend to rise as employment improves, and the
increase in output will be accompanied by a rise of prices (in terms of the wage-unit)
owing to increasing cost in the short period.

Thus the position of equilibrium will be influenced by these repercussions; and there are
other repercussions also. Moreover, there is not one of the above factors which is not
liable to change without much warning, and sometimes substantially. Hence the extreme
complexity of the actual course of events. Nevertheless, these seem to be the factors
which it is useful and convenient to isolate. If we examine any actual problem along the
lines of the above schematism, we shall find it more manageable; and our practical
intuition (which can take account of a more detailed complex of facts than can be treated
on general principles) will be offered a less intractable material upon which to work.

III

The above is a summary of the General Theory. But the actual phenomena of the
economic system are also coloured by certain special characteristics of the propensity to
consume, the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital and the rate of interest, about
which we can safely generalise from experience, but which are not logically necessary.

In particular, it is an outstanding characteristic of the economic system in which we live

that, whilst it is subject to severe fluctuations in respect of output and employment, it is
not violently unstable. Indeed it seems capable of remaining in a chronic condition of
subnormal activity for a considerable period without any marked tendency either towards
recovery or towards complete collapse. Moreover, the evidence indicates that full, or
even approximately full, employment is of rare and short-lived occurrence. Fluctuations
may start briskly but seem to wear themselves out before they have proceeded to great
extremes, and an intermediate situation which is neither desperate nor satisfactory is our
normal lot. It is upon the fact that fluctuations tend to wear themselves out before
proceeding to extremes and eventually to reverse themselves, that the theory of business
cycles having a regular phase has been founded. The same thing is true of prices, which;
in response to an initiating cause of disturbance, seem to be able to find a level at which
they can remain, for the time being, moderately stable.

Now, since these facts of experience do not follow of logical necessity, one must suppose
that the environment and the psychological propensities of the modern world must be of
such a character as to produce these results. It is, therefore, useful to consider what
hypothetical psychological propensities would lead to a stable system; and, then, whether
these propensities can be plausibly ascribed, on our general knowledge of contemporary
human nature, to the world in which we live.

The conditions of stability which the foregoing analysis suggests to us as capable of

explaining the observed results are the following:

(i) The marginal propensity to consume is such that, when the output of a given
community increases (or decreases) because more (or less) employment is being applied
to its capital equipment, the multiplier relating the two is greater than unity but not very
large.

(ii) When there is a change in the prospective yield of capital or in the rate of interest, the
schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital will be such that the change in new
investment will not be in great disproportion to the change in the former; i.e. moderate
changes in the prospective yield of capital or in the rate of interest will not be associated
with very great changes in the rate of investment.

(iii) When there is a change in employment, money-wages tend to change in the same
direction as, but not in great disproportion to, the change in employment; i.e. moderate
changes in employment are not associated with very great changes in money-wages. This
is a condition of the stability of prices rather than of employment.

(iv) We may add a fourth condition, which provides not so much for the stability of the
system as for the tendency of a fluctuation in one direction to reverse itself in due course;
namely, that a rate of investment, higher (or lower) than prevailed formerly, begins to
react unfavourably (or favourably) on the marginal efficiency of capital if it is continued
for a period which, measured in years, is not very large.

(i) Our first condition of stability, namely, that the multiplier, whilst greater than unity, is
not very great, is highly plausible as a psychological characteristic of human nature. As
real income increases, both the pressure of present needs diminishes and the margin over
the established standard of life is increased; and as real income diminishes the opposite is
true. Thus it is naturalat any rate on the average of the communitythat current
consumption should be expanded when employment increases, but by less than the full
increment of real income; and that it should be diminished when employment diminishes,
but by less than the full decrement of real income. Moreover, what is true of the average
of individuals is likely to be also true of governments, especially in an age when a
progressive increase of unemployment will usually force the State to provide relief out of
borrowed funds.
But whether or not this psychological law strikes the reader as plausible a priori, it is
certain that experience would be extremely different from what it is if the law did not
hold. For in that case an increase of investment, however small, would set moving a
cumulative increase of effective demand until a position of full employment had been
reached; while a decrease of investment would set moving a cumulative decrease of
effective demand until no one at all was employed. Yet experience shows that we are
generally in an intermediate position. It is not impossible that there may be a range within
which instability does in fact prevail. But, if so, it is probably a narrow one, outside of
which in either direction our psychological law must unquestionably hold good.
Furthermore, it is also evident that the multiplier, though exceeding unity, is not, in
normal circumstances, enormously large. For, if it were, a given change in the rate of
investment would involve a great change (limited only by full or zero employment) in the
rate of consumption.

(ii) Whilst our first condition provides that a moderate change in the rate of investment
will not involve an indefinitely great change in the demand for consumption-goods our
second condition provides that a moderate change in the prospective yield of capital-
assets or in the rate of interest will not involve an indefinitely great change in the rate of
investment. This is likely to be the case owing to the increasing cost of producing a
greatly enlarged Output from the existing equipment. If, indeed, we start from a position
where there are very large surplus resources for the production of capital-assets, there
may be considerable instability within a certain range; but this will cease to hold good as
soon as the surplus is being largely utilised. Moreover, this condition sets a limit to the
instability resulting from rapid changes in the prospective yield of capital-assets due to
sharp fluctuations in business psychology or to epoch-making inventionsthough more,
perhaps, in the upward than in the downward direction.

(iii) Our third condition accords with our experience of human nature. For although the
struggle for money-wages is, as we have pointed out above, essentially a struggle to
maintain a high relative wage, this struggle is likely, as employment increases, to be
intensified in each individual case both because the bargaining position of the worker is
improved and because the diminished marginal utility of his wage and his improved
financial margin make him readier to run risks. Yet, all the same, these motives will
operate within limits, and workers will not seek a much greater money-wage when
employment improves or allow a very great reduction rather than suffer any
unemployment at all.

But here again, whether or not this conclusion is plausible a priori, experience shows that
some such psychological law must actually hold. For if competition between unemployed
workers always led to a very great reduction of the money-wage, there would be a violent
instability in the price-level. Moreover, there might be no position of stable equilibrium
except in conditions consistent with full employment; since the wage-unit might have to
fall without limit until it reached a point where the effect of the abundance of money in
terms of the wage-unit on the rate of interest was sufficient to restore a level of full
employment. At no other point could there be a resting-place[3].
(iv) Our fourth condition, which is a condition not so much of stability as of alternate
recession and recovery, is merely based on the presumption that capital-assets are of
various ages, wear out with time and are not all very long-lived; so that if the rate of
investment falls below a certain minimum level, it is merely a question of time (failing
large fluctuations in other factors) before the marginal efficiency of capital rises
sufficiently to bring about a recovery of investment above this minimum. And similarly,
of course, if investment rises to a higher figure than formerly, it is only a question of time
before the marginal efficiency of capital falls sufficiently to bring about a recession
unless there are compensating changes in other factors.

For this reason, even those degrees of recovery and recession, which can occur within the
limitations set by our other conditions of stability, will be likely, if they persist for a
sufficient length of time and are not interfered with by changes in the other factors, to
cause a reverse movement in the opposite direction, until the same forces as before again
reverse the direction.

Thus our four conditions together are adequate to explain the outstanding features of our
actual experience;namely, that we oscillate, avoiding the gravest extremes of
fluctuation in employment and in prices in both directions, round an intermediate position
appreciably below full employment and appreciably above the minimum employment a
decline below which would endanger life.

But we must not conclude that the mean position thus determined by 'natural' tendencies,
namely, by those tendencies which are likely to persist, failing measures expressly
designed to correct them, is, therefore, established by laws of necessity. The unimpeded
rule of the above conditions is a fact of observation concerning the world as it is or has
been, and not a necessary principle which cannot be changed.

1. We are ignoring at this stage certain complications which arise when the employment functions of
different products have different curvatures within the relevant range of employment. See
Chapter 20 below.

2. Defined in Chapter 20 below.

3. The effects of changes in the wage-unit will be considered in detail in Chapter 19.
Chapter 19

CHANGES IN MONEY-WAGES

It would have been an advantage if the effects of a change in money-wages could have
been discussed in an earlier chapter. For the classical theory has been accustomed to rest
the supposedly self-adjusting character of the economic system on an assumed fluidity of
money-wages; and, when there is rigidity, to lay on this rigidity the blame of
maladjustment.

It was not possible, however, to discuss this matter fully until our own theory had been
developed. For the consequences of a change in money-wages are complicated. A
reduction in money-wages is quite capable in certain circumstances of affording a
stimulus to output, as the classical theory supposes. My difference from this theory is
primarily a difference of analysis; so that it could not be set forth clearly until the reader
was acquainted with my own method.

The generally accepted explanation is, as I understand it, quite a simple one. It does not
depend on roundabout repercussions, such as we shall discuss below. The argument
simply is that a reduction in money-wages will cet. par. stimulate demand by diminishing
the price of the finished product, and will therefore increase output and employment up to
the point where the reduction which labour has agreed to accept in its money-wages is
just offset by the diminishing marginal efficiency of labour as output (from a given
equipment) is increased.

In its crudest form, this is tantamount to assuming that the reduction in money-wages will
leave demand unaffected. There may be some economists who would maintain that there
is no reason why demand should be affected, arguing that aggregate demand depends on
the quantity of money multiplied by the income-velocity of money and that there is no
obvious reason why a reduction in money-wages would reduce either the quantity of
money or its income-velocity. Or they may even argue that profits will necessarily go up
because wages have gone down. But it would, I think, be more usual to agree that the
reduction in money-wages may have some effect on aggregate demand through its
reducing the purchasing power of some of the workers, but that the real demand of other
factors, whose money incomes have not been reduced, will be stimulated by the fall in
prices, and that the aggregate demand of the workers themselves will be very likely
increased as a result of the increased volume of employment, unless the elasticity of
demand for labour in response to changes in money-wages is less than unity. Thus in the
new equilibrium there will be more employment than there would have been otherwise
except, perhaps, in some unusual limiting case which has no reality in practice.
It is from this type of analysis that I fundamentally differ; or rather from the analysis
which seems to lie behind such observations as the above. For whilst the above fairly
represents, I think, the way in which many economists talk and write, the underlying
analysis has seldom been written down in detail.

It appears, however, that this way of thinking is probably reached as follows. In any
given industry we have a demand schedule for the product relating the quantities which
can be sold to the prices asked; we have a series of supply schedules relating the prices
which will be asked for the sale of different quantities on various bases of cost; and these
schedules between them lead up to a further schedule which, on the assumption that other
costs are unchanged (except as a result of the change in output), gives us the demand
schedule for labour in the industry relating the quantity of employment to different levels
of wages, the shape of the curve at any point furnishing the elasticity of demand for
labour. This conception is then transferred without substantial modification to industry as
a whole; and it is supposed, by a parity of reasoning, that we have a demand schedule for
labour in industry as a whole relating the quantity of employment to different levels of
wages. It is held that it makes no material difference to this argument whether it is in
terms of money-wages or of real wages. If we are thinking in terms of money-wages, we
must, of course, correct for changes in the value of money; but this leaves the general
tendency of the argument unchanged, since prices certainly do not change in exact
proportion to changes in money-wages.

If this is the groundwork of the argument (and, if it is not, I do not know what the
groundwork is), surely it is fallacious. For the demand schedules for particular industries
can only be constructed on some fixed assumption as to the nature of the demand and
supply schedules of other industries and as to the amount of the aggregate effective
demand. It is invalid, therefore, to transfer the argument to industry as a whole unless we
also transfer our assumption that the aggregate effective demand is fixed. Yet this
assumption reduces the argument to an ignoratio elenchi. For, whilst no one would wish
to deny the proposition that a reduction in money-wages accompanied by the same
aggregate effective demand as before will be associated with an increase in employment,
the precise question at issue is whether the reduction in money-wages will or will not be
accompanied by the same aggregate effective demand as before measured in money, or,
at any rate, by an aggregate effective demand which is not reduced in full proportion to
the reduction in money-wages (i.e. which is somewhat greater measured in wage-units).
But if the classical theory is not allowed to extend by analogy its conclusions in respect
of a particular industry to industry as a whole, it is wholly unable to answer the question
what effect on employment a reduction in money-wages will have. For it has no method
of analysis wherewith to tackle the problem. Professor Pigou's Theory of Unemployment
seems to me to get out of the classical theory all that can be got out of it; with the result
that the book becomes a striking demonstration that this theory has nothing to offer, when
it is applied to the problem of what determines the volume of actual employment as a
whole[1].
II

Let us, then, apply our own method of analysis to answering the problem. It falls into two
parts. (i) Does a reduction in money-wages have a direct tendency, cet. par., to increase
employment, 'cet. par.' being taken to mean that the propensity to consume, the schedule
of the marginal efficiency of capital and the rate of interest are the same as before for the
community as a whole? And (2) does a reduction in money-wages have a certain or
probable tendency to affect employment in a particular direction through its certain or
probable repercussions on these three factors?

The first question we have already answered in the negative in the preceding chapters.
For we have shown that the volume of employment is uniquely correlated with the
volume of effective demand measured in wage-units, and that the effective demand,
being the sum of the expected consumption and the expected investment, cannot change,
if the propensity to consume, the schedule of marginal efficiency of capital and the rate of
interest are all unchanged. If, without any change in these factors, the entrepreneurs were
to increase employment as a whole, their proceeds will necessarily fall short of their
supply-price.

Perhaps it will help to rebut the crude conclusion that a reduction in money-wages will
increase employment 'because it reduces the cost of production', if we follow up the
course of events on the hypothesis most favourable to this view, namely that at the outset
entrepreneurs expect the reduction in money-wages to have this effect. It is indeed not
unlikely that the individual entrepreneur, seeing his own costs reduced, will overlook at
the outset the repercussions on the demand for his product and will act on the assumption
that he will be able to sell at a profit a larger output than before. If, then, entrepreneurs
generally act on this expectation, will they in fact succeed in increasing their profits?
Only if the community's marginal propensity to consume is equal to unity, so that there is
no gap between the increment of income and the increment of consumption; or if there is
an increase in investment, corresponding to the gap between the increment of income and
the increment of consumption, which will only occur if the schedule of marginal
efficiencies of capital has increased relatively to the rate of interest. Thus the proceeds
realised from the increased output will disappoint the entrepreneurs and employment will
fall back again to its previous figure, unless the marginal propensity to consume is equal
to unity or the reduction in money-wages has had the effect of increasing the schedule of
marginal efficiencies of capital relatively to the rate of interest and hence the amount of
investment. For if entrepreneurs offer employment on a scale which, if they could sell
their output at the expected price, would provide the public with incomes out of which
they would save more than the amount of current investment, entrepreneurs are bound to
make a loss equal to the difference; and this will be the case absolutely irrespective of the
level of money-wages. At the best, the date of their disappointment can only be delayed
for the interval during which their own investment in increased working capital is filling
the gap.

Thus the reduction in money-wages will have no lasting tendency to increase

employment except by virtue of its repercussion either on the propensity to consume for
the community as a whole, or on the schedule of marginal efficiencies of capital, or on
the rate of interest. There is no method of analysing the effect of a reduction in money-
wages, except by following up its possible effects on these three factors.

The most important repercussions on these factors are likely, in practice, to be the
following:

(1) A reduction of money-wages will somewhat reduce prices. It will, therefore, involve
some redistribution of real income (a) from wage-earners to other factors entering into
marginal prime cost whose remuneration has not been reduced, and (b) from
entrepreneurs to rentiers to whom a certain income fixed in terms of money has been
guaranteed.

What will be the effect of this redistribution on the propensity to consume for the
community as a whole? The transfer from wage-earners to other factors is likely to
diminish the propensity to consume. The effect of the transfer from entrepreneurs to
rentiers is more open to doubt. But if rentiers represent on the whole the richer section of
the community and those whose standard of life is least flexible, then the effect of this
also will be unfavourable. What the net result will be on a balance of considerations, we
can only guess. Probably it is more likely to be adverse than favourable.

(2) If we are dealing with an unclosed system, and the reduction of money-wages is a
reduction relatively to money-wages abroad when both are reduced to a common unit, it
is evident that the change will be favourable to investment, since it will tend to increase
the balance of trade. This assumes, of course, that the advantage is not offset by a change
in tariffs, quotas, etc. The greater strength of the traditional belief in the efficacy of a
reduction in money-wages as a means of increasing employment in Great Britain, as
compared with the United States, is probably attributable to the latter being,
comparatively with ourselves, a closed system.

(3) In the case of an unclosed system, a reduction of money-wages, though it increases

the favourable balance of trade, is likely to worsen the terms of trade. Thus there will be a
reduction in real incomes, except in the case of the newly employed, which may tend to
increase the propensity to consume.

(4) If the reduction of money-wages is expected to be a reduction relatively to money-

wages in the future, the change will be favourable to investment, because as we have seen
above, it will increase the marginal efficiency of capital; whilst for the same reason it
may be favourable to consumption. If, on the other hand, the reduction leads to the
expectation, or even to the serious possibility, of a further wage-reduction in prospect, it
will have precisely the opposite effect. For it will diminish the marginal efficiency of
capital and will lead to the postponement both of investment and of consumption.

(5) The reduction in the wages-bill, accompanied by some reduction in prices and in
money-incomes generally, will diminish the need for cash for income and business
purposes; and it will therefore reduce pro tanto the schedule of liquidity-preference for
the community as a whole. Cet. par. this will reduce the rate of interest and thus prove
favourable to investment. In this case, however, the effect of expectation concerning the
future will be of an opposite tendency to those just considered under (4). For, if wages
and prices are expected to rise again later on, the favourable reaction will be much less
pronounced in the case of long-term loans than in that of short-term loans. If, moreover,
the reduction in wages disturbs political confidence by causing popular discontent, the
increase in liquidity-preference due to this cause may more than offset the release of cash
from the active circulation.

(6) Since a special reduction of money-wages is always advantageous to an individual

entrepreneur or industry, a general reduction (though its actual effects are different) may
also produce an optimistic tone in the minds of entrepreneurs, which may break through a
vicious circle of unduly pessimistic estimates of the marginal efficiency of capital and set
things moving again on a more normal basis of expectation. On the other hand, if the
workers make the same mistake as their employers about the effects of a general
reduction, labour troubles may offset this favourable factor; apart from which, since there
is, as a rule, no means of securing a simultaneous and equal reduction of money-wages in
all industries, it is in the interest of all workers to resist a reduction in their own particular
case. In fact, a movement by employers to revise money-wage bargains downward will
be much more strongly resisted than a gradual and automatic lowering of real wages as a
result of rising prices.

(7) On the other hand, the depressing influence on entrepreneurs of their greater burden
of debt may partly offset any cheerful reactions from the reduction of wages. Indeed if
the fall of wages and prices goes far, the embarrassment of those entrepreneurs who are
heavily indebted may soon reach the point of insolvency,with severely adverse effects
on investment. Moreover the effect of the lower price-level on the real burden of the
national debt and hence on taxation is likely to prove very adverse to business confidence.

This is not a complete catalogue of all the possible reactions of wage reductions in the
complex real world. But the above cover, I think, those which are usually the most
important.

If, therefore, we restrict our argument to the case of a closed system, and assume that
there is nothing to be hoped, but if anything the contrary, from the repercussions of the
new distribution of real incomes on the community's propensity to spend, it follows that
we must base any hopes of favourable results to employment from a reduction in money-
wages mainly on an improvement in investment due either to an increased marginal
efficiency of capital under (4) or a decreased rate of interest under (5). Let us consider
these two possibilities in further detail.

The contingency, which is favourable to an increase in the marginal efficiency of capital,

is that in which money-wages are believed to have touched bottom, so that further
changes are expected to be in the upward direction. The most unfavourable contingency
is that in which money-wages are slowly sagging downwards and each reduction in
wages serves to diminish confidence in the prospective maintenance of wages. When we
enter on a period of weakening effective demand, a sudden large reduction of money-
wages to a level so low that no one believes in its indefinite continuance would be the
event most favourable to a strengthening of effective demand. But this could only be
accomplished by administrative decree and is scarcely practical politics under a system of
free wage-bargaining. On the other hand, it would be much better that wages should be
rigidly fixed and deemed incapable of material changes, than that depressions should be
accompanied by a gradual downward tendency of money-wages, a further moderate wage
reduction being expected to signalise each increase of; say, 1 per cent in the amount of
unemployment. For example, the effect of an expectation that wages are going to sag by,
say, 2 per cent in the coming year will be roughly equivalent to the effect of a rise of 2
per cent in the amount of interest payable for the same period. The same observations
apply mutatis mutandis to the case of a boom.

It follows that with the actual practices and institutions of the contemporary world it is
more expedient to aim at a rigid money-wage policy than at a flexible policy responding
by easy stages to changes in the amount of unemployment;so far, that is to say, as the
marginal efficiency of capital is concerned. But is this conclusion upset when we turn to
the rate of interest?

It is, therefore, on the effect of a falling wage- and price-level on the demand for money
that those who believe in the self-adjusting quality of the economic system must rest the
weight of their argument; though I am not aware that they have done so. If the quantity of
money is itself a function of the wage- and price-level, there is indeed, nothing to hope in
this direction. But if the quantity of money is virtually fixed, it is evident that its quantity
in terms of wage-units can be indefinitely increased by a sufficient reduction in money-
wages; and that its quantity in proportion to incomes generally can be largely increased,
the limit to this increase depending on the proportion of wage-cost to marginal prime cost
and on the response of other elements of marginal prime cost to the falling wage-unit.

We can, therefore, theoretically at least, produce precisely the same effects on the rate of
interest by reducing wages, whilst leaving the quantity of money unchanged, that we can
produce by increasing the quantity of money whilst leaving the level of wages unchanged.
It follows that wage reductions, as a method of securing full employment, are also subject
to the same limitations as the method of increasing the quantity of money. The same
reasons as those mentioned above, which limit the efficacy of increases in the quantity of
money as a means of increasing investment to the optimum figure, apply mutatis
mutandis to wage reductions. Just as a moderate increase in the quantity of money may
exert an inadequate influence over the long-term rate of interest, whilst an immoderate
increase may offset its other advantages by its disturbing effect on confidence; so a
moderate reduction in money-wages may prove inadequate, whilst an immoderate
reduction might shatter confidence even if it were practicable.

There is, therefore, no ground for the belief that a flexible wage policy is capable of
maintaining a state of continuous full employment;any more than for the belief that an
open-market monetary policy is capable, unaided, of achieving this result. The economic
system cannot be made self-adjusting along these lines.
If, indeed, labour were always in a position to take action (and were to do so), whenever
there was less than full employment, to reduce its money demands by concerted action to
whatever point was required to make money so abundant relatively to the wage-unit that
the rate of interest would fall to a level compatible with full employment, we should, in
effect, have monetary management by the trade unions, aimed at full employment,
instead of by the banking system.

Nevertheless while a flexible wage policy and a flexible money policy come, analytically,
to the same thing, inasmuch as they are alternative means of changing the quantity of
money in terms of wage-units, in other respects there is, of course, a world of difference
between them. Let me briefly recall to the reader's mind the four outstanding
considerations.

(i) Except in a socialised community where wage-policy is settled by decree, there is no

means of securing uniform wage reductions for every class of labour. The result can only
be brought about by a series of gradual, irregular changes, justifiable on no criterion of
social justice or economic expedience, and probably completed only after wasteful and
disastrous struggles, where those in the weakest bargaining position will suffer relatively
to the rest. A change in the quantity of money, on the other hand, is already within the
power of most governments by open-market policy or analogous measures. Having
regard to human nature and our institutions, it can only be a foolish person who would
prefer a flexible wage policy to a flexible money policy, unless he can point to
advantages from the former which are not obtainable from the latter. Moreover, other
things being equal, a method which it is comparatively easy to apply should be deemed
preferable to a method which is probably so difficult as to be impracticable.

(ii) If money-wages are inflexible, such changes in prices as occur (i.e. apart from
'administered' or monopoly prices which are determined by other considerations besides
marginal cost) will mainly correspond to the diminishing marginal productivity of the
existing equipment as the output from it is increased. Thus the greatest practicable
fairness will be maintained between labour and the factors whose remuneration is
contractually fixed in terms of money, in particular the rentier class and persons with
fixed salaries on the permanent establishment of a firm, an institution or the State. If
important classes are to have their remuneration fixed in terms of money in any case,
social justice and social expediency are best served if the remunerations of all factors are
somewhat inflexible in terms of money. Having regard to the large groups of incomes
which are comparatively inflexible in terms of money, it can only be an unjust person
who would prefer a flexible wage policy to a flexible money policy, unless he can point
to advantages from the former which are not obtainable from the latter.

(iii) The method of increasing the quantity of money in terms of wage-units by

decreasing the wage-unit increases proportionately the burden of debt; whereas the
method of producing the same result by increasing the quantity of money whilst leaving
the wage-unit unchanged has the opposite effect. Having regard to the excessive burden
of many types of debt, it can only be an inexperienced person who would prefer the
former.
(iv) If a sagging rate of interest has to be brought about by a sagging wage-level, there is,
for the reasons given above, a double drag on the marginal efficiency of capital and a
double reason for putting off investment and thus postponing recovery.

III

It follows, therefore, that if labour were to respond to conditions of gradually diminishing

employment by offering its services at a gradually diminishing money-wage, this would
not, as a rule, have the effect of reducing real wages and might even have the effect of
increasing them, through its adverse influence on the volume of output. The chief result
of this policy would be to cause a great instability of prices, so violent perhaps as to make
business calculations futile in an economic society functioning after the manner of that in
which we live. To suppose that a flexible wage policy is a right and proper adjunct of a
system which on the whole is one of laissez-faire, is the opposite of the truth. It is only in
a highly authoritarian society, where sudden, substantial, all-round changes could be
decreed that a flexible wage policy could function with success. One can imagine it in
operation in Italy, Germany or Russia, but not in France, the United States or Great
Britain.

If, as in Australia, an attempt were made to fix real wages by legislation, then there
would be a certain level of employment corresponding to that level of real wages; and the
actual level of employment would, in a closed system, oscillate violently between that
level and no employment at all, according as the rate of investment was or was not below
the rate compatible with that level; whilst prices would be in unstable equilibrium when
investment was at the critical level, racing to zero whenever investment was below it, and
to infinity whenever it was above it. The element of stability would have to be found, if at
all, in the factors controlling the quantity of money being so determined that there always
existed some level of money-wages at which the quantity of money would be such as to
establish a relation between the rate of interest and the marginal efficiency of capital
which would maintain investment at the critical level. In this event employment would be
constant (at the level appropriate to the legal real wage) with money-wages and prices
fluctuating rapidly in the degree just necessary to maintain this rate of investment at the
appropriate figure. In the actual case of Australia, the escape was found, partly of course
in the inevitable inefficacy of the legislation to achieve its object, and partly in Australia
not being a closed system, so that the level of money-wages was itself a determinant of
the level of foreign investment and hence of total investment, whilst the terms of trade
were an important influence on real wages.

In the light of these considerations I am now of the opinion that the maintenance of a
stable general level of money-wages is, on a balance of considerations, the most
advisable policy for a closed system; whilst the same conclusion will hold good for an
open system, provided that equilibrium with the rest of the world can be secured by
means of fluctuating exchanges. There are advantages in some degree of flexibility in the
wages of particular industries so as to expedite transfers from those which are relatively
declining to those which are relatively expanding. But the money-wage level as a whole
should be maintained as stable as possible, at any rate in the short period.
This policy will result in a fair degree of stability in the price-level;greater stability, at
least, than with a flexible wage policy. Apart from 'administered' or monopoly prices, the
price-level will only change in the short period in response to the extent that changes in
the volume of employment affect marginal prime costs; whilst in the long period they
will only change in response to changes in the cost of production due to new techniques
and new or increased equipment.

It is true that, if there are, nevertheless, large fluctuations in employment, substantial

fluctuations in the price-level will accompany them. But the fluctuations will be less, as I
have said above, than with a flexible wage policy.

Thus with a rigid wage policy the stability of prices will be bound up in the short period
with the avoidance of fluctuations in employment. In the long period, on the other hand,
we are still left with the choice between a policy of allowing prices to fall slowly with the
progress of technique and equipment whilst keeping wages stable, or of allowing wages
to rise slowly whilst keeping prices stable. On the whole my preference is for the latter
alternative, on account of the fact that it is easier with an expectation of higher wages in
future to keep the actual level of employment within a given range of full employment
than with an expectation of lower wages in future, and on account also of the social
advantages of gradually diminishing the burden of debt, the greater ease of adjustment
from decaying to growing industries, and the psychological encouragement likely to be
felt from a moderate tendency for money-wages to increase. But no essential point of
principle is involved, and it would lead me beyond the scope of my present purpose to
develop in detail the arguments on either side.

1. We are ignoring at this stage certain complications which arise when the employment functions of
different products have different curvatures within the relevant range of employment. See
Chapter 20 below.
APPENDIX: PROFESSOR PIGOU'S 'THEORY OF UNEMPLOYMENT'

Professor Pigou in his Theory of Unemployment makes the volume of employment to

depend on two fundamental factors, namely (i) the real rates of wages for which
workpeople stipulate, and (2) the shape of the Real Demand Function for Labour. The
central sections of his book are concerned with determining the shape of the latter
function. The fact that workpeople in fact stipulate, not for a real rate of wages, but for a
money-rate, is not ignored; but, in effect, it is assumed that the actual money-rate of
wages divided by the price of wage-goods can be taken to measure the real rate
demanded.

The equations which, as he says, 'form the starting point of the enquiry' into the Real
Demand Function for Labour are given in his Theory of Unemployment, p. 90. Since the
tacit assumptions, which govern the application of his analysis, slip in near the outset of
his argument, I will summarise his treatment up to the crucial point.

Professor Pigou divides industries into those 'engaged in making wage-goods at home
and in making exports the sale of which creates claims to wage-goods abroad' and the
'other' industries: which it is convenient to call the wage-goods industries and the non-
wage-goods industries respectively. He supposes x men to be employed in the former and
y men in the latter. The output in value of wage-goods of the x men he calls F(x); and the
general rate of wages F'(x). This, though he does not stop to mention it, is tantamount to
assuming that marginal wage-cost is equal to marginal prime cost[1]. Further, he assumes
that x + y = ( x), i.e. that the number of men employed in the wage-goods industries is
a function of total employment. He then shows that the elasticity of the real demand for
labour in the aggregate (which gives us the shape of our quaesitum, namely the Real
Demand Function for Labour) can be written

'(x) F'(x)
Er =
(x) F"(x)

So far as notation goes, there is no significant difference between this and my own modes
of expression. In so far as we can identify Professor Pigou's wage-goods with my
consumption-goods, and his 'other goods' with my investment-goods, it follows that his
F(x) / F'(x), being the value of the output of the wage-goods industries in terms of the
wage-unit, is the same as my Cw. Furthermore, his function is (subject to the
identification of wage-goods with consumption-goods) a function of what I have called
above the employment multiplier k'. For

x = k'y,
so that

1
'(x) = 1 +
k

Thus Professor Pigou's 'elasticity of the real demand for labour in the aggregate' is a
concoction similar to some of my own, depending partly on the physical and technical
conditions in industry (as given by his function F) and partly on the propensity to
consume wage-goods (as given by his function ); provided always that we are limiting
ourselves to the special case where marginal labour-cost is equal to marginal prime cost.

To determine the quantity of employment, Professor Pigou then combines with his 'real
demand for labour', a supply function for labour. He assumes that this is a function of the
real wage and of nothing else. But, as he has also assumed that the real wage is a function
of the number of men x who are employed in the wage-goods industries, this amounts to
assuming that the total supply of labour at the existing real wage is a function of x and of
nothing else. That is to say, n = (x), where n is the supply of labour available at a real
wage F'(x).

Thus, cleared of all complication, Professor Pigou's analysis amounts to an attempt to

discover the volume of actual employment from the equations

x + y = ( x)

and n = (x).

But there are here three unknowns and only two equations. It seems clear that he gets
round this difficulty by taking n = x + y. This amounts, of course, to assuming that there
is no involuntary unemployment in the strict sense, i.e. that all labour available at the
existing real wage is in fact employed. In this case x has the value which satisfies the
equation

(x) = (x)

and when we have thus found that the value of x is equal to (say) n1, y must be equal to
(n1) n1, and total employment n is equal to (n1).

It is worth pausing for a moment to consider what this involves. It means that, if the
supply function of labour changes, more labour being available at a given real wage (so
that n1 + dn1 is now the value of x which satisfies the equation (x) = (x)), the demand
for the output of the non-wage-goods industries is such that employment in these
industries is bound to increase by just the amount which will preserve equality between
(n1 + dn1) and (n1 + dn1). The only other way in which it is possible for aggregate
employment to change is through a modification of the propensity to purchase wage-
goods and non-wage-goods respectively such that there is an increase of y accompanied
by a greater decrease of x.

The assumption that n = x + y means, of course, that labour is always in a position to

determine its own real wage. Thus, the assumption that labour is in a position to
determine its own real wage, means that the demand for the output of the non-wage-
goods industries obeys the above laws. In other words, it is assumed that the rate of
interest always adjusts itself to the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital in such a
way as to preserve full employment. Without this assumption Professor Pigou's analysis
breaks down and provides no means of determining what the volume of employment will
be. It is, indeed, strange that Professor Pigou should have supposed that he could furnish
a theory of unemployment which involves no reference at all to changes in the rate of
investment (i.e. to changes in employment in the non-wage-goods industries) due, not to
a change in the supply function of labour, but to changes in (e.g.) either the rate of
interest or the state of confidence.

His title the 'Theory of Unemployment' is, therefore, something of a misnomer. His book
is not really concerned with this subject. It is a discussion of how much employment
there will be, given the supply function of labour, when the conditions for full
employment are satisfied. The purpose of the concept of the elasticity of the real demand
for labour in the aggregate is to show by how much full employment will rise or fall
corresponding to a given shift in the supply function of labour. Oralternatively and
perhaps betterwe may regard his book as a non-causative investigation into the
functional relationship which determines what level of real wages will correspond to any
given level of employment. But it is not capable of telling us what determines the actual
level of employment; and on the problem of involuntary unemployment it has no direct
bearing.

If Professor Pigou were to deny the possibility of involuntary unemployment in the sense
in which I have defined it above, as, perhaps, he would, it is still difficult to see how his
analysis could be applied. For his omission to discuss what determines the connection
between x and y, i.e. between employment in the wage-goods and non-wage-goods
industries respectively, still remains fatal.

Moreover, he agrees that within certain limits labour in fact often stipulates, not for a
given real wage, but for a given money-wage. But in this case the supply function of
labour is not a function of F'(x) alone but also of the money-price of wage-goods;with
the result that the previous analysis breaks down and an additional factor has to be
introduced, without there being an additional equation to provide for this additional
unknown. The pitfalls of a pseudo-mathematical method, which can make no progress
except by making everything a function of a single variable and assuming that all the
partial differentials vanish, could not be better illustrated. For it is no good to admit later
on that there are in fact other variables, and yet to proceed without re-writing everything
that has been written up to that point. Thus if (within limits) it is a money-wage for which
labour stipulates, we still have insufficient data, even if we assume that n = x + y, unless
we know what determines the money-price of wage-goods. For, the money-price of
wage-goods will depend on the aggregate amount of employment. Therefore we cannot
say what aggregate employment will be, until we know the money-price of wage-goods;
and we cannot know the money-price of wage-goods until we know the aggregate
amount of employment. We are, as I have said, one equation short. Yet it might be a
provisional assumption of a rigidity of money-wages, rather than of real wages, which
would bring our theory nearest to the facts. For example, money-wages in Great Britain
during the turmoil and uncertainty and wide price fluctuations of the decade 19241934
were stable within a range of 6 per cent, whereas real wages fluctuated by more than 20
per cent. A theory cannot claim to be a general theory, unless it is applicable to the case
where (or the range within which) money-wages are fixed, just as much as to any other
case. Politicians are entitled to complain that money-wages ought to be highly flexible;
but a theorist must be prepared to deal indifferently with either state of affairs. A
scientific theory cannot require the facts to conform to its own assumptions.

When Professor Pigou comes to deal expressly with the effect of a reduction of money-
wages, he again, palpably (to my mind), introduces too few data to permit of any definite
answer being obtainable. He begins by rejecting the argument (op. cit. p. 101) that, if
marginal prime cost is equal to marginal wage-cost, non-wage-earners' incomes will be
altered, when money-wages are reduced, in the same proportion as wage-earners', on the
ground that this is only valid, if the quantity of employment remains unalteredwhich is
the very point under discussion. But he proceeds on the next page (op. cit. p. 102) to
make the same mistake himself by taking as his assumption that 'at the outset nothing has
happened to non-wage-earners money-income', which, as he has just shown, is only valid
if the quantity of employment does not remain unaltered-which is the very point under
discussion In fact, no answer is possible, unless other factors are included in our data.

The manner in which the admission, that labour in fact stipulates for a given money-wage
and not for a given real wage (provided that the real wage does not fall below a certain
minimum), affects the analysis, can also be shown by pointing out that in this case the
assumption that more labour is not available except at a greater real wage, which is
fundamental to most of the argument, breaks down. For example, Professor Pigou rejects
(op. cit. p. 75) the theory of the multiplier by assuming that the rate of real wages is given,
i.e. that, there being already full employment, no additional labour is forthcoming at a
lower real wage. Subject to this assumption, the argument is, of course, correct. But in
this passage Professor Pigou is criticising a proposal relating to practical policy; and it is
fantastically far removed from the facts to assume, at a time when statistical
unemployment in Great Britain exceeded 2,000,000 (i.e. when there were 2,000,000 men
willing to work at the existing money-wage), that any rise in the cost of living, however
moderate, relatively to the money-wage would cause the withdrawal from the labour
market of more than the equivalent of all these 2,000,000 men.

It is important to emphasise that the whole of Professor Pigou's book is written on the
assumption that any rise in the cost of living, however moderate, relatively to the money-
wage will cause the withdrawal from the labour market of a number of workers greater
than that of all the existing unemployed.
Moreover, Professor Pigou does not notice in this passage (op. cit. p. 75) that the
argument, which he advances against 'secondary' employment as a result of public works,
is, on the same assumptions, equally fatal to increased 'primary' employment from the
same policy. For if the real rate of wages ruling in the wage-goods industries is given, no
increased employment whatever is possibleexcept, indeed, as a result of non-wage-
earners reducing their consumption of wage-goods. For those newly engaged in the
primary employment will presumably increase their consumption of wage-goods which
will reduce the real wage and hence (on his assumptions) lead to a withdrawal of labour
previously employed elsewhere. Yet Professor Pigou accepts, apparently, the possibility
of increased primary employment. The line between primary and secondary employment
seems to be the critical psychological point at which his good common sense ceases to
overbear his bad theory.

The difference in the conclusions to which the above differences in assumptions and in
analysis lead can be shown by the following important passage in which Professor Pigou
sums up his point of view: 'With perfectly free competition among workpeople and
labour perfectly mobile, the nature of the relation (i.e. between the real wage-rates for
which people stipulate and the demand function for labour) will be very simple. There
will always be at work a strong tendency for wage-rates to be so related to demand that
everybody is employed. Hence, in stable conditions everyone will actually be employed.
The implication is that such unemployment as exists at any time is due wholly to the fact
that changes in demand conditions are continually taking place and that frictional
resistances prevent the appropriate wage adjustments from being made instantaneously.'[2]

He concludes (op. cit. p. 253) that unemployment is primarily due to a wage policy which
fails to adjust itself sufficiently to changes in the real demand function for labour. Thus
Professor Pigou believes that in the long run unemployment can be cured by wage
adjustments[3]; whereas I maintain that the real wage (subject only to a minimum set by
the marginal disutility of employment) is not primarily determined by 'wage adjustments'
(though these may have repercussions) but by the other forces of the system, some of
which (in particular the relation between the schedule of the marginal efficiency of
capital and the rate of interest) Professor Pigou has failed, if I am right, to include in his
formal scheme.

Finally, when Professor Pigou comes to the 'Causation of Unemployment' he speaks, it is

true, of fluctuations in the state of demand, much as I do. But he identifies the state of
demand with the Real Demand Function for Labour, forgetful of how narrow a thing the
latter is on his definition. For the Real Demand Function for Labour depends by
definition (as we have seen above) on nothing but two factors, namely (1) the relationship
in any given environment between the total number of men employed and the number
who have to be employed in the wage-goods industries to provide them with what they
consume, and (2) the state of marginal productivity in the wage-goods industries. Yet in
Part V of his Theory of Unemployment fluctuations in the state of 'the real demand for
labour' are given a position of importance. The 'real demand for labour' is regarded as a
factor which is susceptible of wide short-period fluctuations (op. cit. Part V,
chaps. vi.xii.), and the suggestion seems to be that swings in 'the real demand for labour'
are, in combination with the failure of wage policy to respond sensitively to such changes,
largely responsible for the trade cycle. To the reader all this seems, at first, reasonable
and familiar. For, unless he goes back to the definition, 'fluctuations in the real demand
for labour' will convey to his mind the same sort of suggestion as I mean to convey by
'fluctuations in the state of aggregate demand'. But if we go back to the definition of the
'real demand for labour', all this loses its plausibility. For we shall find that there is
nothing in the world less likely to be subject to sharp short-period swings than this factor.

Professor Pigou's 'real demand for labour' depends, by definition, on nothing but F(x),
which represents the physical conditions of production in the wage-goods industries, and
(x), which represents the functional relationship between employment in the wage-goods
industries and total employment corresponding to any given level of the latter. It is
difficult to see a reason why either of these functions should change, except gradually
over a long period. Certainly there seems no reason to suppose that they are likely to
fluctuate during a trade cycle. For F(x) can only change slowly, and, in a technically
progressive community, only in the forward direction; whilst (x) will remain stable,
unless we suppose a sudden outbreak of thrift in the working classes, or, more generally,
a sudden shift in the propensity to consume. I should expect, therefore, that the real
demand for labour would remain virtually constant throughout a trade cycle. I repeat that
Professor Pigou has altogether omitted from his analysis the unstable factor, namely
fluctuations in the scale of investment, which is most often at the bottom of the
phenomenon of fluctuations in employment.

I have criticised at length Professor Pigou's theory of unemployment not because he

seems to me to be more open to criticism than other economists of the classical school;
but because his is the only attempt with which I am acquainted to write down the
classical theory of unemployment precisely. Thus it has been incumbent on me to raise
my objections to this theory in the most formidable presentment in which it has been
advanced.

1. The source of the fallacious practice of equating marginal wage-cost to marginal prime cost may,
perhaps, be found in an ambiguity in the meaning of marginal wage-cost. We might mean by it the
cost of an additional unit except additional wage-cost; or we might mean the additional wage-cost
involved in producing an additional unit of output in the most economical way with the help of the
existing equipment and other unemployed factors. In the former case we are precluded from
combining with the additional labour any additional entrepreneurship or working capital or
anything else other than labour which would add to the cost; and we are even precluded from
allowing the additional labour to wear out the equipment any faster than the smaller labour force
would have done. Since in the former case we have forbidden any element of cost other than
labour cost to enter into marginal prime-cost, it does, of course, follow that marginal wage-cost
and marginal prime-cost are equal. But the results of an analysis conducted on this premiss have
almost no application, since the assumption on which it is based is very seldom realised in practice.
For we are not so foolish in practice as to refuse to associate with additional labour appropriate
additions of other factors, in so far as they are available, and the assumption will, therefore, only
apply if we assume that all the factors, other than labour, are already being employed to the
utmost.

2. Op. Cit. p. 252.

3. There is no hint or suggestion that this comes about through reactions on the rate of interest.
Chapter 20

THE EMPLOYMENT FUNCTION[1]

In Chapter 3 we have defined the aggregate supply function Z = (N), which relates the
employment N with the aggregate supply price of the corresponding output. The
employment function only differs from the aggregate supply function in that it is, in effect,
its inverse function and is defined in terms of the wage-unit; the object of the
employment function being to relate the amount of the effective demand, measured in
terms of the wage-unit, directed to a given firm or industry or to industry as a whole with
the amount of employment, the supply price of the output of which will compare to that
amount of effective demand. Thus if an amount of effective demand Dwr, measured in
wage-units, directed to a firm or industry calls forth an amount of employment Nr in that
firm or industry, the employment function is given by Nr = Fr(Dwr). Or, more generally,
if we are entitled to assume that Dwr is a unique function of the total effective demand Dw,
the employment function is given by Nr = Fr(Dw) That is to say, Nr men will be
employed in industry r when effective demand is Dw.

We shall develop in this chapter certain properties of the employment function. But apart
from any interest which these may have, there are two reasons why the substitution of the
employment function for the ordinary supply curve is consonant with the methods and
objects of this book. In the first place, it expresses the relevant facts in terms of the units
to which we have decided to restrict ourselves, without introducing any of the units
which have a dubious quantitative character. In the second place, it lends itself to the
problems of industry and output as a whole, as distinct from the problems of a single
industry or firm in a given environment, more easily than does the ordinary supply
curvefor the following reasons.

The ordinary demand curve for a particular commodity is drawn on some assumption as
to the incomes of members of the public, and has to be re-drawn if the incomes change.
In the same way the ordinary supply curve for a particular commodity is drawn on some
assumption as to the output of industry as a whole and is liable to change if the aggregate
output of industry is changed. When, therefore, we are examining the response of
individual industries to changes in aggregate employment, we are necessarily concerned,
not with a single demand curve for each industry, in conjunction with a single supply
curve, but with two families of such curves corresponding to different assumptions as to
the aggregate employment. In the case of the employment function, however, the task of
arriving at a function for industry as a whole which will reflect changes in employment as
a whole is more practicable.

For let us assume (to begin with) that the propensity to consume is given as well as the
other factors which we have taken as given in above, and that we are considering changes
in employment in response to changes in the rate of investment. Subject to this
assumption, for every level of effective demand in terms of wage-units there will be a
corresponding aggregate employment and this effective demand will be divided in
determinate proportions between consumption and investment. Moreover, each level of
effective demand will correspond to a given distribution of income. It is reasonable,
therefore, further to assume that corresponding to a given level of aggregate effective
demand there is a unique distribution of it between different industries.

This enables us to determine what amount of employment in each industry will

correspond to a given level of aggregate employment. That is to say, it gives us the
amount of employment in each particular industry corresponding to each level of
aggregate effective demand measured in terms of wage-units, so that the conditions are
satisfied for the second form of the employment function for the industry, defined above,
namely Nr = Fr(Dw) Thus we have the advantage that, in these conditions, the individual
employment functions are additive in the sense that the employment function for industry
as a whole, corresponding to a given level of effective demand, is equal to the sum of the
employment functions for each separate industry; i.e.

Fr(Dw) = N = Nr = Fr(Dw).

Next, let us define the elasticity of employment. The elasticity of employment for a given
industry is

dNr Dwr
eer = ,
dDwr Nr

since it measures the response of the number of labour-units employed in the industry to
changes in the number of wage-units which are expected to be spent on purchasing its
output. The elasticity of employment for industry as a whole we shall write

dN Dw
ee = ,
dDw Nr

Provided that we can find some sufficiently satisfactory method of measuring output, it is
also useful to define what may be called the elasticity of output or production, which
measures the rate at which output in any industry increases when more effective demand
in terms of wage-units is directed towards it, namely

dOr Dwr
eor = ,
dDwr Or

Provided we can assume that the price is equal to the marginal prime cost, we then have
 1
Dwr = DPr
1 eor

where Pr is the expected profit[2]. It follows from this that if eor = 0, i.e. if the output of
the industry is perfectly inelastic, the whole of the increased effective demand (in terms
of wage-units) is expected to accrue to the entrepreneur as profit, i.e. Dwr = Pr; whilst
if eor = 1, i.e. if the elasticity of output is unity, no part of the increased effective
demand is expected to accrue as profit, the whole of it being absorbed by the elements
entering into marginal prime cost.

Moreover, if the output of an industry is a function (Nr) of the labour employed in it, we
have[3]

1 eor Nr "(Nr)
= ,
eer pwr{'(Nr)}2

where pwr is the expected price of a unit of output in terms of the wage-unit. Thus the
condition eor = 1 means that "(Nr) = 0, i.e. that there are constant returns in response
to increased employment.

Now, in so far as the classical theory assumes that real wages are always equal to the
marginal disutility of labour and that the latter increases when employment increases, so
that the labour supply will fall off; cet. par., if real wages are reduced, it is assuming that
in practice it is impossible to increase expenditure in terms of wage-units. If this were
true, the concept of elasticity of employment would have no field of application.
Moreover, it would, in this event, be impossible to increase employment by increasing
expenditure in terms of money; for money-wages would rise proportionately to the
increased money expenditure so that there would be no increase of expenditure in terms
of wage-units and consequently no increase in employment. But if the classical
assumption does not hold good, it will be possible to increase employment by increasing
expenditure in terms of money until real wages have fallen to equality with the marginal
disutility of labour, at which point there will, by definition, be full employment.

Ordinarily, of course, eor will have a value intermediate between zero and unity. The
extent to which prices (in terms of wage-units) will rise, i.e. the extent to which real
wages will fall, when money expenditure is increased, depends, therefore, on the
elasticity of output in response to expenditure in terms of wage-units.

Let the elasticity of the expected price pwr in response to changes in effective demand Dwr,
namely (dpwr/dDwr) (Dwr /pwr), be written e'pr.

Since Or pwr = Dwr, we have

 dOr Dwr dpwr Dwr
+ = 1
dDwr Or dDwr pwr

or e'pr + eor = 1.

That is to say, the sum of the elasticities of price and of output in response to changes in
effective demand (measured in terms of wage-units) is equal to unity. Effective demand
spends it sell, partly in affecting output and partly in affecting price, according to this law.

If we are dealing with industry as a whole and are prepared to assume that we have a unit
in which output as a whole can be measured, the same line of argument applies, so that
e'p + eo = 1, where the elasticities without a suffix r apply to industry as a whole.

Let us now measure values in money instead of wage-units and extend to this case our
conclusions in respect of industry as a whole.

If W stands for the money-wages of a unit of labour and p for the expected price of a unit
of output as a whole in terms of money, we can write ep (= (Ddp) / (pdD)) for the
elasticity of money-prices in response to changes in effective demand measured in terms
of money, and ew (= (DdW) / (WdD)) for the elasticity of money-wages in response to
changes in effective demand in terms of money. It is then easily shown that

ep = 1 = eo(1 ew)[4].

This equation is, as we shall see in the next chapter, first step to a generalised quantity
theory of money.

If eo = 0 or if ew = 1, output will be unaltered and prices will rise in the same

proportion as effective demand in terms of money. Otherwise they will rise in a smaller
proportion.

II

Let us return to the employment function. We have assumed in the foregoing that to
every level or aggregate effective demand there corresponds a unique distribution of
effective demand between the products of each individual industry. Now, as aggregate
expenditure changes, the corresponding expenditure on the products of an individual
industry will not, in general, change in the same proportion;partly because individuals
will not, as their incomes rise, increase the amount of the products of each separate
industry, which they purchase, in the same proportion, and partly because the prices of
different commodities will respond in different degrees to increases in expenditure upon
them.

It follows from this that the assumption upon which we have worked hitherto, that
changes in employment depend solely on changes in aggregate effective demand (in
terms of wage-units), is no better than a first approximation, if we admit that there is
more than one way in which an increase of income can be spent. For the way in which we
suppose the increase in aggregate demand to be distributed between different
commodities may considerably influence the volume of employment. If, for example, the
increased demand is largely directed towards products which have a high elasticity of
employment, the aggregate increase in employment will be greater than if it is largely
directed towards products which have a low elasticity of employment.

In the same way employment may fall off without there having been any change in
aggregate demand, if the direction of demand is changed in favour of products having a
relatively low elasticity of employment.

These considerations are particularly important if we are concerned with short-period

phenomena in the sense of changes in the amount or direction of demand which are not
foreseen some time ahead. Some products take time to produce, so that it is practically
impossible to increase the supply of them quickly. Thus, if additional demand is directed
to them without notice, they will show a low elasticity of employment; although it may
be that, given sufficient notice, their elasticity of employment approaches unity.

It is in this connection that I find the principal significance of the conception of a period
of production. A product, I should prefer to say[5], has a period of production n if n time-
units of notice of changes in the demand for it have to be given if it is to offer its
maximum elasticity of employment. Obviously consumption-goods, taken as a whole,
have in this sense the longest period of production, since of every productive process they
constitute the last stage. Thus if the first impulse towards the increase in effective
demand comes from an increase in consumption, the initial elasticity of employment will
be further below its eventual equilibrium-level than if the impulse comes from an
increase in investment. Moreover, if the increased demand is directed to products with a
relatively low elasticity of employment, a larger proportion of it will go to swell the
incomes of entrepreneurs and a smaller proportion to swell the incomes of wage-earners
and other prime-cost factors; with the possible result that the repercussions may be
somewhat less favourable to expenditure, owing to the likelihood of entrepreneurs saving
more of their increment of income than wage-earners would. Nevertheless the distinction
between the two cases must not be over-stated, since a large part of the reactions will be
much the same in both[6].

However long the notice given to entrepreneurs of a prospective change in demand, it is

not possible for the initial elasticity of employment, in response to a given increase of
investment, to be as great as its eventual equilibrium value, unless there are surplus
stocks and surplus capacity at every stage of production. On the other hand, the depletion
of the surplus stocks will have an offsetting effect on the amount by which investment
increases. If we suppose that there are initially some surpluses at every point, the initial
elasticity of employment may approximate to unity; then after the stocks have been
absorbed, but before an increased supply is coming forward at an adequate rate from the
earlier stages of production, the elasticity will fall away; rising again towards unity as the
new position of equilibrium is approached. This is subject, however, to some
qualification in so far as there are rent factors which absorb more expenditure as
employment increases, or if the rate of interest increases. For these reasons perfect
stability of prices is impossible in an economy subject to changeunless, indeed, there is
some peculiar mechanism which ensures temporary fluctuations of just the right degree in
the propensity to consume. But price-instability arising in this way does not lead to the
kind of profit stimulus which is liable to bring into existence excess capacity. For the
windfall gain will wholly accrue to those entrepreneurs who happen to possess products
at a relatively advanced stage of production, and there is nothing which the entrepreneur,
who does not possess specialised resources of the right kind, can do to attract this gain to
himself. Thus the inevitable price-instability due to change cannot affect the actions of
entrepreneurs, but merely directs a de facto windfall of wealth into the laps of the lucky
ones (mutatis mutandis when the supposed change is in the other direction). This fact has,
I think, been overlooked in some contemporary discussions of a practical policy aimed at
stabilising prices.

It is true that in a society liable to change such a policy cannot be perfectly successful.
But it does not follow that every small temporary departure from price stability
necessarily sets up a cumulative disequilibrium.

III

We have shown that when effective demand is deficient there is under-employment of

labour in the sense that there are men unemployed who would be willing to work at less
than the existing real wage. Consequently, as effective demand increases, employment
increases, though at a real wage equal to or less than the existing one, until a point comes
at which there is no surplus of labour available at the then existing real wage; i.e. no more
men (or hours of labour) available unless money-wages rise (from this point onwards)
faster than prices. The next problem is to consider what will happen If, when this point
has been reached, expenditure still continues to increase.

Up to this point the decreasing return from applying more labour to a given capital
equipment has been offset by the acquiescence of labour in a diminishing real wage. But
after this point a unit of labour would require the inducement of the equivalent of an
increased quantity of product, whereas the yield from applying a further unit would be a
diminished quantity of product. The conditions of strict equilibrium require, therefore,
that wages and prices, and consequently profits also, should all rise in the same
proportion as expenditure, the 'real' position, including the volume of output and
employment, being left unchanged in all respects. We have reached, that is to say, a
situation in which the crude quantity theory of money (interpreting 'velocity' to mean
'income-velocity') is fully satisfied; for output does not alter and prices rise in exact
proportion to MV.

Nevertheless there are certain practical qualifications to this conclusion which must be
borne in mind in applying it to an actual case:
(1) For a time at least, rising prices may delude entrepreneurs into increasing employment
beyond the level which maximises their individual profits measured in terms of the
product. For they are so accustomed to regard rising sale-proceeds in terms of money as a
signal for expanding production, that they may continue to do so when this policy has in
fact ceased to be to their best advantage; i.e. they may underestimate their marginal user
cost in the new price environment.

(2) Since that part of his profit which the entrepreneur has to hand on to the rentier is
fixed in terms of money, rising prices, even though unaccompanied by any change in
output, will redistribute incomes to the advantage of the entrepreneur and to the
disadvantage of the rentier, which may have a reaction on the propensity to consume.
This, however, is not a process which will have only begun when full employment has
been attained;it will have been making steady progress all the time that the expenditure
was increasing. If the rentier is less prone to spend than the entrepreneur, the gradual
withdrawal of real income from the former will mean that full employment will be
reached with a smaller increase in the quantity of money and a smaller reduction in the
rate of interest than will be the case if the opposite hypothesis holds. After full
employment has been reached, a further rise of prices will, if the first hypothesis
continues to hold, mean that the rate of interest will have to rise somewhat to prevent
prices from rising indefinitely, and that the increase in the quantity of money will be less
than in proportion to the increase in expenditure; whilst if the second hypothesis holds,
the opposite will be the case. It may be that, as the real income of the rentier is
diminished, a point will come when, as a result of his growing relative impoverishment,
there will be a change-over from the first hypothesis to the second, which point may be
reached either before or after full employment has been attained.

IV

There is, perhaps, something a little perplexing in the apparent asymmetry between
inflation and deflation. For whilst a deflation of effective demand below the level
required for full employment will diminish employment as well as prices, an inflation of
it above this level will merely affect prices. This asymmetry is, however, merely a
reflection of the fact that, whilst labour is always in a position to refuse to work on a
scale involving a real wage which is less than the marginal disutility of that amount of
employment, it is not in a position to insist on being offered work on a scale involving a
real wage which is not greater than the marginal disutility of that amount of employment.

1. Those who (rightly) dislike algebra will lose little by omitting the first section of this chapter.

2. For, if pwr is the expected price of a unit of output in terms of the wage-unit,

DDwr = D (pwrOr) = pwrDOr + OrDpwr

= (Dwr/Or). DOr + OrDpwr ,

so that
 OrDpwr = DDwr (1 - eor)

or

DDwr = OrDpwr/(1 - eor) .

But

OrDpwr = DDwr - pwrDOr

= DDwr - (marginal prime cost) DOr

= DP.

Hence

DDwr = 1/(1 - eor). DPr .

3. For, since Dwr = pwrOr, we have

1 = pwr. dOr/dDwr + Or.dpwr/dDwr

= eor - (Nrf''(Nr)/{f'(Nr)}2).eor/pwr .

4. For, since p = pw.W and D = Dw.W, we have

Dp = WDpw + (p/W) . DW

= W. e'p.(pw/Dw). DDw + (p/W). DW

= e'p(p/D)( DD - (D/W) DW) + (p/W) DW

= e'p(p/D). DD + DW(p/W)(1 - e'p) ,

so that

ep = DDp/pDD) = e'p +(D/pDD). DW.p/W).(1 - e'p)

= e'p + ew(1 - e'p)

= 1 - eo(1 - ew)

5. This is not identical with the usual definition, but it seems to me to embody what is significant in
the idea.

6. Some further discussion of the above topic is to be found in my Treatise on Money, Book IV.
Chapter 21

THE THEORY OF PRICES

So long as economists are concerned with what is called the theory of value, they have
been accustomed to teach that prices are governed by the conditions of supply and
demand; and, in particular, changes in marginal cost and the elasticity of short-period
supply have played a prominent part. But when they pass in volume II, or more often in a
separate treatise, to the theory of money and prices, we hear no more of these homely but
intelligible concepts and move into a world where prices are governed by the quantity of
money, by its income-velocity, by the velocity of circulation relatively to the volume of
transactions, by hoarding, by forced saving, by inflation and deflation et hoc genus omne;
and little or no attempt is made to relate these vaguer phrases to our former notions of the
elasticities of supply and demand. If we reflect on what we are being taught and try to
rationalise it, in the simpler discussions it seems that the elasticity of supply must have
become zero and demand proportional to the quantity of money; whilst in the more
sophisticated we are lost in a haze where nothing is clear and everything is possible. We
have all of us become used to finding ourselves sometimes on the one side of the moon
and sometimes on the other, without knowing what route or journey connects them,
related, apparently, after the fashion of our waking and our dreaming lives.

One of the objects of the foregoing chapters has been to escape from this double life and
to bring the theory of prices as a whole back to close contact with the theory of value.
The division of economics between the theory of value and distribution on the one hand
and the theory of money on the other hand is, I think, a false division. The right
dichotomy is, I suggest, between the theory of the individual industry or firm and of the
rewards and the distribution between different uses of a given quantity of resources on the
one hand, and the theory of output and employment as a whole on the other hand. So
long as we limit ourselves to the study of the individual industry or firm on the
assumption that the aggregate quantity of employed resources is constant, and,
provisionally, that the conditions of other industries or firms are unchanged, it is true that
we are not concerned with the significant characteristics of money. But as soon as we
pass to the problem of what determines output and employment as a whole, we require
the complete theory of a monetary economy.

Or, perhaps, we might make our line of division between the theory of stationary
equilibrium and the theory of shifting equilibriummeaning by the latter the theory of a
system in which changing views about the future are capable of influencing the present
situation. For the importance of money essentially flows from its being a link between the
present and the future. We can consider what distribution of resources between different
uses will be consistent with equilibrium under the influence of normal economic motives
in a world in which our views concerning the future are fixed and reliable in all
respects;with a further division, perhaps, between an economy which is unchanging
and one subject to change, but where all things are foreseen from the beginning. Or we
can pass from this simplified propaedeutic to the problems of the real world in which our
previous expectations are liable to disappointment and expectations concerning the future
affect what we do to-day. It is when we have made this transition that the peculiar
properties of money as a link between the present and the future must enter into our
calculations. But, although the theory of shifting equilibrium must necessarily be pursued
in terms of a monetary economy, it remains a theory of value and distribution and not a
separate 'theory of money'. Money in its significant attributes is, above all, a subtle device
for linking the present to the future; and we cannot even begin to discuss the effect of
changing expectations on current activities except in monetary terms. We cannot get rid
of money even by abolishing gold and silver and legal tender instruments. So long as
there exists any durable asset, it is capable of possessing monetary attributes[1] and,
therefore, of giving rise to the characteristic problems of a monetary economy.

II

In a single industry its particular price-level depends partly on the rate of remuneration of
the factors of production which enter into its marginal cost, and partly on the scale of
output. There is no reason to modify this conclusion when we pass to industry as a whole.
The general price-level depends partly on the rate of remuneration of the factors of
production which enter into marginal cost and partly on the scale of output as a whole, i.e.
(taking equipment and technique as given) on the volume of employment. It is true that,
when we pass to output as a whole, the costs of production in any industry partly depend
on the output of other industries. But the more significant change, of which we have to
take account, is the effect of changes in demand both on costs and on volume. It is on the
side of demand that we have to introduce quite new ideas when we are dealing with
demand as a whole and no longer with the demand for a single product taken in isolation,
with demand as a whole assumed to be unchanged.

III

If we allow ourselves the simplification of assuming that the rates of remuneration of the
different factors of production which enter into marginal cost all change in the same
proportion, i.e. in the same proportion as the wage-unit, it follows that the general price-
level (taking equipment and technique as given) depends partly on the wage-unit and
partly on the volume of employment. Hence the effect of changes in the quantity of
money on the price-level can be considered as being compounded of the effect on the
wage-unit and the effect on employment.

To elucidate the ideas involved, let us simplify our assumptions still further, and assume
(1) that all unemployed resources are homogeneous and interchangeable in their
efficiency to produce what is wanted, and (2) that the factors of production entering into
marginal cost are content with the same money-wage so long as there is a surplus of them
unemployed. In this case we have constant returns and a rigid wage-unit, so long as there
is any unemployment. It follows that an increase in the quantity of money will have no
effect whatever on prices, so long as there is any unemployment, and that employment
will increase in exact proportion to any increase in effective demand brought about by the
increase in the quantity of money; whilst as soon as full employment is reached, it will
thenceforward be the wage-unit and prices which will increase in exact proportion to the
increase in effective demand. Thus if there is perfectly elastic supply so long as there is
unemployment, and perfectly inelastic supply so soon as full employment is reached, and
if effective demand changes in the same proportion as the quantity of money, the quantity
theory of money can be enunciated as follows: 'So long as there is unemployment,
employment will change in the same proportion as the quantity of money; and when there
is full employment, prices will change in the same proportion as the quantity of money'.

Having, however, satisfied tradition by introducing a sufficient number of simplifying

assumptions to enable us to enunciate a quantity theory of money, let us now consider the
possible complications which will in fact influence events:

(1) Effective demand will not change in exact proportion to the quantity of money.

(2) Since resources are not homogeneous, there will be diminishing, and not constant,
returns as employment gradually increases.

(3) Since resources are not interchangeable, some commodities will reach a condition of
inelastic supply whilst there are still unemployed resources available for the production
of other commodities.

(4) The wage-unit will tend to rise, before full employment has been reached.

(5) The remunerations of the factors entering into marginal cost will not all change in the
same proportion.

Thus we must first consider the effect of changes in the quantity of money on the quantity
of effective demand; and the increase in effective demand will, generally speaking, spend
itself partly in increasing the quantity of employment and partly in raising the level of
prices. Thus instead of constant prices in conditions of unemployment, and of prices
rising in proportion to the quantity of money in conditions of full employment, we have
in fact a condition of prices rising gradually as employment increases. The theory of
prices, that is to say, the analysis of the relation between changes in the quantity of
money and changes in the price-level with a view to determining the elasticity of prices
in response to changes in the quantity of money, must, therefore, direct itself to the five
complicating factors set forth above.

We will consider each of them in turn. But this procedure must not be allowed to lead us
into supposing that they are, strictly speaking, independent. For example, the proportion,
in which an increase in effective demand is divided in its effect between increasing
output and raising prices, may affect the way in which the quantity of money is related to
the quantity of effective demand. Or, again, the differences in the proportions, in which
the remunerations of different factors change, may influence the relation between the
quantity of money and the quantity of effective demand. The object of our analysis is, not
to provide a machine, or method of blind manipulation, which will furnish an infallible
answer, but to provide ourselves with an organised and orderly method of thinking out
particular problems; and, after we have reached a provisional conclusion by isolating the
complicating factors one by one, we then have to go back on ourselves and allow, as well
as we can, for the probable interactions of the factors amongst themselves. This is the
nature of economic thinking. Any other way of applying our formal principles of thought
(without which, however, we shall be lost in the wood) will lead us into error. It is a great
fault of symbolic pseudo-mathematical methods of formalising a system of economic
analysis, such as we shall set down in section vi of this chapter, that they expressly
assume strict independence between the factors involved and lose all their cogency and
authority if this hypothesis is disallowed; whereas, in ordinary discourse, where we are
not blindly manipulating but know all the time what we are doing and what the words
mean, we can keep 'at the back of our heads' the necessary reserves and qualifications and
the adjustments which we shall have to make later on, in a way in which we cannot keep
complicated partial differentials 'at the back' of several pages of algebra which assume
that they all vanish. Too large a proportion of recent 'mathematical' economics are merely
concoctions, as imprecise as the initial assumptions they rest on, which allow the author
to lose sight of the complexities and interdependencies of the real world in a maze of
pretentious and unhelpful symbols.

IV

(1) The primary effect of a change in the quantity of money on the quantity of effective
demand is through its influence on the rate of interest. If this were the only reaction, the
quantitative effect could be derived from the three elements(a) the schedule of
liquidity-preference which tells us by how much the rate of interest will have to fall in
order that the new money may be absorbed by willing holders, (b) the schedule of
marginal efficiencies which tells us by how much a given fall in the rate of interest will
increase investment, and (c) the investment multiplier which tells us by how much a
given increase in investment will increase effective demand as a whole.

But this analysis, though it is valuable in introducing order and method into our enquiry,
presents a deceptive simplicity, if we forget that the three elements (a), (b) and (c) are
themselves partly dependent on the complicating factors (2), (3), (4) and (5) which we
have not yet considered. For the schedule of liquidity-preference itself depends on how
much of the new money is absorbed into the income and industrial circulations, which
depends in turn on how much effective demand increases and how the increase is divided
between the rise of prices, the rise of wages, and the volume of output and employment.
Furthermore, the schedule of marginal efficiencies will partly depend on the effect which
the circumstances attendant on the increase in the quantity of money have on
expectations of the future monetary prospects. And finally the multiplier will be
influenced by the way in which the new income resulting from the increased effective
demand is distributed between different classes of consumers. Nor, of course, is this list
of possible interactions complete. Nevertheless, if we have all the facts before us, we
shall have enough simultaneous equations to give us a determinate result. There will be a
determinate amount of increase in the quantity of effective demand which, after taking
everything into account, will correspond to, and be in equilibrium with, the increase in
the quantity of money. Moreover, it is only in highly exceptional circumstances that an
increase in the quantity of money will be associated with a decrease in the quantity of
effective demand.

The ratio between the quantity of effective demand and the quantity of money closely
corresponds to what is often called the 'income-velocity of money';except that effective
demand corresponds to the income the expectation of which has set production moving,
not to the actually realised income, and to gross, not net, income. But the 'income-
velocity of money' is, in itself, merely a name which explains nothing. There is no reason
to expect that it will be constant. For it depends, as the foregoing discussion has shown,
on many complex and variable factors. The use of this term obscures, I think, the real
character of the causation, and has led to nothing but confusion.

(2) As we have shown above (Chapter 4), the distinction between diminishing and
constant returns partly depends on whether workers are remunerated in strict proportion
to their efficiency. If so, we shall have constant labour-costs (in terms of the wage-unit)
when employment increases. But if the wage of a given grade of labourers is uniform
irrespective of the efficiency of the individuals, we shall have rising labour-costs,
irrespective of the efficiency of the equipment. Moreover, if equipment is non-
homogeneous and some part of it involves a greater prime cost per unit of output, we
shall have increasing marginal prime costs over and above any increase due to increasing
labour-costs.

Hence, in general, supply price will increase as output from a given equipment is
increased. Thus increasing output will be associated with rising prices, apart from any
change in the wage-unit.

(3) Under (2) we have been contemplating the possibility of supply being imperfectly
elastic. If there is a perfect balance in the respective quantities of specialised unemployed
resources, the point of full employment will be reached for all of them simultaneously.
But, in general, the demand for some services and commodities will reach a level beyond
which their supply is, for the time being, perfectly inelastic, whilst in other directions
there is still a substantial surplus of resources without employment. Thus as output
increases, a series of 'bottle-necks' will be successively reached, where the supply of
particular commodities ceases to be elastic and their prices have to rise to whatever level
is necessary to divert demand into other directions.

It is probable that the general level of prices will not rise very much as output increases,
so long as there are available efficient unemployed resources of every type. But as soon
as output has increased sufficiently to begin to reach the 'bottle-necks', there is likely to
be a sharp rise in the prices of certain commodities.

Under this heading, however, as also under heading (2), the elasticity of supply partly
depends on the elapse of time. If we assume a sufficient interval for the quantity of
equipment itself to change, the elasticities of supply will be decidedly greater eventually.
Thus a moderate change in effective demand, coming on a situation where there is
widespread unemployment, may spend itself very little in raising prices and mainly in
increasing employment; whilst a larger change, which, being unforeseen, causes some
temporary 'bottle-necks' to be reached, will spend itself in raising prices, as distinct from
employment, to a greater extent at first than subsequently.

(4) That the wage-unit may tend to rise before full employment has been reached,
requires little comment or explanation. Since each group of workers will gain, cet. par.,
by a rise in its own wages, there is naturally for all groups a pressure in this direction,
which entrepreneurs will be more ready to meet when they are doing better business. For
this reason a proportion of any increase in effective demand is likely to be absorbed in
satisfying the upward tendency of the wage-unit.

Thus, in addition to the final critical point of full employment at which money-wages
have to rise, in response to an increasing effective demand in terms of money, fully in
proportion to the rise in the prices of wage-goods, we have a succession of earlier semi-
critical points at which an increasing effective demand tends to raise money-wages
though not fully in proportion to the rise in the price of wage-goods; and similarly in the
case of a decreasing effective demand. In actual experience the wage-unit does not
change continuously in terms of money in response to every small change in effective
demand; but discontinuously. These points of discontinuity are determined by the
psychology of the workers and by the policies of employers and trade unions. In an open
system, where they mean a change relatively to wage-costs elsewhere, and in a trade
cycle, where even in a closed system they may mean a change relatively to expected
wage-costs in the future, they can be of considerable practical significance. These points,
where a further increase in effective demand in terms of money is liable to cause a
discontinuous rise in the wage-unit, might be deemed, from a certain point of view, to be
positions of semi-inflation, having some analogy (though a very imperfect one) to the
absolute inflation which ensues on an increase in effective demand in circumstances of
full employment. They have, moreover, a good deal of historical importance. But they do
not readily lend themselves to theoretical generalisations.

(5) Our first simplification consisted in assuming that the remunerations of the various
factors entering into marginal cost all change in the same proportion. But in fact the rates
of remuneration of different factors in terms of money will show varying degrees of
rigidity and they may also have different elasticities of supply in response to changes in
the money-rewards offered. If it were not for this, we could say that the price-level is
compounded of two factors, the wage-unit and the quantity of employment.

Perhaps the most important element in marginal cost which is likely to change in a
different proportion from the wage-unit, and also to fluctuate within much wider limits, is
marginal user cost. For marginal user cost may increase sharply when employment
begins to improve, if (as will probably be the case) the increasing effective demand
brings a rapid change in the prevailing expectation as to the date when the replacement of
equipment will be necessary.
Whilst it is for many purposes a very useful first approximation to assume that the
rewards of all the factors entering into marginal prime-cost change in the same proportion
as the wage-unit, it might be better, perhaps, to take a weighted average of the rewards of
the factors entering into marginal prime-cost, and call this the cost-unit. The cost-unit, or,
subject to the above approximation, the wage-unit, can thus be regarded as the essential
standard of value; and the price-level, given the state of technique and equipment, will
depend partly on the cost-unit, and partly on the scale of output, increasing, where output
increases, more than in proportion to any increase in the cost-unit, in accordance with the
principle of diminishing returns in the short period. We have full employment when
output has risen to a level at which the marginal return from a representative unit of the
factors of production has fallen to the minimum figure at which a quantity of the factors
sufficient to produce this output is available.

When a further increase in the quantity of effective demand produces no further increase
in output and entirely spends itself on an increase in the cost-unit fully proportionate to
the increase in effective demand, we have reached a condition which might be
appropriately designated as one of true inflation. Up to this point the effect of monetary
expansion is entirely a question of degree, and there is no previous point at which we can
draw a definite line and declare that conditions of inflation have set in. Every previous
increase in the quantity of money is likely, in so far as it increases effective demand, to
spend itself partly in increasing the cost-unit and partly in increasing output.

It appears, therefore, that we have a sort of asymmetry on the two sides of the critical
level above which true inflation sets in. For a contraction of effective demand below the
critical level will reduce its amount measured in cost-units; whereas an expansion of
effective demand beyond this level will not, in general, have the effect of increasing its
amount in terms of cost-units. This result follows from the assumption that the factors of
production, and in particular the workers, are disposed to resist a reduction in their
money-rewards, and that there is no corresponding motive to resist an increase. This
assumption is, however, obviously well founded in the facts, due to the circumstance that
a change, which is not an all-round change, is beneficial to the special factors affected
when it is upward and harmful when it is downward.

If, on the contrary, money-wages were to fall without limit whenever there was a
tendency for less than full employment, the asymmetry would, indeed, disappear. But in
that case there would be no resting-place below full employment until either the rate of
interest was incapable of falling further or wages were zero. In fact we must have some
factor, the value of which in terms of money is, if not fixed, at least sticky, to give us any
stability of values in a monetary system.

The view that any increase in the quantity of money is inflationary (unless we mean by
inflationary merely that prices are rising) is bound up with the underlying assumption of
the classical theory that we are always in a condition where a reduction in the real
rewards of the factors of production will lead to a curtailment in their supply.
VI

With the aid of the notation introduced in Chapter 20 we can, if we wish, express the
substance of the above in symbolic form.

Let us write MV = D where M is the quantity of money, V its income-velocity (this

definition differing in the minor respects indicated above from the usual definition) and D
the effective demand. If, then, V is constant, prices will change in the same proportion as
the quantity of money provided that ep ( = (Dpd) / (pdD)) is unity. This condition is
satisfied (see Chapter 20 above) if eo = 0 or if ew = 1. The condition ew = 1 means that
the wage-unit in terms of money rises in the same proportion as the effective demand,
since ew = (DdW) / (WdD) and the condition eo = 0 means that output no longer shows
any response to a further increase in effective demand, since eo = (DdO) / (OdD).
Output in either case will be unaltered. Next, we can deal with the case where income-
velocity is not constant, by introducing yet a further elasticity, namely the elasticity of
effective demand in response to changes in the quantity of money,

MdD
ed =
DdM

This gives us

Mdp
= ep ed where ep = 1 ee eo(1 ew);
pdM

so that e = ed (1 ew)ed eeeo

= ed(1 ee eo + ee eo ew)

where e without suffix (= (Mdp) / (pdM)) stands for the apex of this pyramid and
measures the response of money-prices to changes in the quantity of money.

Since this last expression gives us the proportionate change in prices in response to a
change in the quantity of money, it can be regarded as a generalised statement of the
quantity theory of money. I do not myself attach much value to manipulations of this
kind; and I would repeat the warning, which I have given above, that they involve just as
much tacit assumption as to what variables are taken as independent (partial differentials
being ignored throughout) as does ordinary discourse, whilst I doubt if they carry us any
further than ordinary discourse can. Perhaps the best purpose served by writing them
down is to exhibit the extreme complexity of the relationship between prices and the
quantity of money, when we attempt to express it in a formal manner. It is, however,
worth pointing out that, of the four terms ed, ew, ee and eo upon which the effect on prices
of changes in the quantity of money depends, ed stands for the liquidity factors which
determine the demand for money in each situation, ew for the labour factors (or, more
strictly, the factors entering into prime-cost) which determine the extent to which money-
wages are raised as employment increases, and ee and eo for the physical factors which
determine the rate of decreasing returns as more employment is applied to the existing
equipment.

If the public hold a constant proportion of their income in money, ed = 1; if money-

wages are fixed, ew = 0; if there are constant returns throughout so that marginal return
equals average return, ee eo = 1; and if there is full employment either of labour or of
equipment, ee eo = 0.

Now e = 1, if ed = 1, and ew = 1; or if ed = 1, ew = 0 and ee eo = 0; or if ed = 1

and eo = 0. And obviously there is a variety of other special eases in which e = 1. But
in general e is not unity; and it is, perhaps, safe to make the generalisation that on
plausible assumptions relating to the real world, and excluding the case of a 'flight from
the currency' in which ed and ew become large, e is, as a rule, less than unity.

VII

So far, we have been primarily concerned with the way in which changes in the quantity
of money affect prices in the short period. But in the long run is there not some simpler
relationship?

This is a question for historical generalisation rather than for pure theory. If there is some
tendency to a measure of long-run uniformity in the state of liquidity-preference, there
may well be some sort of rough relationship between the national income and the
quantity of money required to satisfy liquidity-preference, taken as a mean over periods
of pessimism and optimism together. There may be, for example, some fairly stable
proportion of the national income more than which people will not readily keep in the
shape of idle balances for long periods together, provided the rate of interest exceeds a
certain psychological minimum; so that if the quantity of money beyond what is required
in the active circulation is in excess of this proportion of the national income, there will
be a tendency sooner or later for the rate of interest to fall to the neighbourhood of this
minimum. The falling rate of interest will then, cet. par., increase effective demand, and
the increasing effective demand will reach one or more of the semi-critical points at
which the wage-unit will tend to show a discontinuous rise, with a corresponding effect
on prices. The opposite tendencies will set in if the quantity of surplus money is an
abnormally low proportion of the national income. Thus the net effect of fluctuations
over a period of time will be to establish a mean figure in conformity with the stable
proportion between the national income and the quantity of money to which the
psychology of the public tends sooner or later to revert.

These tendencies will probably work with less friction in the upward than in the
downward direction. But if the quantity of money remains very deficient for a long time,
the escape will be normally found in changing the monetary standard or the monetary
system so as to raise the quantity of money, rather than in forcing down the wage-unit
and thereby increasing the burden of debt. Thus the very long-run course of prices has
almost always been upward. For when money is relatively abundant, the wage-unit rises;
and when money is relatively scarce, some means is found to increase the effective
quantity of money.

During the nineteenth century, the growth of population and of invention, the opening-up
of new lands, the state of confidence and the frequency of war over the average of (say)
each decade seem to have been sufficient, taken in conjunction with the propensity to
consume, to establish a schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital which allowed a
reasonably satisfactory average level of employment to be compatible with a rate of
interest high enough to be psychologically acceptable to wealth-owners. There is
evidence that for a period of almost one hundred and fifty years the long-run typical rate
of interest in the leading financial centres was about 5 per cent, and the gilt-edged rate
between 3 and 3 per cent; and that these rates of interest were modest enough to
encourage a rate of investment consistent with an average of employment which was not
intolerably low. Sometimes the wage-unit, but more often the monetary standard or the
monetary system (in particular through the development of bank-money), would be
adjusted so as to ensure that the quantity of money in terms of wage-units was sufficient
to satisfy normal liquidity-preference at rates of interest which were seldom much below
the standard rates indicated above. The tendency of the wage-unit was, as usual, steadily
upwards on the whole, but the efficiency of labour was also increasing. Thus the balance
of forces was such as to allow a fair measure of stability of prices;the highest
quinquennial average for Sauerbeck's index number between 1820 and 1914 was only 50
per cent above the lowest. This was not accidental. It is rightly described as due to a
balance of forces in an age when individual groups of employers were strong enough to
prevent the wage-unit from rising much faster than the efficiency of production, and
when monetary systems were at the same time sufficiently fluid and sufficiently
conservative to provide an average supply of money in terms of wage-units which
allowed to prevail the lowest average rate of interest readily acceptable by wealth-owners
under the influence of their liquidity-preferences. The average level of employment was,
of course, substantially below full employment, but not so intolerably below it as to
provoke revolutionary changes.

To-day and presumably for the future the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital is,
for a variety of reasons, much lower than it was in the nineteenth century. The acuteness
and the peculiarity of our contemporary problem arises, therefore, out of the possibility
that the average rate of interest which will allow a reasonable average level of
employment is one so unacceptable to wealth-owners that it cannot be readily established
merely by manipulating the quantity of money. So long as a tolerable level of
employment could be attained on the average of one or two or three decades merely by
assuring an adequate supply of money in terms of wage-units, even the nineteenth
century could find a way. If this was our only problem nowif a sufficient degree of
devaluation is all we needwe, to-day, would certainly find a way.

But the most stable, and the least easily shifted, element in our contemporary economy
has been hitherto, and may prove to be in future, the minimum rate of interest acceptable
to the generality of wealth-owners[2]. If a tolerable level of employment requires a rate of
interest much below the average rates which ruled in the nineteenth century, it is most
doubtful whether it can be achieved merely by manipulating the quantity of money. From
the percentage gain, which the schedule of marginal efficiency of capital allows the
borrower to expect to earn, there has to be deducted (1) the cost of bringing borrowers
and lenders together, (2) income and sur-taxes and (3) the allowance which the lender
requires to cover his risk and uncertainty, before we arrive at the net yield available to
tempt the wealth-owner to sacrifice his liquidity. If, in conditions of tolerable average
employment, this net yield turns out to be infinitesimal, time-honoured methods may
prove unavailing.

To return to our immediate subject, the long-run relationship between the national
income and the quantity of money will depend on liquidity-preferences. And the long-run
stability or instability of prices will depend on the strength of the upward trend of the
wage-unit (or, more precisely, of the cost-unit) compared with the rate of increase in the
efficiency of the productive system.

1. Cf. Chapter 17 above.

2. Cf. the nineteenth-century saying, quoted by Bagehot, that John Bull can stand many things, but
he cannot stand 2 per cent.
Chapter 22

NOTES ON THE TRADE CYCLE

Since we claim to have shown in the preceding chapters what determines the volume of
employment at any time, it follows, if we are right, that our theory must be capable of
explaining the phenomena of the trade cycle.

If we examine the details of any actual instance of the trade cycle, we shall find that it is
highly complex and that every element in our analysis will be required for its complete
explanation. In particular we shall find that fluctuations in the propensity to consume, in
the state of liquidity-preference, and in the marginal efficiency of capital have all played
a part. But I suggest that the essential character of the trade cycle and, especially, the
regularity of time-sequence and of duration which justifies us in calling it a cycle, is
mainly due to the way in which the marginal efficiency of capital fluctuates. The trade
cycle is best regarded, I think, as being occasioned by a cyclical change in the marginal
efficiency of capital, though complicated and often aggravated by associated changes in
the other significant short-period variables of the economic system. To develop this thesis
would occupy a book rather than a chapter, and would require a close examination of
facts. But the following short notes will be sufficient to indicate the line of investigation
which our preceding theory suggests.

By a cyclical movement we mean that as the system progresses in, e.g. the upward
direction, the forces propelling it upwards at first gather force and have a cumulative
effect on one another but gradually lose their strength until at a certain point they tend to
be replaced by forces operating in the opposite direction; which in turn gather force for a
time and accentuate one another, until they too, having reached their maximum
development, wane and give place to their opposite. We do not, however, merely mean
by a cyclical movement that upward and downward tendencies, once started, do not
persist for ever in the same direction but are ultimately reversed. We mean also that there
is some recognisable degree of regularity in the time-sequence and duration of the
upward and downward movements.

There is, however, another characteristic of what we call the trade cycle which our
explanation must cover if it is to be adequate; namely, the phenomenon of the crisisthe
fact that the substitution of a downward for an upward tendency often takes place
suddenly and violently, whereas there is, as a rule, no such sharp turning-point when an
upward is substituted for a downward tendency.

Any fluctuation in investment not offset by a corresponding change in the propensity to

consume will, of course, result in a fluctuation in employment. Since, therefore, the
volume of investment is subject to highly complex influences, it is highly improbable that
all fluctuations either in investment itself or in the marginal efficiency of capital will be
of a cyclical character. One special case, in particular, namely, that which is associated
with agricultural fluctuations, will be separately considered in a later section of this
chapter. I suggest, however, that there are certain definite reasons why, in the case of a
typical industrial trade cycle in the nineteenth-century environment, fluctuations in the
marginal efficiency of capital should have had cyclical characteristics. These reasons are
by no means unfamiliar either in themselves or as explanations of the trade cycle. My
only purpose here is to link them up with the preceding theory.

II

I can best introduce what I have to say by beginning with the later stages of the boom and
the onset of the 'crisis'.

We have seen above that the marginal efficiency of capital[1] depends, not only on the
existing abundance or scarcity of capital-goods and the current cost of production of
capital-goods, but also on current expectations as to the future yield of capital-goods. In
the case of durable assets it is, therefore, natural and reasonable that expectations of the
future should play a dominant part in determining the scale on which new investment is
deemed advisable. But, as we have seen, the basis for such expectations is very
precarious. Being based on shifting and unreliable evidence, they are subject to sudden
and violent changes.

Now, we have been accustomed in explaining the 'crisis' to lay stress on the rising
tendency of the rate of interest under the influence of the increased demand for money
both for trade and speculative purposes. At times this factor may certainly play an
aggravating and, occasionally perhaps, an initiating part. But I suggest that a more typical,
and often the predominant, explanation of the crisis is, not primarily a rise in the rate of
interest, but a sudden collapse in the marginal efficiency of capital.

The later stages of the boom are characterised by optimistic expectations as to the future
yield of capital-goods sufficiently strong to offset their growing abundance and their
rising costs of production and, probably, a rise in the rate of interest also. It is of the
nature of organised investment markets, under the influence of purchasers largely
ignorant of what they are buying and of speculators who are more concerned with
forecasting the next shift of market sentiment than with a reasonable estimate of the
future yield of capital-assets, that, when disillusion falls upon an over-optimistic and
over-bought market, it should fall with sudden and even catastrophic force[2]. Moreover,
the dismay and uncertainty as to the future which accompanies a collapse in the marginal
efficiency of capital naturally precipitates a sharp increase in liquidity-preferenceand
hence a rise in the rate of interest. Thus the fact that a collapse in the marginal efficiency
of capital tends to be associated with a rise in the rate of interest may seriously aggravate
the decline in investment. But the essence of the situation is to be found, nevertheless, in
the collapse in the marginal efficiency of capital, particularly in the case of those types of
capital which have been contributing most to the previous phase of heavy new investment.
Liquidity-preference, except those manifestations of it which are associated with
increasing trade and speculation, does not increase until after the collapse in the marginal
efficiency of capital.

It is this, indeed, which renders the slump so intractable. Later on, a decline in the rate of
interest will be a great aid to recovery and, probably, a necessary condition of it. But, for
the moment, the collapse in the marginal efficiency of capital may be so complete that no
practicable reduction in the rate of interest will be enough. If a reduction in the rate of
interest was capable of proving an effective remedy by itself; it might be possible to
achieve a recovery without the elapse of any considerable interval of time and by means
more or less directly under the control of the monetary authority. But, in fact, this is not
usually the case; and it is not so easy to revive the marginal efficiency of capital,
determined, as it is, by the uncontrollable and disobedient psychology of the business
world. It is the return of confidence, to speak in ordinary language, which is so
insusceptible to control in an economy of individualistic capitalism. This is the aspect of
the slump which bankers and business men have been right in emphasising, and which
the economists who have put their faith in a 'purely monetary' remedy have
underestimated.

This brings me to my point. The explanation of the time-element in the trade cycle, of the
fact that an interval of time of a particular order of magnitude must usually elapse before
recovery begins, is to be sought in the influences which govern the recovery of the
marginal efficiency of capital. There are reasons, given firstly by the length of life of
durable assets in relation to the normal rate of growth in a given epoch, and secondly by
the carrying-costs of surplus stocks, why the duration of the downward movement should
have an order of magnitude which is not fortuitous, which does not fluctuate between, say,
one year this time and ten years next time, but which shows some regularity of habit
between, let us say, three and five years.

Let us recur to what happens at the crisis. So long as the boom was continuing, much of
the new investment showed a not unsatisfactory current yield. The disillusion comes
because doubts suddenly arise concerning the reliability of the prospective yield, perhaps
because the current yield shows signs of falling off, as the stock of newly produced
durable goods steadily increases. If current costs of production are thought to be higher
than they will be later on, that will be a further reason for a fall in the marginal efficiency
of capital. Once doubt begins it spreads rapidly. Thus at the outset of the slump there is
probably much capital of which the marginal efficiency has become negligible or even
negative. But the interval of time, which will have to elapse before the shortage of capital
through use, decay and obsolescence causes a sufficiently obvious scarcity to increase the
marginal efficiency, may be a somewhat stable function of the average durability of
capital in a given epoch. If the characteristics of the epoch shift, the standard time-
interval will change. If, for example, we pass from a period of increasing population into
one of declining population, the characteristic phase of the cycle will be lengthened. But
we have in the above a substantial reason why the duration of the slump should have a
definite relationship to the length of life of durable assets and to the normal rate of
growth in a given epoch.
The second stable time-factor is due to the carrying-costs of surplus stocks which force
their absorption within a certain period, neither very short nor very long. The sudden
cessation of new investment after the crisis will probably lead to an accumulation of
surplus stocks of unfinished goods. The carrying-costs of these stocks will seldom be less
than 10 per cent. per annum. Thus the fall in their price needs to be sufficient to bring
about a restriction which provides for their absorption within a period of; say, three to
five years at the outside. Now the process of absorbing the stocks represents negative
investment, which is a further deterrent to employment; and, when it is over, a manifest
relief will be experienced. Moreover, the reduction in working capital, which is
necessarily attendant on the decline in output on the downward phase, represents a further
element of disinvestment, which may be large; and, once the recession has begun, this
exerts a strong cumulative influence in the downward direction. In the earliest phase of a
typical slump there will probably be an investment in increasing stocks which helps to
offset disinvestment in working-capital; in the next phase there may be a short period of
disinvestment both in stocks and in working-capital; after the lowest point has been
passed there is likely to be a further disinvestment in stocks which partially offsets
reinvestment in working-capital; and, finally, after the recovery is well on its way, both
factors will be simultaneously favourable to investment. It is against this background that
the additional and superimposed effects of fluctuations of investment in durable goods
must be examined. When a decline in this type of investment has set a cyclical fluctuation
in motion there will be little encouragement to a recovery in such investment until the
cycle has partly run its course[3].

Unfortunately a serious fall in the marginal efficiency of capital also tends to affect
adversely the propensity to consume. For it involves a severe decline in the market value
of stock exchange equities. Now, on the class who take an active interest in their stock
exchange investments, especially if they are employing borrowed funds, this naturally
exerts a very depressing influence. These people are, perhaps, even more influenced in
their readiness to spend by rises and falls in the value of their investments than by the
state of their incomes. With a 'stock-minded' public as in the United States to-day, a
rising stock-market may be an almost essential condition of a satisfactory propensity to
consume; and this circumstance, generally overlooked until lately, obviously serves to
aggravate still further the depressing effect of a decline in the marginal efficiency of
capital.

When once the recovery has been started, the manner in which it feeds on itself and
cumulates is obvious. But during the downward phase, when both fixed capital and
stocks of materials are for the time being redundant and working-capital is being reduced,
the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital may fall so low that it can scarcely be
corrected, so as to secure a satisfactory rate of new investment, by any practicable
reduction in the rate of interest. Thus with markets organised and influenced as they are
at present, the market estimation of the marginal efficiency of capital may suffer such
enormously wide fluctuations that it cannot be sufficiently offset by corresponding
fluctuations in the rate of interest. Moreover, the corresponding movements in the stock-
market may, as we have seen above, depress the propensity to consume just when it is
most needed. In conditions of laissez-faire the avoidance of wide fluctuations in
employment may, therefore, prove impossible without a far-reaching change in the
psychology of investment markets such as there is no reason to expect. I conclude that the
duty of ordering the current volume of investment cannot safely be left in private hands.

III

The preceding analysis may appear to be in conformity with the view of those who hold
that over-investment is the characteristic of the boom, that the avoidance of this over-
investment is the only possible remedy for the ensuing slump, and that, whilst for the
reasons given above the slump cannot be prevented by a low rate of interest, nevertheless
the boom can be avoided by a high rate of interest. There is, indeed, force in the argument
that a high rate of interest is much more effective against a boom than a low rate of
interest against a slump.

To infer these conclusions from the above would, however, misinterpret my analysis; and
would, according to my way of thinking, involve serious error. For the term over-
investment is ambiguous. It may refer to investments which are destined to disappoint the
expectations which prompted them or for which there is no use in conditions of severe
unemployment, or it may indicate a state of affairs where every kind of capital-goods is
so abundant that there is no new investment which is expected, even in conditions of full
employment, to earn in the course of its life more than its replacement cost. It is only the
latter state of affairs which is one of over-investment, strictly speaking, in the sense that
any further investment would be a sheer waste of resources[4]. Moreover, even if over-
investment in this sense was a normal characteristic of the boom, the remedy would not
lie in clapping on a high rate of interest which would probably deter some useful
investments and might further diminish the propensity to consume, but in taking drastic
steps, by redistributing incomes or otherwise, to stimulate the propensity to consume.

According to my analysis, however, it is only in the former sense that the boom can be
said to be characterised by over-investment. The situation, which I am indicating as
typical, is not one in which capital is so abundant that the community as a whole has no
reasonable use for any more, but where investment is being made in conditions which are
unstable and cannot endure, because it is prompted by expectations which are destined to
disappointment.

It may, of course, be the caseindeed it is likely to bethat the illusions of the boom
cause particular types of capital-assets to be produced in such excessive abundance that
some part of the output is, on any criterion, a waste of resources;which sometimes
happens, we may add, even when there is no boom. It leads, that is to say, to misdirected
investment. But over and above this it is an essential characteristic of the boom that
investments which will in fact yield, say, 2 per cent in conditions of full employment are
made in the expectation of a yield of; say, 6 per cent, and are valued accordingly. When
the disillusion comes, this expectation is replaced by a contrary 'error of pessimism', with
the result that the investments, which would in fact yield 2 per cent in conditions of full
employment, are expected to yield less than nothing; and the resulting collapse of new
investment then leads to a state of unemployment in which the investments, which would
have yielded 2 per cent in conditions of full employment, in fact yield less than nothing.
We reach a condition where there is a shortage of houses, but where nevertheless no one
can afford to live in the houses that there are.

Thus the remedy for the boom is not a higher rate of interest but a lower rate of interest[5]!
For that may enable the so-called boom to last. The right remedy for the trade cycle is not
to be found in abolishing booms and thus keeping us permanently in a semi-slump; but in
abolishing slumps and thus keeping us permanently in a quasi-boom.

The boom which is destined to end in a slump is caused, therefore, by the combination of
a rate of interest, which in a correct state of expectation would be too high for full
employment, with a misguided state of expectation which, so long as it lasts, prevents
this rate of interest from being in fact deterrent. A boom is a situation in which over-
optimism triumphs over a rate of interest which, in a cooler light, would be seen to be
excessive.

Except during the war, I doubt if we have any recent experience of a boom so strong that
it led to full employment. In the United States employment was very satisfactory in
192829 on normal standards; but I have seen no evidence of a shortage of labour, except,
perhaps, in the case of a few groups of highly specialised workers. Some 'bottle-necks'
were reached, but output as a whole was still capable of further expansion. Nor was there
over-investment in the sense that the standard and equipment of housing was so high that
everyone, assuming full employment, had all he wanted at a rate which would no more
than cover the replacement cost, without any allowance for interest, over the life of the
house; and that transport, public services and agricultural improvement had been carried
to a point where further additions could not reasonably be expected to yield even their
replacement cost. Quite the contrary. It would be absurd to assert of the United States in
1929 the existence of over-investment in the strict sense. The true state of affairs was of a
different character. New investment during the previous five years had been, indeed, on
so enormous a scale in the aggregate that the prospective yield of further additions was,
coolly considered, falling rapidly. Correct foresight would have brought down the
marginal efficiency of capital to an unprecedentedly low figure; so that the 'boom' could
not have continued on a sound basis except with a very low long-term rate of interest, and
an avoidance of misdirected investment in the particular directions which were in danger
of being over-exploited. In fact, the rate of interest was high enough to deter new
investment except in those particular directions which were under the influence of
speculative excitement and, therefore, in special danger of being over-exploited; and a
rate of interest, high enough to overcome the speculative excitement, would have checked,
at the same time, every kind of reasonable new investment. Thus an increase in the rate of
interest, as a remedy for the state of affairs arising out of a prolonged period of
abnormally heavy new investment, belongs to the species of remedy which cures the
disease by killing the patient.

It is, indeed, very possible that the prolongation of approximately full employment over a
period of years would be associated in countries so wealthy as Great Britain or the United
States with a volume of new investment, assuming the existing propensity to consume, so
great that it would eventually lead to a state of full investment in the sense that an
aggregate gross yield in excess of replacement cost could no longer be expected on a
reasonable calculation from a further increment of durable goods of any type whatever.
Moreover, this situation might be reached comparatively soonsay within twenty-five
years or less. I must not be taken to deny this, because I assert that a state of full
investment in the strict sense has never yet occurred, not even momentarily.

Furthermore, even if we were to suppose that contemporary booms are apt to be

associated with a momentary condition of full investment or over-investment in the strict
sense, it would still be absurd to regard a higher rate of interest as the appropriate remedy.
For in this event the case of those who attribute the disease to under-consumption would
be wholly established. The remedy would lie in various measures designed to increase the
propensity to consume by the redistribution of incomes or otherwise; so that a given level
of employment would require a smaller volume of current investment to support it.

IV

It may be convenient at this point to say a word about the important schools of thought
which maintain, from various points of view, that the chronic tendency of contemporary
societies to under-employment is to be traced to under-consumption;that is to say, to
social practices and to a distribution of wealth which result in a propensity to consume
which is unduly low.

In existing conditionsor, at least, in the condition which existed until latelywhere the
volume of investment is unplanned and uncontrolled, subject to the vagaries of the
marginal efficiency of capital as determined by the private judgment of individuals
ignorant or speculative, and to a long-term rate of interest which seldom or never falls
below a conventional level, these schools of thought are, as guides to practical policy,
undoubtedly in the right. For in such conditions there is no other means of raising the
average level of employment to a more satisfactory level. If it is impracticable materially
to increase investment, obviously there is no means of securing a higher level of
employment except by increasing consumption.

Practically I only differ from these schools of thought in thinking that they may lay a
little too much emphasis on increased consumption at a time when there is still much
social advantage to be obtained from increased investment. Theoretically, however, they
are open to the criticism of neglecting the fact that there are two ways to expand output.
Even if we were to decide that it would be better to increase capital more slowly and to
concentrate effort on increasing consumption, we must decide this with open eyes after
well considering the alternative. I am myself impressed by the great social advantages of
increasing the stock of capital until it ceases to be scarce. But this is a practical judgment,
not a theoretical imperative.

Moreover, I should readily concede that the wisest course is to advance on both fronts at
once. Whilst aiming at a socially controlled rate of investment with a view to a
progressive decline in the marginal efficiency of capital, I should support at the same
time all sorts of policies for increasing the propensity to consume. For it is unlikely that
full employment can be maintained, whatever we may do about investment, with the
existing propensity to consume. There is room, therefore, for both policies to operate
together;to promote investment and, at the same time, to promote consumption, not
merely to the level which with the existing propensity to consume would correspond to
the increased investment, but to a higher level still. Ifto take round figures for the
purpose of illustrationthe average level of output of to-day is 15 per cent below what it
would be with continuous full employment, and if 10 per cent of this output represents
net investment and 90 per cent of it consumptionif, furthermore, net investment would
have to rise 50 per cent in order to secure full employment with the existing propensity to
consume, so that with full employment output would rise from 100 to 115, consumption
from 90 to 100 and net investment from 10 to 15:then we might aim, perhaps, at so
modifying the propensity to consume that with full employment consumption would rise
from 90 to 103 and net investment from 10 to 12.

Another school of thought finds the solution of the trade cycle, not in increasing either
consumption or investment, but in diminishing the supply of labour seeking employment;
i.e. by redistributing the existing volume of employment without increasing employment
or output.

This seems to me to be a premature policymuch more clearly so than the plan of

increasing consumption. A point comes where every individual weighs the advantages of
increased leisure against increased income. But at present the evidence is, I think, strong
that the great majority of individuals would prefer increased income to increased leisure;
and I see no sufficient reason for compelling those who would prefer more income to
enjoy more leisure.

VI

It may appear extraordinary that a school of thought should exist which finds the solution
for the trade cycle in checking the boom in its early stages by a higher rate of interest.
The only line of argument, along which any justification for this policy can be discovered,
is that put forward by Mr D. H. Robertson, who assumes, in effect, that full employment
is an impracticable ideal and that the best that we can hope for is a level of employment
much more stable than at present and averaging, perhaps, a little higher.

If we rule out major changes of policy affecting either the control of investment or the
propensity to consume, and assume, broadly speaking, a continuance of the existing state
of affairs, it is, I think, arguable that a more advantageous average state of expectation
might result from a banking policy which always nipped in the bud an incipient boom by
a rate of interest high enough to deter even the most misguided optimists. The
disappointment of expectation, characteristic of the slump, may lead to so much loss and
waste that the average level of useful investment might be higher if a deterrent is applied.
It is difficult to be sure whether or not this is correct on its own assumptions; it is a matter
for practical judgment where detailed evidence is wanting. It may be that it overlooks the
social advantage which accrues from the increased consumption which attends even on
investment which proves to have been totally misdirected, so that even such investment
may be more beneficial than no investment at all. Nevertheless, the most enlightened
monetary control might find itself in difficulties, faced with a boom of the 1929 type in
America, and armed with no other weapons than those possessed at that time by the
Federal Reserve System; and none of the alternatives within its power might make much
difference to the result. However this may be, such an outlook seems to me to be
dangerously and unnecessarily defeatist. It recommends, or at least assumes, for
permanent acceptance too much that is defective in our existing economic scheme.

The austere view, which would employ a high rate of interest to check at once any
tendency in the level of employment to rise appreciably above the average of; say, the
previous decade, is, however, more usually supported by arguments which have no
foundation at all apart from confusion of mind. It flows, in some cases, from the belief
that in a boom investment tends to outrun saving, and that a higher rate of interest will
restore equilibrium by checking investment on the one hand and stimulating savings on
the other. This implies that saving and investment can be unequal, and has, therefore, no
meaning until these terms have been defined in some special sense. Or it is sometimes
suggested that the increased saving which accompanies increased investment is
undesirable and unjust because it is, as a rule, also associated with rising prices. But if
this were so, any upward change in the existing level of output and employment is to be
deprecated. For the rise in prices is not essentially due to the increase in investment;it
is due to the fact that in the short period supply price usually increases with increasing
output, on account either of the physical fact of diminishing return or of the tendency of
the cost-unit to rise in terms of money when output increases. If the conditions were those
of constant supply-price, there would, of course, be no rise of prices; yet, all the same,
increased saving would accompany increased investment. It is the increased output which
produces the increased saving; and the rise of prices is merely a by-product of the
increased output, which will occur equally if there is no increased saving but, instead, an
increased propensity to consume. No one has a legitimate vested interest in being able to
buy at prices which are only low because output is low.

Or, again, the evil is supposed to creep in if the increased investment has been promoted
by a fall in the rate of interest engineered by an increase in the quantity of money. Yet
there is no special virtue in the pre-existing rate of interest, and the new money is not
'forced' on anyone;it is created in order to satisfy the increased liquidity-preference
which corresponds to the lower rate of interest or the increased volume of transactions,
and it is held by those individuals who prefer to hold money rather than to lend it at the
lower rate of interest. Or, once more, it is suggested that a boom is characterised by
'capital consumption', which presumably means negative net investment, i.e. by an
excessive propensity to consume. Unless the phenomena of the trade cycle have been
confused with those of a flight from the currency such as occurred during the post-war
European currency collapses, the evidence is wholly to the contrary. Moreover, even if it
were so, a reduction in the rate of interest would be a more plausible remedy than a rise
in the rate of interest for conditions of under-investment. I can make no sense at all of
these schools of thought; except, perhaps, by supplying a tacit assumption that aggregate
output is incapable of change. But a theory which assumes constant output is obviously
not very serviceable for explaining the trade cycle.

VII

In the earlier studies of the trade cycle, notably by Jevons, an explanation was found in
agricultural fluctuations due to the seasons, rather than in the phenomena of industry. In
the light of the above theory this appears as an extremely plausible approach to the
problem. For even to-day fluctuation in the stocks of agricultural products as between one
year and another is one of the largest individual items amongst the causes of changes in
the rate of current investment; whilst at the time when Jevons wroteand more
particularly over the period to which most of his statistics appliedthis factor must have
far outweighed all others. Jevons's theory, that the trade cycle was primarily due to the
fluctuations in the bounty of the harvest, can be re-stated as follows. When an
exceptionally large harvest is gathered in, an important addition is usually made to the
quantity carried over into later years. The proceeds of this addition are added to the
current incomes of the farmers and are treated by them as income; whereas the increased
carry-over involves no drain on the income-expenditure of other sections of the
community but is financed out of savings. That is to say, the addition to the carry-over is
an addition to current investment. This conclusion is not invalidated even if prices fall
sharply. Similarly when there is a poor harvest, the carry-over is drawn upon for current
consumption, so that a corresponding part of the income-expenditure of the consumers
creates no current income for the farmers. That is to say, what is taken from the carry-
over involves a corresponding reduction in current investment. Thus, if investment in
other directions is taken to be constant, the difference in aggregate investment between a
year in which there is a substantial addition to the carry-over and a year in which there is
a substantial subtraction from it may be large; and in a community where agriculture is
the predominant industry it will be overwhelmingly large compared with any other usual
cause of investment fluctuations. Thus it is natural that we should find the upward
turning-point to be marked by bountiful harvests and the downward turning-point by
deficient harvests. The further theory, that there are physical causes for a regular cycle of
good and bad harvests, is, of course, a different matter with which we are not concerned
here.

More recently, the theory has been advanced that it is bad harvests, not good harvests,
which are good for trade, either because bad harvests make the population ready to work
for a smaller real reward or because the resulting redistribution of purchasing-power is
held to be favourable to consumption. Needless to say, it is not these theories which I
have in mind in the above description of harvest phenomena as an explanation of the
trade cycle.

The agricultural causes of fluctuation are, however, much less important in the modern
world for two reasons. In the first place agricultural output is a much smaller proportion
of total output. And in the second place the development of a world market for most
agricultural products, drawing upon both hemispheres, leads to an averaging out of the
effects of good and bad seasons, the percentage fluctuation in the amount of the world
harvest being far less than the percentage fluctuations in the harvests of individual
countries. But in old days, when a country was mainly dependent on its own harvest, it is
difficult to see any possible cause of fluctuations in investment, except war, which was in
any way comparable in magnitude with changes in the carry-over of agricultural products.

Even to-day it is important to pay close attention to the part played by changes in the
stocks of raw materials, both agricultural and mineral, in the determination of the rate of
current investment. I should attribute the slow rate of recovery from a slump, after the
turning-point has been reached, mainly to the deflationary effect of the reduction of
redundant stocks to a normal level. At first the accumulation of stocks, which occurs after
the boom has broken, moderates the rate of the collapse; but we have to pay for this relief
later on in the damping-down of the subsequent rate of recovery. Sometimes, indeed, the
reduction of stocks may have to be virtually completed before any measurable degree of
recovery can be detected. For a rate of investment in other directions, which is sufficient
to produce an upward movement when there is no current disinvestment in stocks to set
off against it, may be quite inadequate so long as such disinvestment is still proceeding.

We have seen, I think, a signal example of this in the earlier phases of America's 'New
Deal'. When President Roosevelt's substantial loan expenditure began, stocks of all
kindsand particularly of agricultural productsstill stood at a very high level. The
'New Deal' partly consisted in a strenuous attempt to reduce these stocksby curtailment
of current output and in all sorts of ways. The reduction of stocks to a normal level was a
necessary processa phase which had to be endured. But so long as it lasted, namely,
about two years, it constituted a substantial offset to the loan expenditure which was
being incurred in other directions. Only when it had been completed was the way
prepared for substantial recovery.

Recent American experience has also afforded good examples of the part played by
fluctuations in the stocks of finished and unfinished goods'inventories' as it is
becoming usual to call themin causing the minor oscillations within the main
movement of the trade cycle. Manufacturers, setting industry in motion to provide for a
scale of consumption which is expected to prevail some months later, are apt to make
minor miscalculations, generally in the direction of running a little ahead of the facts.
When they discover their mistake they have to contract for a short time to a level below
that of current consumption so as to allow for the absorption of the excess inventories;
and the difference of pace between running a little ahead and dropping back again has
proved sufficient in its effect on the current rate of investment to display itself quite
clearly against the background of the excellently complete statistics now available in the
United States.

1. It is often convenient in contexts where there is no room for misunderstanding to write the
marginal efficiency of capital, where the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital is meant.

2. I have shown above (Chapter 12) that, although the private investor is seldom himself directly
responsible for new investment, nevertheless the entrepreneurs, who are directly responsible, will
 find it financially advantageous, and often unavoidable, to fall in with the ideas of the market,
even though they themselves are better instructed.

3. Some part of the discussion in my Treatise on Money, Book IV, bears upon the above.

4. On certain assumptions, however, as to the distribution of the propensity to consume through time,
investment which yielded a negative return might be advantageous in the sense that, for the
community as a whole, it would maximise satisfaction.

5. See below (p. 327) for some arguments which can be urged on the other side. For, if we are
precluded from making large changes in our present methods, I should agree that to raise the rate
of interest during a boom may be, in conceivable circumstances, the lesser evil.
Chapter 23

NOTES ON MERCANTILISM, THE USURY LAWS, STAMPED

MONEY AND THEORIES OF UNDER-CONSUMPTION

For some two hundred years both economic theorists and practical men did not doubt that
there is a peculiar advantage to a country in a favourable balance of trade, and grave
danger in an unfavourable balance, particularly if it results in an efflux of the precious
metals. But for the past one hundred years there has been a remarkable divergence of
opinion. The majority of statesmen and practical men in most countries, and nearly half
of them even in Great Britain, the home of the opposite view, have remained faithful to
the ancient doctrine; whereas almost all economic theorists have held that anxiety
concerning such matters is absolutely groundless except on a very short view, since the
mechanism of foreign trade is self-adjusting and attempts to interfere with it are not only
futile, but greatly impoverish those who practise them because they forfeit the advantages
of the international division of labour. It will be convenient, in accordance with tradition,
to designate the older opinion as mercantilism and the newer as free trade, though these
terms, since each of them has both a broader and a narrower signification, must be
interpreted with reference to the context.

Generally speaking, modern economists have maintained not merely that there is, as a
rule, a balance of gain from the international division of labour sufficient to outweigh
such advantages as mercantilist practice can fairly claim, but that the mercantilist
argument is based, from start to finish, on an intellectual confusion.

Marshall[1], for example, although his references to mercantilism are not altogether
unsympathetic, had no regard for their central theory as such and does not even mention
those elements of truth in their contentions which I shall examine below[2]. In the same
way, the theoretical concessions which free-trade economists have been ready to make in
contemporary controversies, relating, for example, to the encouragement of infant
industries or to the improvement of the terms of trade, are not concerned with the real
substance of the mercantilist case. During the fiscal controversy of the first quarter of the
present century I do not remember that any concession was ever allowed by economists
to the claim that protection might increase domestic employment. It will be fairest,
perhaps, to quote, as an example, what I wrote myself. So lately as 1923, as a faithful
pupil of the classical school who did not at that time doubt what he had been taught and
entertained on this matter no reserves at all, I wrote: 'If there is one thing that Protection
can not do, it is to cure Unemployment There are some arguments for Protection, based
upon its securing possible but improbable advantages, to which there is no simple answer.
But the claim to cure Unemployment involves the Protectionist fallacy in its grossest and
crudest form.'[3] As for earlier mercantilist theory, no intelligible account was available;
and we were brought up to believe that it was little better than nonsense. So absolutely
overwhelming and complete has been the domination of the classical school.

II

Let me first state in my own terms what now seems to me to be the element of scientific
truth in mercantilist doctrine. We will then compare this with the actual arguments of the
mercantilists. It should be understood that the advantages claimed are avowedly national
advantages and are unlikely to benefit the world as a whole.

When a country is growing in wealth somewhat rapidly, the further progress of this
happy state of affairs is liable to be interrupted, in conditions of laissez-faire, by the
insufficiency of the inducements to new investment. Given the social and political
environment and the national characteristics which determine the propensity to consume,
the well-being of a progressive state essentially depends, for the reasons we have already
explained, on the sufficiency of such inducements. They may be found either in home
investment or in foreign investment (including in the latter the accumulation of the
precious metals), which, between them, make up aggregate investment. In conditions in
which the quantity of aggregate investment is determined by the profit motive alone, the
opportunities for home investment will be governed, in the long run, by the domestic rate
of interest; whilst the volume of foreign investment is necessarily determined by the size
of the favourable balance of trade. Thus, in a society where there is no question of direct
investment under the aegis of public authority, the

economic objects, with which it is reasonable for the government to be preoccupied, are
the domestic rate of interest and the balance of foreign trade.

Now, if the wage-unit is somewhat stable and not liable to spontaneous changes of
significant magnitude (a condition which is almost always satisfied), if the state of
liquidity-preference is somewhat stable, taken as an average of its short-period
fluctuations, and if banking conventions are also stable, the rate of interest will tend to be
governed by the quantity of the precious metals, measured in terms of the wage-unit,
available to satisfy the community's desire for liquidity. At the same time, in an age in
which substantial foreign loans and the outright ownership of wealth located abroad are
scarcely practicable, increases and decreases in the quantity of the precious metals will
largely depend on whether the balance of trade is favourable or unfavourable.

Thus, as it happens, a preoccupation on the part of the authorities with a favourable

balance of trade served both purposes; and was, furthermore, the only available means of
promoting them. At a time when the authorities had no direct control over the domestic
rate of interest or the other inducements to home investment, measures to increase the
favourable balance of trade were the only direct means at their disposal for increasing
foreign investment; and, at the same time, the effect of a favourable balance of trade on
the influx of the precious metals was their only indirect means of reducing the domestic
rate of interest and so increasing the inducement to home investment.
There are, however, two limitations on the success of this policy which must not be
overlooked. If the domestic rate of interest falls so low that the volume of investment is
sufficiently stimulated to raise employment to a level which breaks through some of the
critical points at which the wage-unit rises, the increase in the domestic level of costs will
begin to react unfavourably on the balance of foreign trade, so that the effort to increase
the latter will have overreached and defeated itself. Again, if the domestic rate of interest
falls so low relatively to rates of interest elsewhere as to stimulate a volume of foreign
lending which is disproportionate to the favourable balance, there may ensue an efflux of
the precious metals sufficient to reverse the advantages previously obtained. The risk of
one or other of these limitations becoming operative is increased in the case of a country
which is large and internationally important by the fact that, in conditions where the
current output of the precious metals from the mines is on a relatively small scale, an
influx of money into one country means an efflux from another; so that the adverse
effects of rising costs and falling rates of interest at home may be accentuated (if the
mercantilist policy is pushed too far) by falling costs and rising rates of interest abroad.

The economic history of Spain in the latter part of the fifteenth and in the sixteenth
centuries provides an example of a country whose foreign trade was destroyed by the
effect on the wage-unit of an excessive abundance of the precious metals. Great Britain in
the pre-war years of the twentieth century provides an example of a country in which the
excessive facilities for foreign lending and the purchase of properties abroad frequently
stood in the way of the decline in the domestic rate of interest which was required to
ensure full employment at home. The history of India at all times has provided an
example of a country impoverished by a preference for liquidity amounting to so strong a
passion that even an enormous and chronic influx of the precious metals has been
insufficient to bring down the rate of interest to a level which was compatible with the
growth of real wealth.

Nevertheless, if we contemplate a society with a somewhat stable wage-unit, with

national characteristics which determine the propensity to consume and the preference for
liquidity, and with a monetary system which rigidly links the quantity of money to the
stock of the precious metals, it will be essential for the maintenance of prosperity that the
authorities should pay close attention to the state of the balance of trade. For a favourable
balance, provided it is not too large, will prove extremely stimulating; whilst an
unfavourable balance may soon produce a state of persistent depression.

It does not follow from this that the maximum degree of restriction of imports will
promote the maximum favourable balance of trade. The earlier mercantilists laid great
emphasis on this and were often to be found opposing trade restrictions because on a long
view they were liable to operate adversely to a favourable balance. It is, indeed, arguable
that in the special circumstances of mid-nineteenth-century Great Britain an almost
complete freedom of trade was the policy most conducive to the development of a
favourable balance. Contemporary experience of trade restrictions in post-war Europe
offers manifold examples of ill-conceived impediments on freedom which, designed to
improve the favourable balance, had in fact a contrary tendency.
For this and other reasons the reader must not reach a premature conclusion as to the
practical policy to which our argument leads up. There are strong presumptions of a
general character against trade restrictions unless they can be justified on special grounds.
The advantages of the international division of labour are real and substantial, even
though the classical school greatly overstressed them. The fact that the advantage which
our own country gains from a favourable balance is liable to involve an equal
disadvantage to some other country (a point to which the mercantilists were fully alive)
means not only that great moderation is necessary, so that a country secures for itself no
larger a share of the stock of the precious metals than is fair and reasonable, but also that
an immoderate policy may lead to a senseless international competition for a favourable
balance which injures all alike[4]. And finally, a policy of trade restrictions is a
treacherous instrument even for the attainment of its ostensible object, since private
interest, administrative incompetence and the intrinsic difficulty of the task may divert it
into producing results directly opposite to those intended.

Thus, the weight of my criticism is directed against the inadequacy of the theoretical
foundations of the laissez-faire doctrine upon which I was brought up and which for
many years I taught;against the notion that the rate of interest and the volume of
investment are self-adjusting at the optimum level, so that preoccupation with the balance
of trade is a waste of time. For we, the faculty of economists, prove to have been guilty of
presumptuous error in treating as a puerile obsession what for centuries has been a prime
object of practical statecraft.

Under the influence of this faulty theory the City of London gradually devised the most
dangerous technique for the maintenance of equilibrium which can possibly be imagined,
namely, the technique of bank rate coupled with a rigid parity of the foreign exchanges.
For this meant that the objective of maintaining a domestic rate of interest consistent with
full employment was wholly ruled out. Since, in practice, it is impossible to neglect the
balance of payments, a means of controlling it was evolved which, instead of protecting
the domestic rate of interest, sacrificed it to the operation of blind forces. Recently,
practical bankers in London have learnt much, and one can almost hope that in Great
Britain the technique of bank rate will never be used again to protect the foreign balance
in conditions in which it is likely to cause unemployment at home.

Regarded as the theory of the individual firm and of the distribution of the product
resulting from the employment of a given quantity of resources, the classical theory has
made a contribution to economic thinking which cannot be impugned. It is impossible to
think clearly on the subject without this theory as a part of one's apparatus of thought. I
must not be supposed to question this in calling attention to their neglect of what was
valuable in their predecessors. Nevertheless, as a contribution to statecraft, which is
concerned with the economic system as a whole and with securing the optimum
employment of the system's entire resources, the methods of the early pioneers of
economic thinking in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries may have attained to
fragments of practical wisdom which the unrealistic abstractions of Ricardo first forgot
and then obliterated. There was wisdom in their intense preoccupation with keeping
down the rate of interest by means of usury laws (to which we will return later in this
chapter), by maintaining the domestic stock of money and by discouraging rises in the
wage-unit; and in their readiness in the last resort to restore the stock of money by
devaluation, if it had become plainly deficient through an unavoidable foreign drain, a
rise in the wage-unit[5], or any other cause.

III

The early pioneers of economic thinking may have hit upon their maxims of practical
wisdom without having had much cognisance of the underlying theoretical grounds. Let
us, therefore, examine briefly the reasons they gave as well as what they recommended.
This is made easy by reference to Professor Heckscher's great work on Mercantilism, in
which the essential characteristics of economic thought over a period of two centuries are
made available for the first time to the general economic reader. The quotations which
follow are mainly taken from his pages[6].

(1) Mercantilists' thought never supposed that there was a self-adjusting tendency by
which the rate of interest would be established at the appropriate level. On the contrary
they were emphatic that an unduly high rate of interest was the main obstacle to the
growth of wealth; and they were even aware that the rate of interest depended on
liquidity-preference and the quantity of money. They were concerned both with
diminishing liquidity-preference and with increasing the quantity of money, and several
of them made it clear that their preoccupation with increasing the quantity of money was
due to their desire to diminish the rate of interest. Professor Heckscher sums up this
aspect of their theory as follows:

The position of the more perspicacious mercantilists was in this respect, as

in many others, perfectly clear within certain limits. For them, money
wasto use the terminology of to-daya factor of production, on the
same footing as land, sometimes regarded as 'artificial' wealth as distinct
from the 'natural' wealth; interest on capital was the payment for the
renting of money similar to rent for land. In so far as mercantilists sought
to discover objective reasons for the height of the rate of interestand
they did so more and more during this periodthey found such reasons in
the total quantity of money. From the abundant material available, only
the most typical examples will be selected, so as to demonstrate first and
foremost how lasting this notion was, how deep-rooted and independent of
practical considerations.

Both of the protagonists in the struggle over monetary policy and the East
India trade in the early 1620's in England were in entire agreement on this
point. Gerard Malynes stated, giving detailed reason for his assertion, that
'Plenty of money decreaseth usury in price or rate' (Lex Mercatoria and
Maintenance of Free Trade, 1622). His truculent and rather unscrupulous
adversary, Edward Misselden, replied that 'The remedy for Usury may be
plenty of money' (Free Trade or the Meanes to make Trade Florish, same
year). Of the leading writers of half a century later, Child, the omnipotent
 leader of the East India Company and its most skilful advocate, discussed
(1668) the question of how far the legal maximum rate of interest, which
he emphatically demanded, would result in drawing 'the money' of the
Dutch away from England. He found a remedy for this dreaded
disadvantage in the easier transference of bills of debt, if these were used
as currency, for this, he said, 'will certainly supply the defect of at least
one-half of all the ready money we have in use in the nation'. Petty, the
other writer, who was entirely unaffected by the clash of interests, was in
agreement with the rest when he explained the 'natural' fall in the rate of
interest from 10 per cent to 6 per cent by the increase in the amount of
money (Political Arithmetick, 1676), and advised lending at interest as an
appropriate remedy for a country with too much 'Coin' (Quantulumcunque
concerning Money, 1682).

This reasoning, naturally enough, was by no means confined to England.

Several years later (1701 and 1706), for example, French merchants and
statesmen complained of the prevailing scarcity of coin (disette des
espces) as the cause of the high interest rates, and they were anxious to
lower the rate of usury by increasing the circulation of money[7].

The great Locke was, perhaps, the first to express in abstract terms the relationship
between the rate of interest and the quantity of money in his controversy with Petty[8]. He
was opposing Petty's proposal of a maximum rate of interest on the ground that it was as
impracticable as to fix a maximum rent for land, since 'the natural Value of Money, as it
is apt to yield such an yearly Income by Interest, depends on the whole quantity of the
then passing Money of the Kingdom, in proportion to the whole Trade of the Kingdom
(i.e. the general Vent of all the commodities)'[9]. Locke explains that money has two
values: (i) its value in use which is given by the rate of interest and in this it has the
Nature of Land, the Income of one being called Rent, of the other, Use[10]', and (2) its
value in exchange 'and in this it has the Nature of a Commodity', its value in exchange
'depending only on the Plenty or Scarcity of Money in proportion to the Plenty or
Scarcity of those things and not on what Interest shall be'. Thus Locke was the parent of
twin quantity theories. In the first place he held that the rate of interest depended on the
proportion of the quantity of money (allowing for the velocity of circulation) to the total
value of trade. In the second place he held that the value of money in exchange depended
on the proportion of the quantity of money to the total volume of goods in the market.
Butstanding with one foot in the mercantilist world and with one foot in the classical
world[11]he was confused concerning the relation between these two proportions, and he
overlooked altogether the possibility of fluctuations in liquidity-preference. He was,
however, eager to explain that a reduction in the rate of interest has no direct effect on the
price-level and affects prices 'only as the Change of Interest in Trade conduces to the
bringing in or carrying out Money or Commodity, and so in time varying their Proportion
here in England from what it was before', i.e. if the reduction in the rate of interest leads
to the export of cash or an increase in output. But he never, I think, proceeds to a genuine
synthesis[12].
How easily the mercantilist mind distinguished between the rate of interest and the
marginal efficiency of capital is illustrated by a passage (printed in 1621) which Locke
quotes from A Letter to a friend concerning Usury: 'High Interest decays Trade. The
advantage from Interest is greater than the Profit from Trade, which makes the rich
Merchants give over, and put out their Stock to Interest, and the lesser Merchants Break.'
Fortrey (England's Interest and Improvement, 1663) affords another example of the stress
laid on a low rate of interest as a means of increasing wealth.

The mercantilists did not overlook the point that, if an excessive liquidity-preference
were to withdraw the influx of precious metals into hoards, the advantage to the rate of
interest would be lost. In some cases (e.g. Mun) the object of enhancing the power of the
State led them, nevertheless, to advocate the accumulation of state treasure. But others
frankly opposed this policy:

Schrtter, for instance, employed the usual mercantilist arguments in

drawing a lurid picture of how the circulation in the country would be
robbed of all its money through a greatly increasing state treasury. . .he,
too, drew a perfectly logical parallel between the accumulation of treasure
by the monasteries and the export surplus of precious metals, which, to
him, was indeed the worst possible thing which he could think of.
Davenant explained the extreme poverty of many Eastern nationswho
were believed to have more gold and silver than any other countries in the
worldby the fact that treasure 'is suffered to stagnate in the Princes'
Coffers'... If hoarding by the state was considered, at best, a doubtful boon,
and often a great danger, it goes without saying that private hoarding was
to be shunned like the pest. It was one of the tendencies against which
innumerable mercantilist writers thundered, and I do not think it would be
possible to find a single dissentient voice[13].

(2) The mercantilists were aware of the fallacy of cheapness and the danger that
excessive competition may turn the terms of trade against a country. Thus Malynes wrote
in his Lex Mercatoria (1622): 'Strive not to undersell others to the hurt of the
Commonwealth, under colour to increase trade: for trade doth not increase when
commodities are good cheap, because the cheapness proceedeth of the small request and
scarcity of money, which maketh things cheap: so that the contrary augmenteth trade
when there is plenty of money, and commodities become dearer being in request'[14].
Professor Heckscher sums up as follows this strand in mercantilist thought:

In the course of a century and a half this standpoint was formulated again
and again in this way, that a country with relatively less money than other
countries must 'sell cheap and buy dear'. . .

Even in the original edition of the Discourse of the Common Weal, that is
in the middle of the 16th century, this attitude was already manifested.
Hales said, in fact, 'And yet if strangers should be content to take but our
wares for theirs, what should let them to advance the price of other things
 (meaning: among others, such as we buy from them), though ours were
good cheap unto them? And then shall we be still losers, and they at the
winning hand with us, while they sell dear and yet buy ours good cheap,
and consequently enrich themselves and impoverish us. Yet had I rather
advance our wares in price, as they advance theirs, as we now do; though
some be losers thereby, and yet not so many as should be the other way.'
On this point he had the unqualified approval of his editor several decades
later (1581). In the 17th century, this attitude recurred again without any
fundamental change in significance. Thus, Malynes believed this
unfortunate position to be the result of what he dreaded above all things,
i.e. a foreign under-valuation of the English exchange. . .The same
conception then recurred continually. In his Verbum Sapienti (written
1665, published 1691), Petty believed that the violent efforts to increase
the quantity of money could only cease 'when we have certainly more
money than any of our Neighbour States (though never so little), both in
Arithmetical and Geometrical proportion'. During the period between the
writing and the publication of this work, Coke declared, 'If our Treasure
were more than our Neighbouring Nations, I did not care whether we had
one fifth part of the Treasure we now have' (1675) [15].

(3) The mercantilists were the originals of 'the fear of goods'[16] and the scarcity of money
as causes of unemployment which the classicals were to denounce two centuries later as
an absurdity:

One of the earliest instances of the application of the unemployment

argument as a reason for the prohibition of imports is to be found in
Florence in the year 1426 The English legislation on the matter goes
back to at least 1455 An almost contemporary French decree of 1466,
forming the basis of the silk industry of Lyons, later to become so famous,
was less interesting in so far as it was not actually directed against foreign
goods. But it, too, mentioned the possibility of giving work to tens of
thousands of unemployed men and women. It is seen how very much this
argument was in the air at the time. . .

The first great discussion of this matter, as of nearly all social and
economic problems, occurred in England in the middle of the i6th century
or rather earlier, during the reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI. In this
connection we cannot but mention a series of writings, written apparently
at the latest in the 1530's, two of which at any rate are believed to have
been by Clement Armstrong. . .He formulates it, for example, in the
following terms: 'By reason of great abundance of strange merchandises
and wares brought yearly into England hath not only caused scarcity of
money, but hath destroyed all handicrafts, whereby great number of
common people should have works to get money to pay for their meat and
drink, which of very necessity must live idly and beg and steal'.
 The best instance to my knowledge of a typically mercantilist discussion
of a state of affairs of this kind is the debates in the English House of
Commons concerning the scarcity of money, which occurred in 1621,
when a serious depression had set in, particularly in the cloth export. The
conditions were described very clearly by one of the most influential
members of parliament, Sir Edwin Sandys. He stated that the farmer and
the artificer had to suffer almost everywhere, that looms were standing
idle for want of money in the country, and that peasants were forced to
repudiate their contracts, 'not (thanks be to God) for want of fruits of the
earth, but for want of money'. The situation led to detailed enquiries into
where the money could have got to, the want of which was felt so bitterly.
Numerous attacks were directed against all persons who were supposed to
have contributed either to an export (export surplus) of precious metals, or
to their disappearance on account of corresponding activities within the
country[17].

Mercantilists were conscious that their policy, as Professor Heckscher puts it, 'killed two
birds with one stone'. 'On the one hand the country was rid of an unwelcome surplus of
goods, which was believed to result in unemployment, while on the other the total stock
of money in the country was increased'[18], with the resulting advantages of a fall in the
rate of interest.

It is impossible to study the notions to which the mercantilists were led by their actual
experiences, without perceiving that there has been a chronic tendency throughout human
history for the propensity to save to be stronger than the inducement to invest. The
weakness of the inducement to invest has been at all times the key to the economic
problem. To-day the explanation of the weakness of this inducement may chiefly lie in
the extent of existing accumulations; whereas, formerly, risks and hazards of all kinds
may have played a larger part. But the result is the same. The desire of, the individual to
augment his personal wealth by abstaining from consumption has usually been stronger
than the inducement to the entrepreneur to augment the national wealth by employing
labour on the construction of durable assets.

(4) The mercantilists were under no illusions as to the nationalistic character of their
policies and their tendency to promote war. It was national advantage and relative
strength at which they were admittedly aiming[19].

We may criticise them for the apparent indifference with which they accepted this
inevitable consequence of an international monetary system. But intellectually their
realism is much preferable to the confused thinking of contemporary advocates of an
international fixed gold standard and laissez-faire in international lending, who believe
that it is precisely these policies which will best promote peace.

For in an economy subject to money contracts and customs more or less fixed over an
appreciable period of time, where the quantity of the domestic circulation and the
domestic rate of interest are primarily determined by the balance of payments, as they
were in Great Britain before the war, there is no orthodox means open to the authorities
for countering unemployment at home except by struggling for an export surplus and an
import of the monetary metal at the expense of their neighbours. Never in history was
there a method devised of such efficacy for setting each country's advantage at variance
with its neighbours' as the international gold (or, formerly, silver) standard. For it made
domestic prosperity directly dependent on a competitive pursuit of markets and a
competitive appetite for the precious metals. When by happy accident the new supplies of
gold and silver were comparatively abundant, the struggle might be somewhat abated.
But with the growth of wealth and the diminishing marginal propensity to consume, it has
tended to become increasingly internecine. The part played by orthodox economists,
whose common sense has been insufficient to check their faulty logic, has been disastrous
to the latest act. For when in their blind struggle for an escape, some countries have
thrown off the obligations which had previously rendered impossible an autonomous rate
of interest, these economists have taught that a restoration of the former shackles is a
necessary first step to a general recovery.

In truth the opposite holds good. It is the policy of an autonomous rate of interest,
unimpeded by international preoccupations, and of a national investment programme
directed to an optimum level of domestic employment which is twice blessed in the sense
that it helps ourselves and our neighbours at the same time. And it is the simultaneous
pursuit of these policies by all countries together which is capable of restoring economic
health and strength internationally, whether we measure it by the level of domestic
employment or by the volume of international trade[20].

IV

The mercantilists perceived the existence of the problem without being able to push their
analysis to the point of solving it. But the classical school ignored the problem, as a
consequence of introducing into their premises conditions which involved its non-
existence; with the result of creating a cleavage between the conclusions of economic
theory and those of common sense. The extraordinary achievement of the classical theory
was to overcome the beliefs of the 'natural man' and, at the same time, to be wrong. As
Professor Heckscher expresses it:

If, then, the underlying attitude towards money and the material from
which money was created did not alter in the period between the Crusades
and the 18th century, it follows that we are dealing with deep-rooted
notions. Perhaps the same notions have persisted even beyond the 500
years included in that period, even though not nearly to the same degree as
the 'fear of goods'. With the exception of the period of laissez-faire, no age
has been free from these ideas. It was only the unique intellectual tenacity
of laissez-faire that for a time overcame the beliefs of the 'natural man' on
this point[21].

It required the unqualified faith of doctrinaire laissez-faire to wipe out the

'fear of goods' [which] is the most natural attitude of the 'natural man' in
 a money economy. Free Trade denied the existence of factors which
appeared to be obvious, and was doomed to be discredited in the eyes of
the man in the street as soon as laissez-faire could no longer hold the
minds of men enchained in its ideology[22].

I remember Bonar Law's mingled rage and perplexity in face of the economists, because
they were denying what was obvious. He was deeply troubled for an explanation. One
recurs to the analogy between the sway of the classical school of economic theory and
that of certain religions. For it is a far greater exercise of the potency of an idea to
exorcise the obvious than to introduce into men's common notions the recondite and the
remote.

There remains an allied, but distinct, matter where for centuries, indeed for several
millenniums, enlightened opinion held for certain and obvious a doctrine which the
classical school has repudiated as childish, but which deserves rehabilitation and honour.
I mean the doctrine that the rate of interest is not self-adjusting at a level best suited to the
social advantage but constantly tends to rise too high, so that a wise government is
concerned to curb it by statute and custom and even by invoking the sanctions of the
moral law.

Provisions against usury are amongst the most ancient economic practices of which we
have record. The destruction of the inducement to invest by an excessive liquidity-
preference was the outstanding evil, the prime impediment to the growth of wealth, in the
ancient and medieval worlds. And naturally so, since certain of the risks and hazards of
economic life diminish the marginal efficiency of capital whilst others serve to increase
the preference for liquidity. In a world, therefore, which no one reckoned to be safe, it
was almost inevitable that the rate of interest, unless it was curbed by every instrument at
the disposal of society, would rise too high to permit of an adequate inducement to invest.

I was brought up to believe that the attitude of the Medieval Church to the rate of interest
was inherently absurd, and that the subtle discussions aimed at distinguishing the return
on money-loans from the return to active investment were merely Jesuitical attempts to
find a practical escape from a foolish theory. But I now read these discussions as an
honest intellectual effort to keep separate what the classical theory has inextricably
confused together, namely, the rate of interest and the marginal efficiency of capital. For
it now seems clear that the disquisitions of the schoolmen were directed towards the
elucidation of a formula which should allow the schedule of the marginal efficiency of
capital to be high, whilst using rule and custom and the moral law to keep down the rate
of interest.

Even Adam Smith was extremely moderate in his attitude to the usury laws. For lie was
well aware that individual savings may be absorbed either by investment or by debts, and
that there is no security that they will find an outlet in the former. Furthermore, he
favoured a low rate of interest as increasing the chance of savings finding their outlet in
new investment rather than in debts; and for this reason, in a passage for which he was
severely taken to task by Bentham[23], he defended a moderate application of the usury
laws[24]. Moreover, Bentham's criticisms were mainly on the ground that Adam Smith's
Scotch caution was too severe on 'projectors' and that a maximum rate of interest would
leave too little margin for the reward of legitimate and socially advisable risks. For
Bentham understood by projectors 'all such persons, as, in the pursuit of wealth, or even
of any other object, endeavour, by the assistance of wealth, to strike into any channel of
invention. . .upon all such persons as, in the line of any of their pursuits, aim at anything
that can be called improvement. . .It falls, in short, upon every application of the human
powers, in which ingenuity stands in need of wealth for its assistance.' Of course
Bentham is right in protesting against laws which stand in the way of taking legitimate
risks. 'A prudent man', Bentham continues, 'will not, in these circumstances, pick out the
good projects from the bad, for he will not meddle with projects at all.'[25]

It may be doubted, perhaps, whether the above is just what Adam Smith intended by his
term. Or is it that we are hearing in Bentham (though writing in March 1787 from
'Crichoff in White Russia') the voice of nineteenth-century England speaking to the
eighteenth? For nothing short of the exuberance of the greatest age of the inducement to
investment could have made it possible to lose sight of the theoretical possibility of its
insufficiency.

VI

It is convenient to mention at this point the strange, unduly neglected prophet Silvio
Gesell (18621930), whose work contains flashes of deep insight and who only just
failed to reach down to the essence of the matter. In the post-war years his devotees
bombarded me with copies of his works; yet, owing to certain palpable defects in the
argument, I entirely failed to discover their merit. As is often the case with imperfectly
analysed intuitions, their significance only became apparent after I had reached my own
conclusions in my own way. Meanwhile, like other academic economists, I treated his
profoundly original strivings as being no better than those of a crank. Since few of the
readers of this book are likely to be well acquainted with the significance of Gesell, I will
give to him what would be otherwise a disproportionate space.

Gesell was a successful German[26] merchant in Buenos Aires who was led to the study of
monetary problems by the crisis of the late 'eighties, which was especially violent in the
Argentine, his first work, Die Reformation im Mnzwesen als Brcke zum socialen Staat,
being published in Buenos Aires in 1891. His fundamental ideas on money were
published in Buenos Aires in the same year under the title Nervus rerum, and many books
and pamphlets followed until he retired to Switzerland in 1906 as a man of some means,
able to devote the last decades of his life to the two most delightful occupations open to
those who do not have to earn their living, authorship and experimental farming.

The first section of his standard work was published in 1906 at Les Hauts Geneveys,
Switzerland, under the title Die Verwirklichung des Rechtes auf dem vollen Arbeitsertrag,
and the second section in 1911 at Berlin under the title Die neue Lehre vom Zins. The two
together were published in Berlin and in Switzerland during the war (1916) and reached a
sixth edition during his lifetime under the title Die natrliche Wirtschaftsordnung durch
Freiland und Freigeld, the English version (translated by Mr Philip Pye) being called The
Natural Economic Order. In April 1919 Gesell joined the short-lived Soviet cabinet of
Bavaria as their Minister of Finance, being subsequently tried by court-martial. The last
decade of his life was spent in Berlin and Switzerland and devoted to propaganda. Gesell,
drawing to himself the semi-religious fervour which had formerly centred round Henry
George, became the revered prophet of a cult with many thousand disciples throughout
the world. The first international convention of the Swiss and German FreilandFreigeld
Bund and similar organisations from many countries was held in Basle in 1923. Since his
death in 1930 much of the peculiar type of fervour which doctrines such as his are
capable of exciting has been diverted to other (in my opinion less eminent) prophets. Dr
Buchi is the leader of the movement in England, but its literature seems to be distributed
from San Antonio, Texas, its main strength lying to-day in the United States, where
Professor Irving Fisher, alone amongst academic economists, has recognised its
significance.

In spite of the prophetic trappings with which his devotees have decorated him, Gesell's
main book is written in cool, scientific language; though it is suffused throughout by a
more passionate, a more emotional devotion to social justice than some think decent in a
scientist. The part which derives from Henry George[27], though doubtless an important
source of the movement's strength, is of altogether secondary interest. The purpose of the
book as a whole may be described as the establishment of an anti-Marxian socialism, a
reaction against laissez-faire built on theoretical foundations totally unlike those of Marx
in being based on a repudiation instead of on an acceptance of the classical hypotheses,
and on an unfettering of competition instead of its abolition. I believe that the future will
learn more from the spirit of Gesell than from that of Marx. The preface to The Natural
Economic Order will indicate to the reader, if he will refer to it, the moral quality of
Gesell. The answer to Marxism is, I think, to be found along the lines of this preface.

Gesell's specific contribution to the theory of money and interest is as follows. In the first
place, he distinguishes clearly between the rate of interest and the marginal efficiency of
capital, and he argues that it is the rate of interest which sets a limit to the rate of growth
of real capital. Next, he points out that the rate of interest is a purely monetary
phenomenon and that the peculiarity of money, from which flows the significance of the
money rate of interest, lies in the fact that its ownership as a means of storing wealth
involves the holder in negligible carrying charges, and that forms of wealth, such as
stocks of commodities which do involve carrying charges, in fact yield a return because
of the standard set by money. He cites the comparative stability of the rate of interest
throughout the ages as evidence that it cannot depend on purely physical characters,
inasmuch as the variation of the latter from one epoch to another must have been
incalculably greater than the observed changes in the rate of interest; i.e. (in my
terminology) the rate of interest, which depends on constant psychological characters, has
remained stable, whilst the widely fluctuating characters, which primarily determine the
schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital, have determined not the rate of interest but
the rate at which the (more or less) given rate of interest allows the stock of real capital to
grow.

But there is a great defect in Gesell's theory. He shows how it is only the existence of a
rate of money interest which allows a yield to be obtained from lending out stocks of
commodities. His dialogue between Robinson Crusoe and a stranger[28] is a most excellent
economic parableas good as anything of the kind that has been writtento
demonstrate this point. But, having given the reason why the money-rate of interest
unlike most commodity rates of interest cannot be negative, he altogether overlooks the
need of an explanation why the money-rate of interest is positive, and he fails to explain
why the money-rate of interest is not governed (as the classical school maintains) by the
standard set by the yield on productive capital. This is because the notion of liquidity-
preference had escaped him. He has constructed only half a theory of the rate of interest.

The incompleteness of his theory is doubtless the explanation of his work having suffered
neglect at the hands of the academic world. Nevertheless he had carried his theory far
enough to lead him to a practical recommendation, which may carry with it the essence of
what is needed, though it is not feasible in the form in which he proposed it. He argues
that the growth of real capital is held back by the money-rate of interest, and that if this
brake were removed the growth of real capital would be, in the modern world, so rapid
that a zero money-rate of interest would probably be justified, not indeed forthwith, but
within a comparatively short period of time. Thus the prime necessity is to reduce the
money-rate of interest, and this, he pointed out, can be effected by causing money to
incur carrying-costs just like other stocks of barren goods. This led him to the famous
prescription of 'stamped' money, with which his name is chiefly associated and which has
received the blessing of Professor Irving Fisher. According to this proposal currency
notes (though it would clearly need to apply as well to some forms at least of bank-
money) would only retain their value by being stamped each month, like an insurance
card, with stamps purchased at a post office. The cost of the stamps could, of course, be
fixed at any appropriate figure. According to my theory it should be roughly equal to the
excess of the money-rate of interest (apart from the stamps) over the marginal efficiency
of capital corresponding to a rate of new investment compatible with full employment.
The actual charge suggested by Gesell was 1 per mil. per week, equivalent to 5.2 per cent
per annum. This would be too high in existing conditions, but the correct figure, which
would have to be changed from time to time, could only be reached by trial and error.

The idea behind stamped money is sound. It is, indeed, possible that means might be
found to apply it in practice on a modest scale. But there are many difficulties which
Gesell did not face. In particular, he was unaware that money was not unique in having a
liquidity-premium attached to it, but differed only in degree from many other articles,
deriving its importance from having a greater liquidity-premium than any other article.
Thus if currency notes were to be deprived of their liquidity-premium by the stamping
system, a long series of substitutes would step into their shoesbank-money, debts at
call, foreign money, jewellery and the precious metals generally, and so forth. As I have
mentioned above, there have been times when it was probably the craving for the
ownership of land, independently of its yield, which served to keep up the rate of
interest;though under Gesell's system this possibility would have been eliminated by
land nationalisation.

VII

The theories which we have examined above are directed, in substance, to the constituent
of effective demand which depends on the sufficiency of the inducement to invest. It is
no new thing, however, to ascribe the evils of unemployment to the insufficiency of the
other constituent, namely, the insufficiency of the propensity to consume. But this
alternative explanation of the economic evils of the dayequally unpopular with the
classical economistsplayed a much smaller part in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century
thinking and has only gathered force in comparatively recent times.

Though complaints of under-consumption were a very subsidiary aspect of mercantilist

thought, Professor Heckscher quotes a number of examples of what he calls 'the deep-
rooted belief in the utility of luxury and the evil of thrift. Thrift, in fact, was regarded as
the cause of unemployment, and for two reasons: in the first place, because real income
was believed to diminish by the amount of money which did not enter into exchange, and
secondly, because saving was believed to withdraw money from circulation.'[29] In 1598
Laffemas (Les Trsors et richesses pour mettre l'Estat en Splendeur) denounced the
objectors to the use of French silks on the ground that all purchasers of French luxury
goods created a livelihood for the poor, whereas the miser caused them to die in
distress'[30]. In 1662 Petty justified 'entertainments, magnificent shews, triumphal arches,
etc.', on the ground that their costs flowed back into the pockets of brewers, bakers,
tailors, shoemakers and so forth. Fortrey justified 'excess of apparel'. Von Schrtter
(i686) deprecated sumptuary regulations and declared that he would wish that display in
clothing and the like were even greater. Barbon (1690) wrote that 'Prodigality is a vice
that is prejudicial to the Man, but not to trade Covetousness is a Vice, prejudicial both
to Man and Trade.'[31] In 1695 Cary argued that if everybody spent more, all would obtain
larger incomes 'and might then live more plentifully'[32].

But it was by Bernard Mandeville's Fable of the Bees that Barbon's opinion was mainly
popularised, a book convicted as a nuisance by the grand jury of Middlesex in 1723,
which stands out in the history of the moral sciences for its scandalous reputation. Only
one man is recorded as having spoken a good word for it, namely Dr Johnson, who
declared that it did not puzzle him, but 'opened his eyes into real life very much'. The
nature of the book's wickedness can be best conveyed by Leslie Stephen's summary in the
Dictionary of National Biography:

Mandeville gave great offence by this book, in which a cynical system of

morality was made attractive by ingenious paradoxes. . .His doctrine that
prosperity was increased by expenditure rather than by saving fell in with
many current economic fallacies not yet extinct[33]. Assuming with the
ascetics that human desires were essentially evil and therefore produced
'private vices' and assuming with the common view that wealth was a
 'public benefit', he easily showed that all civilisation implied the
development of vicious propensities. . .

The text of the Fable of the Bees is an allegorical poem'The Grumbling Hive, or
Knaves turned honest', in which is set forth the appalling plight of a prosperous
community in which all the citizens suddenly take it into their heads to abandon luxurious
living, and the State to cut down armaments, in the interests of Saving:

No Honour now could be content,

To live and owe for what was spent,
Liv'ries in Broker's shops are hung;
They part with Coaches for a song;
Sell stately Horses by whole sets
and Country-Houses to pay debts.
Vain cost is shunn'd as moral Fraud;
They have no Forces kept Abroad;
Laugh at th' Esteem of Foreigners,
And empty Glory got by Wars;
They fight, but for their Country's sake,
When Right or Liberty's at Stake.

The haughty Chloe:

Contracts th' expensive Bill of Fare,

And wears her strong Suit a whole Year.

And what is the result?

Now mind the glorious Hive, and see

How Honesty and Trade agree:
The Shew is gone, it thins apace;
And looks with quite another Face,
For 'twas not only they that went,
By whom vast sums were yearly spent;
But Multitudes that lived on them,
Were daily forc'd to do the same.
In vain to other Trades they'd fly;
All were o'er-stocked accordingly.
The price of Land and Houses falls;
Mirac'lous Palaces whose Walls,
Like those of Thebes, were rais'd by Play,
Are to be let. . .
The Building Trade is quite destroy'd,
Artificers are not employ'd;
No limner for his Art is fam'd,
Stone-cutters, Carvers are not nam'd.
 So 'The Moral' is:

Bare Virtue can't make Nations live

In Splendour. They that would revive
A Golden Age, must be as free,
For Acorns as for Honesty.

Two extracts from the commentary which follows the allegory will show that the above
was not without a theoretical basis:

As this prudent economy, which some people call Saving, is in private

families the most certain method to increase an estate, so some imagine
that, whether a country be barren or fruitful, the same method if generally
pursued (which they think practicable) will have the same effect upon a
whole nation, and that, for example, the English might be much richer
than they are, if they would be as frugal as some of their neighbours. This,
I think, is an error[34].

On the contrary, Mandeville concludes:

The great art to make a nation happy, and what we call flourishing,
consists in giving everybody an opportunity of being employed; which to
compass, let a Government's first care be to promote as great a variety of
Manufactures, Arts and Handicrafts as human wit can invent; and the
second to encourage Agriculture and Fishery in all their branches, that the
whole Earth may be forced to exert itself as well as Man. It is from this
Policy and not from the trifling regulations of Lavishness and Frugality
that the greatness and felicity of Nations must be expected; for let the
value of Gold and Silver rise or fall, the enjoyment of all Societies will
ever depend upon the Fruits of the Earth and the Labour of the People;
both which joined together are a more certain, a more inexhaustible and a
more real Treasure than the Gold of Brazil or the Silver of Potosi.

No wonder that such wicked sentiments called down the opprobrium of two centuries of
moralists and economists who felt much more virtuous in possession of their austere
doctrine that no sound remedy was discoverable except in the utmost of thrift and
economy both by the individual and by the state. Petty's 'entertainments, magnificent
shews, triumphal arches, etc.' gave place to the penny-wisdom of Gladstonian finance and
to a state system which 'could not afford' hospitals, open spaces, noble buildings, even the
preservation of its ancient monuments, far less the splendours of music and the drama, all
of which were consigned to the private charity or magnanimity of improvident
individuals.

The doctrine did not reappear in respectable circles for another century, until in the later
phase of Malthus the notion of the insufficiency of effective demand takes a definite
place as a scientific explanation of unemployment. Since I have already dealt with this
somewhat fully in my essay on Malthus[35], it will be sufficient if I repeat here one or two
characteristic passages which I have already quoted in my essay:

We see in almost every part of the world vast powers of production which
are not put into action, and I explain this phenomenon by saying that from
the want of a proper distribution of the actual produce adequate motives
are not furnished to continued production. . .I distinctly maintain that an
attempt to accumulate very rapidly, which necessarily implies a
considerable diminution of unproductive consumption, by greatly
impairing the usual motives to production must prematurely check the
progress of wealth. . . But if it be true that an attempt to accumulate very
rapidly will occasion such a division between labour and profits as almost
to destroy both the motive and the power of future accumulation and
consequently the power of maintaining and employing an increasing
population, must it not be acknowledged that such an attempt to
accumulate, or that saving too much, may be really prejudicial to a
country? [36]

The question is whether this stagnation of capital, and subsequent

stagnation in the demand for labour arising from increased production
without an adequate proportion of unproductive consumption on the part
of the landlords and capitalists, could take place without prejudice to the
country, without occasioning a less degree both of happiness and wealth
than would have occurred if the unproductive consumption of the
landlords and capitalists had been so proportioned to the natural surplus of
the society as to have continued uninterrupted the motives to production,
and prevented first an unnatural demand for labour and then a necessary
and sudden diminution of such demand. But if this be so, how can it be
said with truth that parsimony, though it may be prejudicial to the
producers, cannot be prejudicial to the state; or that an increase of
unproductive consumption among landlords and capitalists may not
sometimes be the proper remedy for a state of things in which the motives
to production fail? [37]

Adam Smith has stated that capitals are increased by parsimony, that every
frugal man is a public benefactor, and that the increase of wealth depends
upon the balance of produce above consumption. That these propositions
are true to a great extent is perfectly unquestionable. . .But it is quite
obvious that they are not true to an indefinite extent, and that the
principles of saving, pushed to excess, would destroy the motive to
production. If every person were satisfied with the simplest food, the
poorest clothing, and the meanest houses, it is certain that no other sort of
food, clothing, and lodging would be in existence. . .The two extremes are
obvious; and it follows that there must be some intermediate point, though
the resources of political economy may not be able to ascertain it, where,
 taking into consideration both the power to produce and the will to
consume, the encouragement to the increase of wealth is the greatest. [38]

Of all the opinions advanced by able and ingenious men, which I have
ever met with, the opinion of M. Say, which states that, Un produit
consomm ou dtruit est un dbouch ferm (I. i. ch. 15), appears to me to
be the most directly opposed to just theory, and the most uniformly
contradicted by experience. Yet it directly follows from the new doctrine,
that commodities are to be considered only in their relation to each
other,not to the consumers. What, I would ask, would become of the
demand for commodities, if all consumption except bread and water were
suspended for the next half-year? What an accumulation of commodities!
Quels debouchs! What a prodigious market would this event occasion! [39]

Ricardo, however, was stone-deaf to what Malthus was saying. The last echo of the
controversy is to be found in John Stuart Mill's discussion of his wages-fund theory[40],
which in his own mind played a vital part in his rejection of the later phase of Malthus,
amidst the discussions of which he had, of course, been brought up. Mill's successors
rejected his wages-fund theory but overlooked the fact that Mill's refutation of Malthus
depended on it. Their method was to dismiss the problem from the corpus of economics
not by solving it but by not mentioning it. It altogether disappeared from controversy. Mr
Cairncross, searching recently for traces of it amongst the minor Victorians[41], has found
even less, perhaps, than might have been expected[42]. Theories of under-consumption
hibernated until the appearance in 1889 of The Physiology of Industry, by J. A. Hobson
and A. F. Mummery, the first and most significant of many volumes in which for nearly
fifty years Mr Hobson has flung himself with unflagging, but almost unavailing, ardour
and courage against the ranks of orthodoxy. Though it is so completely forgotten to-day,
the publication of this book marks, in a sense, an epoch in economic thought[43].

The Physiology of Industry was written in collaboration with A. F. Mummery. Mr

Hobson has told how the book came to be written as follows[44]:

It was not until the middle 'eighties that my economic heterodoxy began to
take shape. Though the Henry George campaign against land values and
the early agitation of various socialist groups against the visible
oppression of the working classes, coupled with the revelations of the two
Booths regarding the poverty of London, made a deep impression on my
feelings, they did not destroy my faith in Political Economy. That came
from what may be called an accidental contact. While teaching at a school
in Exeter I came into personal relations with a business man named
Mummery, known then and afterwards as a great mountaineer who had
discovered another way up the Matterhorn and who, in 1895, was killed in
an attempt to climb the famous Himalayan mountain Nanga Parbat. My
intercourse with him, I need hardly say, did not lie on this physical plane.
But he was a mental climber as well, with a natural eye for a path of his
own finding and a sublime disregard of intellectual authority. This man
 entangled me in a controversy about excessive saving, which he regarded
as responsible for the under-employment of capital and labour in periods
of bad trade. For a long time I sought to counter his arguments by the use
of the orthodox economic weapons. But at length he convinced me and I
went in with him to elaborate the over-saving argument in a book entitled
The Physiology of Industry, which was published in 1889. This was the
first open step in my heretical career, and I did not in the least realise its
momentous consequences. For just at that time I had given up my
scholastic post and was opening a new line of work as University
Extension Lecturer in Economics and Literature. The first shock came in a
refusal of the London Extension Board to allow me to offer courses of
Political Economy. This was due, I learned, to the intervention of an
Economic Professor who had read my book and considered it as
equivalent in rationality to an attempt to prove the flatness of the earth.
How could there be any limit to the amount of useful saving when every
item of saving went to increase the capital structure and the fund for
paying wages? Sound economists could not fail to view with horror an
argument which sought to check the source of all industrial progress[45].
Another interesting personal experience helped to bring home to me the
sense of my iniquity. Though prevented from lecturing on economics in
London, I had been allowed by the greater liberality of the Oxford
University Extension Movement to address audiences in the Provinces,
confining myself to practical issues relating to working-class life. Now it
happened at this time that the Charity Organisation Society was planning a
lecture campaign upon economic subjects and invited me to prepare a
course. I had expressed my willingness to undertake this new lecture work,
when suddenly, without explanation, the invitation was withdrawn. Even
then I hardly realised that in appearing to question the virtue of unlimited
thrift I had committed the unpardonable sin.

In this early work Mr Hobson with his collaborator expressed himself with more direct
reference to the classical economics (in which he had been brought up) than in his later
writings; and for this reason, as well as because it is the first expression of his theory, I
will quote from it to show how significant and well-founded were the authors' criticisms
and intuitions. They point out in their preface as follows the nature of the conclusions
which they attack:

Saving enriches and spending impoverishes the community along with the
individual, and it may be generally defined as an assertion that the
effective love of money is the root of all economic good. Not merely does
it enrich the thrifty individual himself, but it raises wages, gives work to
the unemployed, and scatters blessings on every side. From the daily
papers to the latest economic treatise, from the pulpit to the House of
Commons, this conclusion is reiterated and re-stated till it appears
positively impious to question it. Yet the educated world, supported by the
majority of economic thinkers, up to the publication of Ricardo's work
 strenuously denied this doctrine, and its ultimate acceptance was
exclusively due to their inability to meet the now exploded wages-fund
doctrine. That the conclusion should have survived the argument on which
it logically stood, can be explained on no other hypothesis than the
commanding authority of the great men who asserted it. Economic critics
have ventured to attack the theory in detail, but they have shrunk appalled
from touching its main conclusions. Our purpose is to show that these
conclusions are not tenable, that an undue exercise of the habit of saving is
possible, and that such undue exercise impoverishes the Community,
throws labourers out of work, drives down wages, and spreads that gloom
and prostration through the commercial world which is known as
Depression in Trade

The object of production is to provide 'utilities and conveniences' for

consumers, and the process is a continuous one from the first handling of
the raw material to the moment when it is finally consumed as a utility or
a convenience. The only use of Capital being to aid the production of these
utilities and conveniences, the total used will necessarily vary with the
total of utilities and conveniences daily or weekly consumed. Now saving,
while it increases the existing aggregate of Capital, simultaneously
reduces the quantity of utilities and conveniences consumed; any undue
exercise of this habit must, therefore, cause an accumulation of Capital in
excess of that which is required for use, and this excess will exist in the
form of general over-production[46].

In the last sentence of this passage there appears the root of Hobson's mistake, namely,
his supposing that it is a ease of excessive saving causing the actual accumulation of
capital in excess of what is required, which is, in fact, a secondary evil which only occurs
through mistakes of foresight; whereas the primary

evil is a propensity to save in conditions of full employment more than the equivalent of
the capital which is required, thus preventing full employment except when there is a
mistake of foresight. A page or two later, however, he puts one half of the matter, as it
seems to me, with absolute precision, though still overlooking the possible role of
changes in the rate of interest and in the state of business confidence, factors which he
presumably takes as given:

We are thus brought to the conclusion that the basis on which all
economic teaching since Adam Smith has stood, viz. that the quantity
annually produced is determined by the aggregates of Natural Agents,
Capital, and Labour available, is erroneous, and that, on the contrary, the
quantity produced, while it can never exceed the limits imposed by these
aggregates, may be, and actually is, reduced far below this maximum by
the check that undue saving and the consequent accumulation of over-
supply exerts on production; i.e. that in the normal state of modern
 industrial Communities, consumption limits production and not production
consumption[47].

Finally he notices the bearing of his theory on the validity of the orthodox Free Trade
arguments:

We also note that the charge of commercial imbecility, so freely launched

by orthodox economists against our American cousins and other
Protectionist Communities, can no longer be maintained by any of the
Free Trade arguments hitherto adduced, since all these are based on the
assumption that over-supply is impossible[48].

The subsequent argument is, admittedly, incomplete. But it is the first explicit statement
of the fact that capital is brought into existence not by the propensity to save but in
response to the demand resulting from actual and prospective consumption. The
following portmanteau quotation indicates the line of thought:

It should be clear that the capital of a community cannot be

advantageously increased without a subsequent increase in consumption of
commodities Every increase an saving and in capital requires, in order
to be effectual, a corresponding increase in immediately future
consumption[49]. And when we say future consumption, we do not refer to
a future of ten, twenty, or fifty years hence, but to a future that is but little
removed from the present. . .If increased thrift or caution induces people
to save more in the present, they must consent to consume more in the
future[50]. No more capital can economically exist at any point in the
productive process than is required to furnish commodities for the current
rate of consumption[51]. It is clear that my thrift in no wise affects the total
economic thrift of the community, but only determines whether a
particular portion of the total thrift shall have been exercised by myself or
by somebody else. We shall show how the thrift of one part of the
community has power to force another part to live beyond their income[52].
Most modern economists deny that consumption could by any possibility
be insufficient. Can we find any economic force at work which might
incite a community to this excess, and if there be any such forces are there
not efficient checks provided by the mechanism of commerce? It will be
shown, firstly, that in every highly organised industrial society there is
constantly at work a force which naturally operates to induce excess of
thrift; secondly, that the checks alleged to be provided by the mechanism
of commerce are either wholly inoperative or are inadequate to prevent
grave commercial evil[53]. The brief answer which Ricardo gave to the
contentions of Malthus and Chalmers seems to have been accepted as
sufficient by most later economists. 'Productions are always bought by
productions or services; money is only the medium by which the exchange
is effected. Hence the increased production being always accompanied by
 a correspondingly increased ability to get and consume, there is no
possibility of Over-production' (Ricardo, Prin. of Pol. Econ. p. 362) [54].

Hobson and Mummery were aware that interest was nothing whatever except payment
for the use of money[55]. They also knew well enough that their opponents would claim
that there would be 'such a fall in the rate of interest (or profit) as will act as a check upon
Saving, and restore the proper relation between production and consumption'[56]. They
point out in reply that 'if a fall of Profit is to induce people to save less, it must operate in
one of two ways, either by inducing them to spend more or by inducing them to produce
less'[57]. As regards the former they argue that when profits fall the aggregate income of
the community is reduced, and 'we cannot suppose that when the average rate of incomes
is falling, individuals will be induced to increase their rate of consumption by the fact that
the premium upon thrift is correspondingly diminished'; whilst as for the second
alternative, 'it is so far from being our intention to deny that a fall of profit, due to over-
supply, will check production, that the admission of the operation of this check forms the
very centre of our argument'[58]. Nevertheless, their theory failed of completeness,
essentially on account of their having no independent theory of the rate of interest; with
the result that Mr Hobson laid too much emphasis (especially in his later books) on
under-consumption leading to over-investment, in the sense of unprofitable investment,
instead of explaining that a relatively weak propensity to consume helps to cause
unemployment by requiring and not receiving the accompaniment of a compensating
volume of new investment, which, even if it may sometimes occur temporarily through
errors of optimism, is in general prevented from happening at all by the prospective profit
falling below the standard set by the rate of interest.

Since the war there has been a spate of heretical theories of under-consumption, of which
those of Major Douglas are the most famous. The strength of Major Douglas's advocacy
has, of course, largely depended on orthodoxy having no valid reply to much of his
destructive criticism. On the other hand, the detail of his diagnosis, in particular the so-
called A + B theorem, includes much mere mystification. If Major Douglas had limited
his B-items to the financial provisions made by entrepreneurs to which no current
expenditure on replacements and renewals corresponds, he would be nearer the truth. But
even in that case it is necessary to allow for the possibility of these provisions being
offset by new investment in other directions as well as by increased expenditure on
consumption. Major Douglas is entitled to claim, as against some of his orthodox
adversaries, that he at least has not been wholly oblivious of the outstanding problem of
our economic system. Yet he has scarcely established an equal claim to ranka private,
perhaps, but not a major in the brave army of hereticswith Mandeville, Malthus, Gesell
and Hobson, who, following their intuitions, have preferred to see the truth obscurely and
imperfectly rather than to maintain error, reached indeed with clearness and consistency
and by easy logic but on hypotheses inappropriate to the facts.

1. Vide his Industry and Trade, Appendix D; Money, Credit and Commerce, p. 130; and Principles
of Economics, Appendix I.

2. His view of them is well summed up in a footnote to the first edition of his Principles, p. 51: Much
study has been given both in England and Germany to medieval opinions as to the relation of
 money to national wealth. On the whole they are to be regarded as confused through want of a
clear understanding of the functions of money, rather than as wrong in consequence of a
deliberate assumption that the increase in the net wealth of a nation can be effected only by an
increase of the stores of the precious metals in her.

3. The Nation and the Athenaeum, November 24, 1923.

4. The remedy of an elastic wage-unit, so that a depression is met by a reduction of wages, is liable,
for the same reason, to be a means of benefiting ourselves at the expense of our neighbours.

5. Experience since the age of Solon at least, and probably, if we had the statistics, for many centuries
before that, indicates what a knowledge of human nature would lead us to expect, namely, that
there is a steady tendency for the wage-unit to rise over long periods of time and that it can be
reduced only amidst the decay and dissolution of economic society. Thus, apart altogether from
progress and increasing population, a gradually increasing stock of money has proved imperative.

6. They are the more suitable for my purpose because Prof. Heckscher is himself an adherent, on the
whole, of the classical theory and much less sympathetic to the mercantilist theories than I am.
Thus there is no risk that his choice of quotations has been biased in any way by a desire to
illustrate their wisdom.

7. Heckscher, Mercantilism, vol. ii. pp. 200, 201, very slightly abridged.

8. Some Considerations of the Consequences of the Lowering of Interest and Raising the Value of
Money, 1692, but written some years previously.

9. He adds: not barely on the quantity of money but the quickness of its circulation.

10. Use being, of course, old-fashioned English for interest.

11. Hume a little later had a foot and a half in the classical world. For Hume began the practice
amongst economists of stressing the importance of the equilibrium position as compared with the
ever-shifting transition towards it, though he was still enough of a mercantilist not to overlook
the fact that it is in the transition that we actually have our being: It is only in this interval or
intermediate situation, between the acquisition of money and a rise of prices, that the increasing
quantity of gold and silver is favourable to industry. ... It is of no manner of consequence, with
regard to the domestic happiness of a state, whether money be in a greater or less quantity. The
good policy of the magistrate consists only in keeping it, if possible, still increasing; because by
that means he keeps alive a spirit of industry in the nation, and increases the state of labour in
which consists all real power and riches. A nation, whose money decreases, is actually, at that
time, weaker and more miserable than another nation, which possesses no more money but is on
the increasing trend. (Essay On Money, 1752).

12. It illustrates the completeness with which the mercantilist view, that interest means interest on
money (the view which is, as it now seems to me, indubitably correct), has dropt out, that Prof.
Heckscher, as a good classical economist, sums up his account of Lockes theory with the
comment Lockes argument would be irrefutable ... if interest really were synonymous with
the price for the loan of money; as this is not so, it is entirely irrelevant (op. cit. vol. ii. p. 204).

13. Heckscher, op. cit. vol. ii. pp. 210, 21I.

14. Heckscher, op. cit. vol. ii. p. 228.

15. Heckscher, op. cit. vol. ii. p. 235.

16. Heckscher, op. cit. vol. ii. p. 122.

17. Heckscher, op. cit. vol. ii. P. 223.

18. Heckscher, op. cit. vol. ii. p. 178.

19. Within the state, mercantilism pursued thoroughgoing dynamic ends. But the important thing is
that this was bound up with a static conception of the total economic resources in the world; for
this it was that created that fundamental disharmony which sustained the endless commercial
wars.... This was the tragedy of mercantilism. Both the Middle Ages with their universal static
ideal and laissez-faire with its universal dynamic ideal avoided this consequence (Heckscher, op.
cit. vol. ii. pp. 25, 26).

20. The consistent appreciation of this truth by the International Labour Office, first under Albert
Thomas and subsequently under Mr. H. B. Butler, has stood out conspicuously amongst the
pronouncements of the numerous post-war international bodies.

21. Heckscher, op. cit. vol. ii. pp. 176-7.

22. Op. cit. vol. ii. p. 335.

23. In his Letter to Adam Smith appended to his Defence of Usury.

24. Wealth of Nations, Book II, chap. 4.

25. Having started to quote Bentham in this context, I must remind the reader of his finest passage:
The career of art, the great road which receives the footsteps of projectors, may be considered
as a vast, and perhaps un-bounded, plain, bestrewed with gulphs, such as Curtius was swallowed
up in. Each requires a human victim to fall into it ere it can close, but when it once closes, it
closes to open no more, and so much of the path is safe to those who follow.

26. Born near the Luxembourg frontier of a German father and a French mother.

27. Gesell differed from George in recommending the payment of compensation when the land is
nationalised.

28. The Natural Economic Order, pp. 297 et seq.

29. Heckscher, op. cit. vol. ii. p. 208.

30. Op. cit. vol. ii. p. 290.

31. Op. cit. vol. ii. p. 209.

32. Op. cit. vol. ii. p. 291.

33. In his History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century Stephen wrote (p. 297) in speaking
of the fallacy made celebrated by Mandeville that ..the complete confutation of it lies in the
doctrine so rarely understood that its complete apprehension is, perhaps, the best test of an
economist that demand for commodities is not demand for labour.
34. Compare Adam Smith, the forerunner of the classical school, who wrote, What is prudence in
the conduct of every private family can scarce be folly in that of a great Kingdom probably
with reference to the above passage from Mandeville.

35. Essays in Biography, pp. 139-47.

36. A letter from Malthus to Ricardo, dated July 7, 1821.

37. A letter from Malthus to Ricardo, dated July 16, 1822.

38. Preface to Malthuss Principles of Political Economy, pp. 8, 9.

39. Malthuss Principles of Political Economy, p. 363, footnote.

40. J. S. Mill, Political Economy, Book I. chapter v. Them is a most important and penetrating
discussion of this aspect of Mills theory in Mummery and Hobsons Physiology of Industry? pp.
38 et seq., and, in particular, of his doctrine (which Marshall, in his very unsatisfactory
discussion of the Wages-Fund Theory, endeavoured to explain away) that a demand for
commodities is not a demand for labour.

41. The Victorians and Investment, Economic History, 1936.

42. Fullartons tract On the Regulation of Currencies (1844) is the most interesting of his references.

43. J. M. Robertsons The Fallacy of Saving, published in I892, supported the heresy of Mummery
and Hobson. But it is not a book of much value or significance, being entirety lacking in the
penetrating intuitions of The Physiology of Industry.

44. In an address called Confessions of an Economic Heretic, delivered before the London Ethical
Society at Conway Hall on Sunday, July 14, 1935. I reproduce it here by Mr. Hobsons
permission.

45. Hobson had written disrespectfully in The Physiology of Industry, p. 26: Thrift is the source of
national wealth, and the more thrifty a nation is the more wealthy it becomes. Such is the
common teaching of almost all economists; many of them assume a tone of ethical dignity as they
plead the infinite value of thrift; this note alone in all their dreary song has caught the favour of
the public ear.

46. Hobson and Mummery, Physiology of Industry, pp. iii-v.

47. Hobson and Mummery, Physiology of Industry, p. vi.

48. Op. cit. p. ix.

49. Op. cit. p. 27

50. Op. cit. pp. 50, 51

51. Op. cit. p. 69

52. Op. cit. p. 113

53. Op. cit. p. 100

54. Op. cit. p. 101

55. Op. cit. p. 79

56. Op. cit. p. 117.

57. Op. cit. P. 130.

58. Hobson and Mummery, Physiology of Industry, p. 131.

Chapter 24

CONCLUDING NOTES ON THE SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY TOWARDS

WHICH THE GENERAL THEORY MIGHT LEAD

The outstanding faults of the economic society in which we live are its failure to provide
for full employment and its arbitrary and inequitable distribution of wealth and incomes.
The bearing of the foregoing theory on the first of these is obvious. But there are also two
important respects in which it is relevant to the second.

Since the end of the nineteenth century significant progress towards the removal of very
great disparities of wealth and income has been achieved through the instrument of direct
taxationincome tax and surtax and death dutiesespecially in Great Britain. Many
people would wish to see this process carried much further, but they are deterred by two
considerations; partly by the fear of making skilful evasions too much worth while and
also of diminishing unduly the motive towards risk-taking, but mainly, I think, by the
belief that the growth of capital depends upon the strength of the motive towards
individual saving and that for a large proportion of this growth we are dependent on the
savings of the rich out of their superfluity. Our argument does not affect the first of these
considerations. But it may considerably modify our attitude towards the second. For we
have seen that, up to the point where full employment prevails, the growth of capital
depends not at all on a low propensity to consume but is, on the contrary, held back by it;
and only in conditions of full employment is a low propensity to consume conducive to
the growth of capital. Moreover, experience suggests that in existing conditions saving by
institutions and through sinking funds is more than adequate, and that measures for the
redistribution of incomes in a way likely to raise the propensity to consume may prove
positively favourable to the growth of capital.

The existing confusion of the public mind on the matter is well illustrated by the very
common belief that the death duties are responsible for a reduction in the capital wealth
of the country. Assuming that the State applies the proceeds of these duties to its ordinary
outgoings so that taxes on incomes and consumption are correspondingly reduced or
avoided, it is, of course, true that a fiscal policy of heavy death duties has the effect of
increasing the community's propensity to consume. But inasmuch as an increase in the
habitual propensity to consume will in general (i.e. except in conditions of full
employment) serve to increase at the same time the inducement to invest, the inference
commonly drawn is the exact opposite of the truth.

Thus our argument leads towards the conclusion that in contemporary conditions the
growth of wealth, so far from being dependent on the abstinence of the rich, as is
commonly supposed, is more likely to be impeded by it. One of the chief social
justifications of great inequality of wealth is, therefore, removed. I am not saying that
there are no other reasons, unaffected by our theory, capable of justifying some measure
of inequality in some circumstances. But it does dispose of the most important of the
reasons why hitherto we have thought it prudent to move carefully. This particularly
affects our attitude towards death duties: for there are certain justifications for inequality
of incomes which do not apply equally to inequality of inheritances.

For my own part, I believe that there is social and psychological justification for
significant inequalities of incomes and wealth, but not for such large disparities as exist
to-day. There are valuable human activities which require the motive of money-making
and the environment of private wealth-ownership for their full fruition. Moreover,
dangerous human proclivities can be canalised into comparatively harmless channels by
the existence of opportunities for money-making and private wealth, which, if they
cannot be satisfied in this way, may find their outlet in cruelty, the reckless pursuit of
personal power and authority, and other forms of self-aggrandisement. It is better that a
man should tyrannise over his bank balance than over his fellow-citizens; and whilst the
former is sometimes denounced as being but a means to the latter, sometimes at least it is
an alternative. But it is not necessary for the stimulation of these activities and the
satisfaction of these proclivities that the game should be played for such high stakes as at
present. Much lower stakes will serve the purpose equally well, as soon as the players are
accustomed to them. The task of transmuting human nature must not be confused with
the task of managing it. Though in the ideal commonwealth men may have been taught or
inspired or bred to take no interest in the stakes, it may still be wise and prudent
statesmanship to allow the game to be played, subject to rules and limitations, so long as
the average man, or even a significant section of the community, is in fact strongly
addicted to the money-making passion.

II

There is, however, a second, much more fundamental inference from our argument which
has a bearing on the future of inequalities of wealth; namely, our theory of the rate of
interest. The justification for a moderately high rate of interest has been found hitherto in
the necessity of providing a sufficient inducement to save. But we have shown that the
extent of effective saving is necessarily determined by the scale of investment and that
the scale of investment is promoted by a low rate of interest, provided that we do not
attempt to stimulate it in this way beyond the point which corresponds to full
employment. Thus it is to our best advantage to reduce the rate of interest to that point
relatively to the schedule of the marginal efficiency of capital at which there is full
employment.

There can be no doubt that this criterion will lead to a much lower rate of interest than
has ruled hitherto; and, so far as one can guess at the schedules of the marginal efficiency
of capital corresponding to increasing amounts of capital, the rate of interest is likely to
fall steadily, if it should be practicable to maintain conditions of more or less continuous
full employmentunless, indeed, there is an excessive change in the aggregate
propensity to consume (including the State).
I feel sure that the demand for capital is strictly limited in the sense that it would not be
difficult to increase the stock of capital up to a point where its marginal efficiency had
fallen to a very low figure. This would not mean that the use of capital instruments would
cost almost nothing, but only that the return from them would have to cover little more
than their exhaustion by wastage and obsolescence together with some margin to cover
risk and the exercise of skill and judgment. In short, the aggregate return from durable
goods in the course of their life would, as in the case of short-lived goods, just cover their
labour-costs of production plus an allowance for risk and the costs of skill and
supervision.

Now, though this state of affairs would be quite compatible with some measure of
individualism, yet it would mean the euthanasia of the rentier, and, consequently, the
euthanasia of the cumulative oppressive power of the capitalist to exploit the scarcity-
value of capital. Interest to-day rewards no genuine sacrifice, any more than does the rent
of land. The owner of capital can obtain interest because capital is scarce, just as the
owner of land can obtain rent because land is scarce. But whilst there may be intrinsic
reasons for the scarcity of land, there are no intrinsic reasons for the scarcity of capital.
An intrinsic reason for such scarcity, in the sense of a genuine sacrifice which could only
be called forth by the offer of a reward in the shape of interest, would not exist, in the
long run, except in the event of the individual propensity to consume proving to be of
such a character that net saving in conditions of full employment comes to an end before
capital has become sufficiently abundant. But even so, it will still be possible for
communal saving through the agency of the State to be maintained at a level which will
allow the growth of capital up to the point where it ceases to be scarce.

I see, therefore, the rentier aspect of capitalism as a transitional phase which will
disappear when it has done its work. And with the disappearance of its rentier aspect
much else in it besides will suffer a sea-change. It will be, moreover, a great advantage of
the order of events which I am advocating, that the euthanasia of the rentier, of the
functionless investor, will be nothing sudden, merely a gradual but prolonged
continuance of what we have seen recently in Great Britain, and will need no revolution.

Thus we might aim in practice (there being nothing in this which is unattainable) at an
increase in the volume of capital until it ceases to be scarce, so that the functionless
investor will no longer receive a bonus; and at a scheme of direct taxation which allows
the intelligence and determination and executive skill of the financier, the entrepreneur et
hoc genus omne (who are certainly so fond of their craft that their labour could be
obtained much cheaper than at present), to be harnessed to the service of the community
on reasonable terms of reward.

At the same time we must recognise that only experience can show how far the common
will, embodied in the policy of the State, ought to be directed to increasing and
supplementing the inducement to invest; and how far it is safe to stimulate the average
propensity to consume, without foregoing our aim of depriving capital of its scarcity-
value within one or two generations. It may turn out that the propensity to consume will
be so easily strengthened by the effects of a falling rate of interest, that full employment
can be reached with a rate of accumulation little greater than at present. In this event a
scheme for the higher taxation of large incomes and inheritances might be open to the
objection that it would lead to full employment with a rate of accumulation which was
reduced considerably below the current level. I must not be supposed to deny the
possibility, or even the probability, of this outcome. For in such matters it is rash to
predict how the average man will react to a changed environment. If, however, it should
prove easy to secure an approximation to full employment with a rate of accumulation
not much greater than at present, an outstanding problem will at least have been solved.
And it would remain for separate decision on what scale and by what means it is right
and reasonable to call on the living generation to restrict their consumption, so as to
establish in course of time, a state of full investment for their successors.

III

In some other respects the foregoing theory is moderately conservative in its implications.
For whilst it indicates the vital importance of establishing certain central controls in
matters which are now left in the main to individual initiative, there are wide fields of
activity which are unaffected. The State will have to exercise a guiding influence on the
propensity to consume partly through its scheme of taxation, partly by fixing the rate of
interest, and partly, perhaps, in other ways. Furthermore, it seems unlikely that the
influence of banking policy on the rate of interest will be sufficient by itself to determine
an optimum rate of investment. I conceive, therefore, that a somewhat comprehensive
socialisation of investment will prove the only means of securing an approximation to
full employment; though this need not exclude all manner of compromises and of devices
by which public authority will co-operate with private initiative. But beyond this no
obvious case is made out for a system of State Socialism which would embrace most of
the economic life of the community. It is not the ownership of the instruments of
production which it is important for the State to assume. If the State is able to determine
the aggregate amount of resources devoted to augmenting the instruments and the basic
rate of reward to those who own them, it will have accomplished all that is necessary.
Moreover, the necessary measures of socialisation can be introduced gradually and
without a break in the general traditions of society.

Our criticism of the accepted classical theory of economics has consisted not so much in
finding logical flaws in its analysis as in pointing out that its tacit assumptions are seldom
or never satisfied, with the result that it cannot solve the economic problems of the actual
world. But if our central controls succeed in establishing an aggregate volume of output
corresponding to full employment as nearly as is practicable, the classical theory comes
into its own again from this point onwards. If we suppose the volume of output to be
given, i.e. to be determined by forces outside the classical scheme of thought, then there
is no objection to be raised against the classical analysis of the manner in which private
self-interest will determine what in particular is produced, in what proportions the factors
of production will be combined to produce it, and how the value of the final product will
be distributed between them. Again, if we have dealt otherwise with the problem of thrift,
there is no objection to be raised against the modern classical theory as to the degree of
consillience between private and public advantage in conditions of perfect and imperfect
competition respectively. Thus, apart from the necessity of central controls to bring about
an adjustment between the propensity to consume and the inducement to invest, there is
no more reason to socialise economic life than there was before.

To put the point concretely, I see no reason to suppose that the existing system seriously
misemploys the factors of production which are in use. There are, of course, errors of
foresight; but these would not be avoided by centralising decisions. When 9,000,000 men
are employed out of 10,000,000 willing and able to work, there is no evidence that the
labour of these 9,000,000 men is misdirected. The complaint against the present system is
not that these 9,000,000 men ought to be employed on different tasks, but that tasks
should be available for the remaining 1,000,000 men. It is in determining the volume, not
the direction, of actual employment that the existing system has broken down.

Thus I agree with Gesell that the result of filling in the gaps in the classical theory is not
to dispose of the 'Manchester System', but to indicate the nature of the environment
which the free play of economic forces requires if it is to realise the full potentialities of
production. The central controls necessary to ensure full employment will, of course,
involve a large extension of the traditional functions of government. Furthermore, the
modern classical theory has itself called attention to various conditions in which the free
play of economic forces may need to be curbed or guided. But there will still remain a
wide field for the exercise of private initiative and responsibility. Within this field the
traditional advantages of individualism will still hold good.

Let us stop for a moment to remind ourselves what these advantages are. They are partly
advantages of efficiencythe advantages of decentralisation and of the play of self-
interest. The advantage to efficiency of the decentralisation of decisions and of individual
responsibility is even greater, perhaps, than the nineteenth century supposed; and the
reaction against the appeal to self-interest may have gone too far. But, above all,
individualism, if it can be purged of its defects and its abuses, is the best safeguard of
personal liberty in the sense that, compared with any other system, it greatly widens the
field for the exercise of personal choice. It is also the best safeguard of the variety of life,
which emerges precisely from this extended field of personal choice, and the loss of
which is the greatest of all the losses of the homogeneous or totalitarian state. For this
variety preserves the traditions which embody the most secure and successful choices of
former generations; it colours the present with the diversification of its fancy; and, being
the handmaid of experiment as well as of tradition and of fancy, it is the most powerful
instrument to better the future.

Whilst, therefore, the enlargement of the functions of government, involved in the task of
adjusting to one another the propensity to consume and the inducement to invest, would
seem to a nineteenth-century publicist or to a contemporary American financier to be a
terrific encroachment on individualism, I defend it, on the contrary, both as the only
practicable means of avoiding the destruction of existing economic forms in their entirety
and as the condition of the successful functioning of individual initiative.
For if effective demand is deficient, not only is the public scandal of wasted resources
intolerable, but the individual enterpriser who seeks to bring these resources into action is
operating with the odds loaded against him. The game of hazard which he plays is
furnished with many zeros, so that the players as a whole will lose if they have the energy
and hope to deal all the cards Hitherto the increment of the world's wealth has fallen short
of the aggregate of positive individual savings; and the difference has been made up by
the losses of those whose courage and initiative have not been supplemented by
exceptional skill or unusual good fortune. But if effective demand is adequate, average
skill and average good fortune will be enough.

The authoritarian state systems of to-day seem to solve the problem of unemployment at
the expense of efficiency and of freedom. It is certain that the world will not much longer
tolerate the unemployment which, apart from brief intervals of excitement, is
associatedand, in my opinion, inevitably associatedwith present-day capitalistic
individualism. But it may be possible by a right analysis of the problem to cure the
disease whilst preserving efficiency and freedom.

IV

I have mentioned in passing that the new system might be more favourable to peace than
the old has been. It is worth while to repeat and emphasise that aspect. War has several
causes. Dictators and others such, to whom war offers, in expectation at least, a
pleasurable excitement, find it easy to work on the natural bellicosity of their peoples.
But, over and above this, facilitating their task of fanning the popular flame, are the
economic causes of war, namely, the pressure of population and the competitive struggle
for markets. It is the second factor, which probably played a predominant part in the
nineteenth century, and might again, that is germane to this discussion.

I have pointed out in the preceding chapter that, under the system of domestic laissez-
faire and an international gold standard such as was orthodox in the latter half of the
nineteenth century, there was no means open to a government whereby to mitigate
economic distress at home except through the competitive struggle for markets. For all
measures helpful to a state of chronic or intermittent under-employment were ruled out,
except measures to improve the balance of trade on income account.

Thus, whilst economists were accustomed to applaud the prevailing international system
as furnishing the fruits of the international division of labour and harmonising at the same
time the interests of different nations, there lay concealed a less benign influence; and
those statesmen were moved by common sense and a correct apprehension of the true
course of events, who believed that if a rich, old country were to neglect the struggle for
markets its prosperity would droop and fail. But if nations can learn to provide
themselves with full employment by their domestic policy (and, we must add, if they can
also attain equilibrium in the trend of their population), there need be no important
economic forces calculated to set the interest of one country against that of its neighbours.
There would still be room for the international division of labour and for international
lending in appropriate conditions. But there would no longer be a pressing motive why
one country need force its wares on another or repulse the offerings of its neighbour, not
because this was necessary to enable it to pay for what it wished to purchase, but with the
express object of upsetting the equilibrium of payments so as to develop a balance of
trade in its own favour. International trade would cease to be what it is, namely, a
desperate expedient to maintain employment at home by forcing sales on foreign markets
and restricting purchases, which, if successful, will merely shift the problem of
unemployment to the neighbour which is worsted in the struggle, but a willing and
unimpeded exchange of goods and services in conditions of mutual advantage.

Is the fulfilment of these ideas a visionary hope? Have they insufficient roots in the
motives which govern the evolution of political society? Are the interests which they will
thwart stronger and more obvious than those which they will serve?

I do not attempt an answer in this place. It would need a volume of a different character
from this one to indicate even in outline the practical measures in which they might be
gradually clothed. But if the ideas are correctan hypothesis on which the author himself
must necessarily base what he writesit would be a mistake, I predict, to dispute their
potency over a period of time. At the present moment people are unusually expectant of a
more fundamental diagnosis; more particularly ready to receive it; eager to try it out, if it
should be even plausible. But apart from this contemporary mood, the ideas of
economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong,
are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else.
Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual
influences, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who
hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few
years back. I am sure that the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared
with the gradual encroachment of ideas. Not, indeed, immediately, but after a certain
interval; for in the field of economic and political philosophy there are not many who are
influenced by new theories after they are twenty-five or thirty years of age, so that the
ideas which civil servants and politicians and even agitators apply to current events are
not likely to be the newest. But, soon or late, it is ideas, not vested interests, which are
dangerous for good or evil.
Appendix 1

PRINTING ERRORS IN THE FIRST EDITION CORRECTED IN THE

PRESENT EDITION

Page Line Correction

[Chapter 6] 6 For 'possession' read 'possessions'
[Chapter 7] 12 For 'has' read 'had'
[Chapter 10] 13 For '23' read '19'
[Chapter 10] footnote I, line 2 For 'th' read 'the'
[Chapter 13] 21 For 'security' read 'precautionary'
[Chapter 16] 9 For 'than' read 'that'
[Chapter 17] 32 For 'output' read 'the stock of assets in general'
[Chapter 17] 25 For 'their' read 'its'
[Chapter 17] 31 For 'or' read 'of'
[Chapter 19] 28 For 'three' read 'four'
[Chapter 19] 4 For 'technique' read 'techniques'
[Chapter 22] 23 For 'income' read 'incomes'
[Chapter 23] 7 For 'Mercantilist' read 'Mercantilists'

These corrections come to light in preparing various foreign editions of The General
Theory, in preparing the variorum version of earlier drafts which appears in volume XIV,
or in setting this book for press. The corrections do not cover more substantial errors such
as the unsatisfactory presentation of aggregate supply and demand on Chapter 3 or the
inadequate derivation of the equations on Chapter 21.
Appendix 2

From The Economic Journal, September 1936

FLUCTUATIONS IN NET INVESTMENT IN THE UNITED STATES

In my General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, Chapter 8, I made a brief

attempt to illustrate the wide range of fluctuations in net investment, basing myself on
certain calculations by Mr Colin Clark for Great Britain and by Mr Kuznets for the
United States.

In the case of Mr Kuznets' figures I pointed out (Chapter 8) that his allowances for
depreciation, etc., included 'no deduction at all in respect of houses and other durable
commodities in the hands of individuals'. But the table which immediately followed this
did not make it sufficiently clear to the reader that the first line relating to 'gross capital
formation' comprised much wider categories of capital goods than the second line
relating to entrepreneurs' depreciation, etc.'; and I was myself misled on the next page,
where I expressed doubts as to the sufficiency of the latter item in relation to the former
(forgetting that the latter related only to a part of the former). The result was that the table
as printed considerably under-stated the force of the phenomenon which I was concerned
to describe, since a complete calculation in respect of depreciation, etc., covering all the
items in the first line of the table, would lead to much larger figures than those given in
the second line. Some correspondence with Mr Kuznets now enables me to explain these
important figures more fully and clearly, and in the light of later information.

Mr Kuznets divides his aggregate of gross capital formation (as he calls it) for the United
States into a number of categories as follows:

(1) Consumers' Durable Commodities

These comprise motor-cars, furniture and house equipment and other more or less
durable articles, apart from houses, purchased and owned by those who consume them.
Whether or not these items should be included in investment depends (so far as the
definition is concerned) on whether the expenditure on them when it is initially made is
included in current saving or in current expenditure; and it depends (so far as the practical
application is concerned) on whether in subsequent years the owners feel under a motive
to make provision for current depreciation out of their incomes even when they are not
replacing or renewing them. Doubtless it is not possible to draw a hard-and-fast line. But
it is probable that few individuals feel it necessary in such cases to make a financial
provision for depreciation apart from actual repairs and renewals. This, in combination
with the difficulty of obtaining proper statistics and of drawing a clear line, makes it
preferable, I think, to exclude such equipment from investment and to include it in
consumption-expenditure in the year in which it is incurred. This is in accordance with
the definition of consumption given in my General Theory, p. 54.
I shall, therefore, exclude this category from the final calculation; though I hope to deal
with the problem more thoroughly at a later time. Nevertheless it may be interesting to
quote Mr Kuznets' estimates, which are of substantial magnitude:

(Millions of dollars.)
1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933
Consumer's durable
8,664 9,316 8,887 9,175 10,058 7,892 5,885 4,022 3,737
commodities

The above figure for 1929 includes 3,400 million dollars for motor-cars, whilst the
depreciation in respect of the same item for that year is estimated at 2,500 million dollars.

(2) Residential Construction

This is an important and highly fluctuating item which should undoubtedly be included in
investment, and not in consumption expenditure, since houses are usually regarded as
purchased out of savings and not out of income, and are often owned by others than the
occupiers. In the Bulletin from which these figures are taken Mr Kuznets gives no
estimate for the annual rate of depreciation, etc. More recently, however, his colleague,
Mr Solomon Fabricant, has published such estimates, which I have used in the following
table:

(Millions of dollars.)
1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933
Residential construction 3,050 2,965 2,856 3,095 2,127 1,222 900 311 276
Depreciation* 1,554 1,676 1,754 1,842 1,911 1,901 1,698 1,460 1,567
Net investment 1,496 1,289 1,102 1,253 216 679 798 1,149 1,291

* These figures are calculated in terms of current (reproduction) costs. Mr Fabricant has
also provided estimates in terms of original cost, which for the years prior to 1932 are
considerably lower.

(3) Business Fixed Capital

Mr Kuznets here distinguishes expenditure on new producers' durable goods and business
construction from the net change in 'business inventories,' i.e. in working and liquid
capital; and we shall, therefore, deal with the latter under a separate heading.

The amount of the deduction to obtain net investment in respect of parts, repairs and
servicing, and repairs and maintenance of business construction as distinct from
depreciation and depletion, which is not made good, depends, of course, on whether the
former have been included in gross investment. Mr Kuznets gives a partial estimate for
the former but the figures given below exclude these items both from gross and from net
investment. But whilst the result of deducting both the repairs item and the depreciation
item probably corresponds fairly closely to my net investment, the two deductions taken
separately do not closely correspond to my deductions for user cost and supplementary
cost; so that it is not possible to calculate from Mr Kuznets' data a figure corresponding
to my (gross) investment.

The following table gives in the first line 'the formation of gross capital destined for
business use, exclusive of parts, repairs and servicing, and repairs and maintenance of
business construction, and excluding changes in business inventories'; and in the second
line the estimated 'depreciation and depletion' on the same items:

(Millions of dollars.)
1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933
Gross business capital
9,070 9,815 9,555 10,019 11,396 9,336 5,933 3,205 2,894
formation (as above)
Depreciation and
5,685 6,269 6,312 6,447 7,039 6,712 6,154 5,092 4,971
depletion*
Net investment 3,385 3,546 3,243 3,572 4,357 2,624 221 1,887 2,077

* These figures are not taken from Mr Kuznets' memoranda, hut from Mr Fabricant's later
and revised estimates. As before they are in terms of current (replacement) cost. In terms
of original cost they are appreciably lower prior to 1931 and higher subsequently.

(4) Business Inventories

For the financial gains or losses arising out of this item there appear to be fairly adequate
statistics in the United States, though not in this country. Mr Kuznets' figures are as
follows:

(Millions of dollars.)
1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933
Net gain or loss in business
916 2,664 176 511 1,800 100 500 2,250 2,250
inventories

This table covers not only manufacturers' stocks but also stocks of farmers, mines, traders,
government agencies, etc. From 1929 onwards the figures given in Mr Kuznets'
memorandum of 1934 proved to require correction. Those given above are provisional
and approximate estimates, pending the publication of revised figures by the National
Bureau.

(5) Public Construction and Borrowing

The relevant figure in this context is not so much the gross (or net) expenditure on
construction, as the amount of expenditure met out of a net increase in borrowing. That is
to say in the case of public authorities and the like, their net investment may be best
regarded as being measured by the net increase in their borrowing. In so far as their
expenditures are met by compulsory transfer from the current income of the public, they
have no correlative in private saving; whilst public saving, if we were to find a
satisfactory definition for this concept, would be subject to quite different psychological
influences from private saving. I have touched on the problem in my General Theory,
footnote. I propose, therefore, to insert in place of the figures of public construction the
'loan expenditure' of public bodies.

Mr Kuznets has very kindly supplied me with figures for the net changes in the amount of
public debt (Federal, State and local) outstanding in the United States, which, except for
minor changes in the Government's cash balances, represent the amount of public
expenditure not covered by taxes and other revenues. This is given below in parallel with
his estimates of the amount of construction by public authorities. The interesting result
emerges that up to 1928 there was a net reduction in the public debt in spite of a large
expenditure on public construction, and that even up to 1931 some part of public
construction was met out of revenue. The excess of borrowing over construction in 1932
and 1933 represents, of course, various measures of public relief.

(Millions of dollars.)
1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933
Public construction 2,717 2,612 3,045 3,023 2,776 3,300 2,906 2,097 1,659
Net change in outstanding
43 280 244 50 +441 +1,712 +2,822 +2,565 +2,796
public debt**

* See Mr Kuznets' Bulletin, Table II, line 22, brought up to date on the basis of more
recent data.

** See col. 9 of the table given in the appendix below.

(6) Foreign Investment

Finally, we have the net change in claims countries, estimated by Mr Kuznets as follows:

(Millions of dollars.)
1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933
428 44 606 957 312 371 326 40 293

(7) Aggregate Net Investment

We are now in a position to combine the above items into a single aggregate. This total is
not quite comprehensive, since it excludes construction by semi-public agencies, and a
small amount unallocable construction. But Mr Kuznets is of the opinion that both
omissions are quite minor in character and could not much affect the movements of net
investment in the table which now follows.
 (Millions of dollars.)
1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933
Residential construction 1,496 1,289 1,102 1,253 216 679 798 1,149 1,291
Business fixed capital 3,385 3,546 3,243 3,572 4,357 2,624 221 1,887 2,077
Business inventories 916 2,664 176 511 1,800 100 500 2,250 2,250
Net loan expenditures by
43 280 244 10 441 1,712 2,822 2,565 2,796
public authorities
Foreign investment 428 44 606 957 312 371 326 40 293
Aggregate net investment 6,182 7,263 4,531 6,283 7,126 4,128 1,629 2,681 2,529

It is evident that this table is of first-class importance for the interpretation of business
fluctuations in the United States. In matters of detail the following points stand out:

(a) The arrears of residential construction at the end of 1933 must have been enormous.
For there had been no net investment in this field since 1925. This does not mean, of
course, that the actual state of housing was so bad as this. Some gross investment in
housing continued throughout, and the gradual deterioration in the state of
accommodation, through obsolescence and decay not made good, does not impair
forthwith to an equal extent the actual accommodation available for the time being.

(b) The part played by fluctuations in business inventories is very marked, especially in
accentuating the depression at the bottom of the slump. The increase in inventories in
1929 was probably for the most part designed to meet demand which did not fully
materialise; whilst the small further increase in 1930 represented accumulations of unsold
stocks. In 1932 and 1933, manufacturers met current demand to an extraordinary extent
out of stocks, so that effective demand fell largely behind actual consumption. But this,
fortunately, is a state of affairs which could not continue indefinitely. A further depletion
of stocks on this scale could not possibly take place, since the stocks were no longer there.
A level of business inventories so low as that which existed in the United States at the
end of 1933 was an almost certain herald of some measure of recovery. In general an
aggregate of net investment which is based on an increase in business inventories beyond
normal is clearly precarious; and it is easy to see in retrospect that a large growth of
inventories in 1929, coupled with a decline in residential construction, was ominous. The
figures for 1934, 1935, and 1936 will be most interesting when we have them. One would
expect that the recovery of the two former years has been based on a return of inventories
to normal and on public loan expenditure, but that by 1936 durable investment was
beginning to supplant inventories in making up the total. It is on the continued steadiness
of the first two items of the above table at figures not less than those of 1925 to 1928 that
the maintenance of prosperity must depend; and it is for this reason that a low long-term
rate of interest is so vitally important.

(c) The manner in which the changes in public loan expenditure came in to moderate the
fluctuations, which would have occurred otherwise, is very apparent. The manner in
which from 1931 Federal borrowing took the place of State and local borrowing, as
shown in the Appendix below, is striking. From 30 June 1924, to 30 June 1930, Federal
loans outstanding fell from 21 to 15 billions, whilst in the same period State and local
loans rose from 10 to 16 billions, the total remaining unchanged; whereas from 30 June
1930 to 30 June 1935, Federal loans rose from 15 to 26 billions and the others from 16
only to 17 billions. The appendix, which gives the figures of public borrowing up to 30
June 1935, showscontrary, perhaps, to the general impressionthat public borrowing
was at its height in 1931, and that in 193435 it was but little more than in 192930.

(d) When comparable figures of income are available, we shall be able to make some
computations as to the value of the Multiplier in the conditions of the United States,
though there are many statistical difficulties still to overcome. If, however, as a very
crude, preliminary test we take the Dept. of Commerce estimates of income (uncorrected
for price changes), we find that during the large movements of the years from 1929 to
1932 the changes in money-incomes were from three to five times the changes in net
investment shown above. In 1933 incomes and investment both increased slightly, but the
movements were too narrow to allow the ratio of the one to the other to be calculated
within a reasonable margin of error.

J. M. KEYNES

A Note to Appendix 2

TOTAL AND NET OUTSTANDING ISSUES OF PUBLIC DEBT

(Millions of dollars.)
Total outstanding issues Net outstanding issues
Date State, State, Average
Net
(30 Federal county, Combined Federal county, Combined for
change
June) (2) city, etc. (4) (5) city, etc. (7) calendar
(8)
(1) (3) (6) year (9)
1924 20,982 11,633 32,615 20,627 9,921 30,548
1925 20,211 12,830 33,041 19,737 10,975 30,712 +164 43
1926 19,384 13,664 33,048 18,790 11,672 30,462 250 280
1927 18,251 14,735 32,986 17,542 12,610 30,152 310 244
1928 17,318 15,699 33,017 16,522 13,452 29,974 178 10
1929 16,639 16,760 33,399 15,773 14,358 30,131 +157 +441
1930 15,922 17,985 33,907 14,969 15,887 30,856 +725 +1,712
1931 16,520 19,188 35,708 16,098 17,457 33,555 +2,699 +2,822
 1932 19,161 19,635 35,796 18,673 17,828 36,501 +2,946 +2,565
1933 22,158 19,107 41,265 21,613 17,072 36,685 +2,184 +2,796
1934 26,480 18,942 45,422 25,323 16,771 42,094 +3,409 +2,173
1935 27,645 19,277 46,922 26,137 16,895 43,032 +938

(Source: Report of the Secretary of the Treasury for year ended 30 June 1935, p. 424.)

Total outstanding issues exclude a small volume of matured and non-interest bearing
obligations (see ibid., p. 379).

Net outstanding issues are equal to total outstanding issues less those held in U.S.
Government trust funds, or owned by U.S. Government or by governmental agencies and
held in sinking funds.

The table above does not include the contingent debt of the Federal Government, i.e.
obligations guaranteed by the United States. These, comprising largely debt issues of the
Federal Farm Mortgage Corporation, Home Owners Loan Corporation and the
Reconstruction Finance Corporation, were as follows:

Date Millions of dollars

30 June 1934 691
31 December 1934 3,079
30 June 1935 4,151
31 December 1935 4,525

(See Cost of Government in the United States, by the National Industrial Conference
Board, pub. no. 223, New York, 1936, Table 26, p. 68.)
Appendix 3

From The Economic Journal, March 1939

RELATIVE MOVEMENTS OF REAL WAGES AND OUTPUT

An article by Mr J. G. Dunlop in this Journal (September 1938, Vol. XLVIII, p. 413) on

The Movement of Real and Money Wage Rates, and the note by Mr L. Tarshis printed
below [in the Economic Journal, March 1939] (p. 150), clearly indicate that a common
belief to which I acceded in my General Theory of Employment needs to be reconsidered.
I there said:

It would be interesting to see the results of a statistical enquiry into the

actual relationship between changes in money wages and changes in real
wages. In the case of a change peculiar to a particular industry one would
expect the change in real wages to be in the same direction as the change
in money wages. But in the case of changes in the general level of wages,
it will be found, I think, that the change in real wages associated with a
change in money wages, so far from being usually in the same direction, is
almost always in the opposite direction. . .This is because, in the short
period, falling money wages and rising real wages are each, for
independent reasons, likely to accompany decreasing employment; labour
being readier to accept wage-cuts when employment is falling off, yet real
wages inevitably rising in the same circumstances on account of the
increasing marginal return to a given capital equipment when output is
diminished.

But Mr Dunlop's investigations into the British statistics appear to show that, when
money wages are rising, real wages have usually risen also; whilst, when money wages
are falling, real wages are no more likely to rise than to fall. And Mr Tarshis has reached
broadly similar results in respect of recent years in the United States.

In the passage quoted above from my General Theory I was accepting, without taking
care to check the facts for myself, a belief which has been widely held by British
economists up to the last year or two. Since the material on which Mr Dunlop mainly
dependsnamely, the indices of real and money wages prepared by Mr G. H. Wood and
Prof. Bowleyhave been available to all of us for many years, it is strange that the
correction has not been made before. But the underlying problem is not simple, and is not
completely disposed of by the statistical studies in question.

First of all it is necessary to distinguish between two different problems. In the passage
quoted above I was dealing with the reaction of real wages to changes in output, and had
in mind situations where changes in real and money wages were a reflection of changes
in the level of employment caused by changes in effective demand. This is, in fact, the
case which, if I understand them rightly, Mr Dunlop and Mr Tarshis have primarily in
view. But there is also the case where changes in wages reflect changes in prices or in the
conditions governing the wage bargain which do not correspond to, or are not primarily
the result of, changes in the level of output and employment and are not caused by
(though they may cause) changes in effective demand. This question I discussed in a
different part of my General Theory (namely Chapter 19, 'Changes in Money Wages'),
where I reached the conclusion that wage changes, which are not in the first instance due
to changes in output, have complex reactions on output which may be in either direction
according to circumstances and about which it is difficult to generalise. It is with the first
problem only that I am concerned in what follows.

The question of the influence on real wages of periods of boom and depression has a long
history. But we need not go farther back than the period of the 'eighties and 'nineties of
the last century, when it was the subject of investigation by various official bodies before
which Marshall gave evidence or in the work of which he took part. I was myself brought
up upon the evidence he gave before the Gold and Silver Commission in 1887 and the
Indian Currency Committee in 1899.

It is not always clear whether Marshall has in mind a rise in money wages associated with
a rise in output, or one which merely reflects a change in prices (due, for example, to a
change in the standard which was the particular subject on which he was giving
evidence); but in some passages it is evident that he is dealing with changes in real wages
at times when output is expanding. It is clear, however, that his conclusion is based, not
like some later arguments on priori grounds arising out of increasing marginal cost in
the short period, but on statistical grounds which showedso he thoughtthat in the
short period wages were stickier than prices. In his preliminary memorandum for the
Gold and Silver Commission (Official Papers, p. 19) he wrote: '[During a slow and
gradual fall of prices] a powerful friction tends to prevent money wages in most trades
from falling as fast as prices; and this tends almost imperceptibly to establish a higher
standard of living among the working classes, and to diminish the inequalities of wealth.
These benefits are often ignored; but in my opinion they are often nearly as important as
the evils which result from that gradual fall of prices which is sometimes called a
depression of trade.' And when Mr Chaplin asked him (op. cit., p. 99), 'You think that
during a period of depression the employed working classes have been getting more than
they did before?' he replied, 'More than they did before, on the average.'

Subsequently, as appears from an important letter of April 1897 (hitherto unpublished) to

Foxwell, who held somewhat strongly the opposite opinion, Marshall's opinion became
rather more tentative; though the following extract refers more to his general attitude
towards rising prices than to their particular effect on real wages:

You know, my views on this matter are (a) not very confident, (b) not very
warmly advocated by me, (c) not very old, (d) based entirely on non-
academic arguments & observation.
 In the years 68 to 77 I was strongly on the side you now advocate. The
observation of events in Bristol made me doubt. In 85, or 86 I wrote a
Memn for the Comn on Depression showing a slight preference for rising
prices. But in the following two years I studied the matter closely, I read
and analysed the evidence of business men before that Commission; & by
the time the Gold & Silver Commission came, I had just turned the corner.

Since then I have read a great deal, but almost exclusively of a non-
academic order on the subject: & was thinking about it duhng a great part
of the evidence given by business men & working men before the Labour
Commission. I have found a good deal that is new to strengthen my new
conviction, nothing to shake it. I am far from certain I am right. I am
absolutely certain that the evidence brought forward in print to the
contrary in England and America (I have not read largely for other
countries) does not prove what it claims to, & does not meet or anticipate
my arguments, in the simple way you seem to imagine.

Shortly afterwards he began to work at his evidence for the Indian Currency Committee
which seems to have had the effect of confirming him in his previous opinion. His final
considered opinion is given in Question 11,781:

I will confess that, for ten or fifteen years after I began to study political
economy, I held the common doctrine, that a rise of prices was generally
beneficial to business men directly, and indirectly to the working classes.
But, after that time, I changed my views, and I have been confirmed in my
new opinions by finding that they are largely held in America, which has
recently passed through experiences somewhat similar to those of England
early in the century. The reasons for the change in my opinion are rather
long, and I gave them at some length before the Gold and Silver
Commission. I think, perhaps, I had better content myself now with calling
your attention to the fact that the statistical aspect of the matter is in a
different position now. The assertions that a rise in prices increased the
real wages of the worker were so consonant with the common opinion of
people who had not specially studied the matter, that it was accepted
almost as an axiom; but, within the last ten years, the statistics of wages
have been carried so far in certain countries, and especially in England and
America, that we are able to bring it to the test. I have accumulated a great
number of facts, but nearly everything I have accumulated is implied in
this table. It is copied from the article by Mr Bowley in the Economic
Journal for last December. It is the result of work that has been going on
for a number of years, and seems to me to be practically decisive. It
collects the average wages in England from the year 1844 to the year 1891,
and then calculates what purchasing power the wages would give at the
different times, and it shows that the rise of real wages after 1873 when
prices were falling was greater than before 1873 when prices were rising.
Here follows a table from Prof. Bowley's article in this Journal for December 1898.
Marshall's final conclusion was crystallised in a passage in the Principles (Book VI, ch.
VIII, 6):

'[When prices rise the employer] will therefore be more able and more
willing to pay the high wages; and wages will tend upwards. But
experience shows that (whether they are governed by sliding scales or not)
they seldom rise as much in proportion as prices; and therefore they do not
rise nearly as much in proportion as profits.'

Although Marshall's evidence before the Indian Currency Committee was given in 1899,
Prof. Bowley's statistics on which he was relying do not relate effectively to a date later
than 1891 (or 1893 at latest). It is clear, I think, that Marshall's generalisation was based
on experience from 1880 to 1886 which did in fact bear it out. If we divide the years from
1880 to 1914 into successive periods of recovery and depression, the broad result,
allowing for trend, appears to be as follows:

Real wages
18801884 Recovery Falling
18841886 Depression Rising
18861890 Recovery Rising
18901896 Depression Falling
18961899 Recovery Rising
18991905 Depression Falling
19051907 Recovery Rising
19071910 Depression Falling
19101914 Recovery Rising

According to this, Marshall's generalisation holds for the periods from 1880 to 1884 and
from 1884 to 1886, but for no subsequent periods. It seems that we have been living all
these years on a generalisation which held good, by exception, in the years 188086,
which was the formative period in Marshall's thought in this matter, but has never once
held good in the fifty years since he crystallised it! For Marshall's view mainly prevailed,
and Foxwell's contrary opinion was discarded as the heresy of an inflationist. It is to be
observed that Marshall offered his generalisation merely as an observed statistical fact,
and, beyond explaining it as probably due to wages being stickier than prices, he did not
attempt to support it by priori reasoning. The fact that it has survived as a dogma
confidently accepted by my generation must be explained, I think, by the more theoretical
support which it has subsequently received.

To my statement that Marshall's generalisation has remained uncorrected until recently

there is, however, an important exception. In his Industrial Fluctuations, published in
1927, Professor Pigou pointed out (p. 217) that 'the upper halves of trade cycles have, on
the whole, been associated with higher rates of real wages than the lower halves,' and he
printed in support of this a large scale chart for the period from 1850 to 1910.
Subsequently, however, he seems to have reverted to the Marshallian tradition, and in his
Theory of Unemployment, published in 1933, he writes (p. 296):

In general, the translation of inertia from real wage-rates to money wage-

rates causes real rates to move in a manner not compensatory, but
complementary, to movements in the real demand function. Real wage-
rates not merely fail to fall when the real demand for labour is falling, but
actually rise; and, in like manner, when the real demand for labour is
expanding, real wage-rates fall.

About that time M. Rueff had attracted much attention by the publication of statistics
which purported to show that a rise in real wages tended to go with an increase in
unemployment, Prof. Pigou points out that these statistics are vitiated by the fact that M.
Rueff divided money wages by the wholesale index instead of by the cost-of-living index,
and he does not agree with M. Rueff that the observed rise in real wages was the main
cause of the increased unemployment with which it was associated. But he concludes,
nevertheless (p. 300), on a balance of considerations, that 'there can be little doubt that in
modern industrial communities this latter tendency (i.e. for shifts in real demand to be
associated with shifts in the opposite sense in the rate of real wages for which work
people stipulate) is predominant'.

Like Marshall, Prof. Pigou based his conclusion primarily on the stickiness of money
wages relatively to prices. But my own readiness to accept the prevailing generalisation,
at the time when I was writing my General Theory, was much influenced by an priori
argument, which had recently won wide acceptance, to be found in Mr R. F. Kahn's
article on 'The Relation of Home Investment to Employment,' published in the Economic
Journal for June 1931. The supposed empirical fact, that in the short period real wages
tend to move in the opposite direction to the level of output, appeared, that is to say, to be
in conformity with the more fundamental generalisations that industry is subject to
increasing marginal cost in the short period, that for a closed system as a whole marginal
cost in the short period is substantially the same thing as marginal wage cost, and that in
competitive conditions prices are governed by marginal cost; all this being subject, of
course, to various qualifications in particular cases, but remaining a reliable
generalisation by and large.

I now recognise that the conclusion is too simple, and does not allow sufficiently for the
complexity of the facts. But I still hold to the main structure of the argument, and believe
that it needs to be amended rather than discarded. That I was an easy victim of the
traditional conclusion because it fitted my theory is the opposite of the truth. For my own
theory this conclusion was inconvenient, since it had a tendency to offset the influence of
the main forces which I was discussing and made it necessary for me to introduce
qualifications, which I need not have troubled with if I could have adopted the contrary
generalisation favoured by Foxwell, Mr Dunlop and Mr Tarshis. In particular, the
traditional conclusion played an important part, it will be remembered, in the discussions,
some ten years ago, as to the effect of expansionist policies on employment, at a time
when I had not developed my own argument in as complete a form as I did subsequently.
I was already arguing at that time that the good effect of an expansionist investment
policy on employment, the fact of which no one denied, was due to the stimulant which it
gave to effective demand. Prof. Pigou, on the other hand, and many other economists
explained the observed result by the reduction in real wages covertly effected by the rise
in prices which ensued on the increase in effective demand. It was held that public
investment policies (and also an improvement in the trade balance through tariffs)
produced their effect by deceiving, so to speak, the working classes into accepting a
lower real wage, effecting by this means the same favourable influence on employment
which, according to these economists, would have resulted from a more direct attack on
real wages (e.g. by reducing money wages whilst enforcing a credit policy calculated to
leave prices unchanged). If the falling tendency of real wages in periods of rising demand
is denied, this alternative explanation must, of course, fall to the ground. Since I shared at
the time the prevailing belief as to the facts, I was not in a position to make this denial. If,
however, it proves right to adopt the contrary generalisation, it would be possible to
simplify considerably the more complicated version of my fundamental explanation
which I have expounded in my General Theory. My practical conclusions would have, in
that case, fortiori force. If we can advance farther on the road towards full employment
than I had previously supposed without seriously affecting real hourly wages or the rate
of profits per unit of output, the warnings of the anti-expansionists need cause us less
anxiety.

Nevertheless, we should, I submit, hesitate somewhat and carry our inquiries further
before we discard too much of our former conclusions which, subject to the right
qualifications, have priori support and have survived for many years the scrutiny of
experience and common sense. I offer, therefore, for further statistical investigation an
analysis of the elements of the problem with a view to discovering at what points the
weaknesses of the former argument emerge. There are five heads which deserve separate
consideration.

First of all, are the statistics on which Mr Dunlop and Mr Tarshis are relying sufficiently
accurate and sufficiently uniform in their indications to form the basis of a reliable
induction?

For example, in so recent a compilation as the League of Nations World Economic

Survey 193738, prepared by Mr J. E. Meade, the traditional conclusion receives support,
not on priori recently available statistics. I quote the following from pp. 5455:

During the great depression after 1929, the demand for goods and services
diminished, and in consequence the price of commodities fell rapidly. In
most countries, as can be seen from the graph on p. 52, hourly money
wages were reduced as the demand for labour fell; but in every case there
was a greater fall in prices, so that hourly real wages rose. . .[It is then
explained that the same was not true of weekly wages.]. . .Since the
 recovery, the opposite movements may be observed. In most countries,
increased demand for goods and services has caused commodity prices to
rise more rapidly than hourly money wages, and the hourly real wage has
fallen. . .In the United States and France, however, the rise in money
wages was so rapid between 1936 and 1937 that the hourly real wage
continued to rise. . .When real hourly wages are raisedi.e. when the
margin between commodity prices and the money-wage cost becomes less
favourableemployers are likely to diminish the amount of employment
which they offer to labour. While there were, no doubt, other influences
affecting the demand for labour, the importance of this factor is well
illustrated by the graph on p. 53. In the case of all the countries
represented for which information is available, the fall in commodity
prices between 1929 and 1932 caused a rise in the hourly real wage, and
this was accompanied by a diminution in employment. . .(it is shown that
on the recovery there has been a greater variety of experience). . .

This authoritative study having international scope indicates that the new generalisations
must be accepted with reserve. In any case Mr Tarshis's scatter diagram printed below [in
the Economic Journal, March 1939] (p. 150), whilst it shows a definite preponderance in
the south-west and north-east compartments and a high coefficient of association,
includes a considerable number of divergent cases, and the absolute range of most of the
scatter is extremely small, with a marked clustering in the neighbourhood of the zero line
for changes in real wages; and much the same is true of Mr Dunlop's results. The great
majority of Mr Tarshis's observations relate to changes of less than 1.5 per cent. In the
introduction to his Wages and Income in the United Kingdom since 1860, Prof. Bowley
indicates that this is probably less than the margin of error for statistics of this kind. This
general conclusion is reinforced by the fact that it is hourly wages which are relevant in
the present context, for which accurate statistics are not available. Moreover, in the post-
scriptum to his note, Mr Tarshis explains that whilst real wages tend to move in the same
direction as money wages, they move in the opposite direction, though only slightly, to
the level of output as measured by man-hours of employment; from which it appears that
Mr Tarshis's final result is in conformity with my original assumption, which is, of course,
concerned with hourly wages. It seems possible, therefore, taking account of Mr Meade's
results, that I may not, after all, have been seriously wrong.

Furthermore, for reasons given below, it is important to separate the observations

according as the absolute level of employment is distinctly good or only mediocre. It may
be that we can analyse our results so as to give two distinct generalisations according to
the absolute level reached by employment. If, at the present stage of the inquiry, we are
to make any single statistical generalisation, I should prefer one to the effect that, for
fluctuations within the range which has been usual in the periods investigated which
seldom approach conditions of full employment, short-period changes in real wages are
usually so small compared with the changes in other factors that we shall not often go far
wrong if we treat real wages as substantially constant in the short period (a very helpful
simplification if it is justified). The conclusion, that changes in real wages are not usually
an important factor in short-period fluctuations until the point of full employment is
approaching, is one which has been already reached by Dr Kalecki on the basis of his
own investigations.

II

It may be that we have under-estimated the quantitative effect of a factor of which we

have always been aware. Our argument assumed that, broadly speaking, labour is
remunerated in terms of its own composite product, or at least that the price of wage-
goods moves in the same way as the price of output as a whole. But no one has supposed
that this was strictly the case or was better than an approximation; and it may be that the
proportion of wage-goods, which are not the current product of the labour in question and
the prices of which are not governed by the marginal cost of such product, is so great as
to interfere with the reliability of our approximation. House-rent and goods imported on
changing terms of trade are leading examples of this factor. If in the short period rents are
constant and the terms of trade tend to improve when money wages rise and to deteriorate
when money wages fall, our conclusion will be upset in practice in spite of the rest of our
premises holding good.

In the case of this country one has been in the habit of supposing that these two factors
have in fact tended to offset one another, though the opposite might be the case in the
raw-material countries. For whereas rents, being largely fixed, rise and fall less than
money wages, the price of imported food-stuffs tends to rise more than money wages in
periods of activity and to fall more in periods of depression. At any rate both Mr Dunlop
and Mr Tarshis claim to show that fluctuations in the terms of trade (terms of foreign
trade in Mr Dunlop's British inquiry and terms of trade between industry and agriculture
in Mr Tarshis's American inquiry) are not sufficient to affect the general tendency of their
results, though they clearly modify them quantitatively to a considerable extent.
Nevertheless, the effect of expenditure on items such as rent, gas, electricity, water,
transport, etc., of which the prices do not change materially in the short period, needs to
be separately calculated before we can be clear. If it should emerge that it is this factor
which explains the results, the rest of our fundamental generalisations would remain
undisturbed. It is important, therefore, if we are to understand the situation, that the
statisticians should endeavour to calculate wages in terms of the actual product of the
labour in question.

III

Has the identification of marginal cost with marginal wage cost introduced a relevant
error? In my General Theory of Employment, I have argued that this identification is
dangerous in that it ignores a factor which I have called 'marginal user cost'. It is unlikely,
however, that this can help us in the present context. For marginal user cost is likely to
increase when output is increasing, so that this factor would work in the opposite
direction from that required to explain our present problem, and would be an additional
reason for expecting prices to rise more than wages. Indeed, one would, on general
grounds, expect marginal total cost to increase more, and not less, than marginal wage
cost.
IV

Is it the assumption of increasing marginal real cost in the short period which we ought to
suspect? Mr Tarshis finds part of the explanation here; and Dr Kalecki is inclined to infer
approximately constant marginal real cost. But there is an important distinction which we
have to make. We should all agree that if we start from a level of output very greatly
below capacity, so that even the most efficient plant and labour are only partially
employed, marginal real cost may be expected to decline with increasing output, or, at the
worst, remain constant. But a point must surely come, long before plant and labour are
fully employed, when less efficient plant and labour have to be brought into commission
or the efficient organisation employed beyond the optimum degree of intensiveness. Even
if one concedes that the course of the short-period marginal cost curve is downwards in
its early reaches, Mr Kahn's assumption that it eventually turns upwards is, on general
common-sense grounds, surely beyond reasonable question; and that this happens,
moreover, on a part of the curve which is highly relevant for practical purposes. Certainly
it would require more convincing evidence than yet exists to persuade me to give up this
presumption.

Nevertheless, it is of great practical importance that the statisticians should endeavour to

determine at what level of employment and output the short-period marginal-cost curve
for the composite product as a whole begins to turn upward and how sharply it rises after
the turning-point has been reached. This knowledge is essential for the interpretation of
the trade cycle. It is for this reason that I suggested above that the observations of the
relative movement of real and money wages should be separately classified according to
the average level of employment which had been reached.

It may prove, indeed, at any rate in the case of statistics relating to recent years that the
level of employment has been preponderantly so low that we have been living more often
than not on the reaches of the curve before the critical point of upturn has been attained.
It should be noticed that Mr Tarshis's American figures relate only to the period from
1932 to 1938, during the whole of which period there has been such intense
unemployment in the United States, both of labour and of plant, that it would be quite
plausible to suppose that the critical point of the marginal cost curve had never been
reached. If this has been the case, it is important that we should know it. But such an
experience must not mislead us into supposing that this must necessarily be the case, or
into forgetting the sharply different theory which becomes applicable after the turning-
point has been reached.

If, indeed, the shape of the marginal-cost curve proves to be such that we tend to be
living, with conditions as they are at present, more often to the left than to the right of its
critical point, the practical case for a planned expansionist policy is considerably
reinforced; for many caveats to which we must attend after this point has been reached
can be, in that case, frequently neglected. In taking it as my general assumption that we
are often on the right of the critical point, I have been taking the case in which the
practical policy which I have advocated needs the most careful handling. In particular the
warnings given, quite rightly, by Mr D. H. Robertson of the dangers which may arise
when we encourage or allow the activity of the system to advance too rapidly along the
upward slopes of the marginal-cost curve towards the goal of full employment, can be
more often neglected, for the time being at least, when the assumption which I have
previously admitted as normal and reasonable is abandoned.

There remains the question whether the mistake lies in the approximate identification of
marginal cost with price, or rather in the assumption that for output as a whole they bear a
more or less proportionate relationship to one another irrespective of the intensity of
output. For it may be the case that the practical workings of the laws of imperfect
competition in the modern quasi-competitive system are such that, when output increases
and money wages rise, prices rise less than in proportion to the increase in marginal
money cost. It is scarcely likely, perhaps, that the narrowing gap could be sufficient to
prevent a decline in real wages in a phase in which marginal real cost was increasing
rapidly. But it might be sufficient to offset the effect on real wages of a modest rise in
marginal real cost, and even to dominate the situation in the event of the marginal real
cost curve proving to be almost horizontal over a substantial portion of its relevant length.

It is evidently possible that some such factor should exist. It might be, in a sense, merely
an extension of the stickiness of prices of which we have already taken account in II
above. Apart from those prices which are virtually constant in the short period, there are
obviously many others which are, for various reasons, more or less sticky. But this factor
would be particularly likely to emerge when output increases, in so far as producers are
influenced in their practical price policies and in their exploitation of the opportunities
given them by the imperfections of competition, by their long-period average cost, and
are less attentive than economists to their short-period marginal cost. Indeed, it is rare for
anyone but an economist to suppose that price is predominantly governed by marginal
cost. Most business men are surprised by the suggestion that it is a close calculation of
short-period marginal cost or of marginal revenue which should dominate their price
policies. They maintain that such a policy would rapidly land in bankruptcy anyone who
practised it. And if it is true that they are producing more often than not on a scale at
which marginal cost is falling with an increase in output, they would clearly be right; for
it would be only on rare occasions that they would be collecting anything whatever
towards their overhead. It is, beyond doubt, the practical assumption of the producer that
his price policy ought to be influenced by the fact that he is normally operating subject to
decreasing average cost, even if in the short-period his marginal cost is rising. His effort
is to maintain prices when output falls and, when output increases, he may raise them by
less than the full amount required to offset higher costs including higher wages. He
would admit that this, regarded by him as the reasonable, prudent and far-sighted policy,
goes by the board when, at the height of the boom, he is overwhelmed by more orders
than he can supply; but even so he is filled with foreboding as to the ultimate
consequences of his being forced so far from the right and reasonable policy of fixing his
prices by reference to his long-period overhead as well as his current costs. Rightly
ordered competition consists, in his opinion, in a proper pressure to secure an adjustment
of prices to changes in long-period average cost; and the suggestion that he is becoming a
dangerous and anti-social monopolist whenever, by open or tacit agreement with his
competitors, he endeavours to prevent prices from hollowing short-period marginal cost,
however much this may fall away from long-period average cost, strikes him as
disastrous. (It is the failure of the latest phase of the New Deal in the United States, in
contrast to the earliest phase, of which the opposite is true, to distinguish between price
agreements for maintaining prices in right relation to average long-period cost and those
which aim at obtaining a monopolistic profit in excess of average long-period cost which
strikes him as particularly unfair.)

Thus, since it is the avowed policy of industrialists to be content with a smaller gross
profit per unit of output when output increases than when it declines, it is not unlikely
that this policy may be, at least partially, operative. It would be of great interest if the
statisticians could show in detail in what way gross profit per unit of output changes in
different industries with a changing ratio between actual and capacity output. Such an
investigation should distinguish, if possible, between the effect of increasing output on
unit-profit and that of higher costs in the shape of higher money wages and other
expenses. If it should appear that Increasing output as such has a tendency to decrease
unit-profit, it would follow that the policy suggested above is actual as well as professed.
If, however, the decline in unit-profit appears to be mainly the result of a tendency of
prices to offset higher costs incompletely, irrespective of changes in the level of output,
then we have merely an example of the stickiness of prices arising out of the imperfection
of competition intrinsic to the market conditions. Unfortunately it is often difficult or
impossible to distinguish clearly between the effects of the two influences, since higher
money costs and increasing output will generally go together.

A well-known statistical phenomenon which ought to have put me on my guard confirms

the probability of constant or diminishing, rather than increasing, profit per unit of output
when output increases. I mean the stability of the proportion of the national dividend
accruing to labour, irrespective apparently of the level of output as a whole and of the
phase of the trade cycle. This is one of the most surprising, yet best-established, facts in
the whole range of economic statistics, both for Great Britain and for the United States.
The following figures summarise briefly what are, I believe, the undisputed facts:
 RELATIVE SHARE OF MANUAL LABOUR IN THE NATIONAL INCOME OF
GREAT BRITAIN
1911 40.7 1924 43.0 1928 43.0 1932 43.0
1925 40.8 1929 42.4 1933 42.7
1926 42.0 1930 41.1 1934 42.0
1927 43.0 1931 43.7 1935 41.8
RELATIVE SHARE OF MANUAL LABOUR IN THE NATIONAL INCOME OF
U.S.A.
1919 34.9 1923 39.3 1927 37.0 1931 34.9
1920 37.4 1924 37.6 1928 35.8 1932 36.0
1921 35.0 1925 37.1 1929 36.1 1933 37.2
1922 37.0 1926 36.7 1930 35.0 1934 35.8

The fluctuations in these figures from year to year appear to be of a random character,
and certainly give no significant indications of any tendency to move against labour in
years of increasing output. It is the stability of the ratio for each country which is chiefly
remarkable, and this appears to be a long-run, and not merely a short-period,
phenomenon. Moreover, it would be interesting to discover whether the difference
between the British and the American ratio is due to a discrepancy in the basis of
reckoning adopted in the two sets of statistics or to a significant difference in the degrees
of monopoly prevalent in the two countries or to technical conditions.

In any case, these facts do not support the recently prevailing assumptions as to the
relative movements of real wages and output, and are inconsistent with the idea of there
being any marked tendency to increasing unit-profit with increasing output. Indeed, even
in the light of the above considerations, the result remains a bit of a miracle. For even if
price policies are such as to cause unit-profit to decrease in the same circumstances as
those in which marginal real cost is increasing, why should the two quantities be so
related that, regardless of other conditions, the movement of the one almost exactly
offsets the movement of the other? I recently offered the problem of explaining this , as
Edgeworth would have called it, to the research students at Cambridge. The only solution
was offered by Dr Kalecki in the brilliant article which has been published in
Econometrica. Dr Kalecki here employs a highly original technique of analysis into the
distributional problem between the factors of production in conditions of imperfect
competition, which may prove to be an important piece of pioneer work. But the main
upshot is what I have indicated above, and Dr Kalecki makes, to the best of my
understanding, no definite progress towards explaining why, when there is a change in
the ratio of actual to capacity output, the corresponding changes in the degree of the
imperfection of competition should so exactly offset other changes. Nor does he explain
why the distribution of the product between capital and labour should be stable in the
long run, beyond suggestion that changes of one kind always just serve to offset changes
of another; yet it is very surprising that on balance there should have been a constant
degree of monopoly over the last twenty years or longer. His own explanation is based on
the assumptions that marginal real costs are constant, that the degree of the imperfection
of the market changes in the opposite direction to output, but that this change is precisely
offset by the fact that the prices of basic raw materials (purchased by the system from
outside) relatively to money wages increase and decrease with output. Yet there is no
obvious reason why these changes should so nearly offset one another; and it would seem
safer not to assume that marginal real costs are constant, but to conclude that in actual
fact, when output changes, the change in the degree of the imperfection of the market is
such as to offset the combined effect of changes in marginal costs and of changes in the
prices of materials bought from outside the system relatively to money wages. It may be
noticed that Dr Kalecki's argument assumes the existence of an opposite change in the
degree of the imperfection of competition (or in the degree in which producers take
advantage of it) when output increases from that expected by Mr R. F. Harrod in his
study on The Trade Cycle. There Mr Harrod expects an increase; here constancy or a
decrease seems to be indicated. Since Mr Harrod gives grounds for his conclusions which
are prima facie plausible, this is a further reason for an attempt to put the issue to a more
decisive statistical test.

To state the case more exactly, we have five factors which fluctuate in the short period
with the level of output:

(1) The price of wage-goods relative to the price of the product;

(2) The price of goods bought from outside the system relatively to money
wages;

(3) The marginal wage cost;

(4) The marginal user cost (I attach importance to including this factor
because it helps to bridge the discontinuity between an increase of output
up to short-period capacity and an increase of output involving an increase
beyond the capacity assumed in short-period conditions); and

(5) The degree of the imperfection of competition.

And it appears that, for reasons which are not yet clear, these factors taken in conjunction
have no significant influence on the distribution between labour and capital of the income
resulting from the output. Whatever a more complete inquiry into the problem may bring
forth, it is evident that Mr Dunlop, Mr Tarshis and Dr Kalecki have given us much to
think about, and have seriously shaken the fundamental assumptions on which the short-
period theory of distribution has been based hitherto; it seems that for practical
purposes a different set of simplifications from those adopted hitherto are preferable.
Meanwhile I am comforted by the fact that their conclusions tend to confirm the idea that
the causes of short-period fluctuation are to be found in changes in the demand for labour,
and not in changes in its real-supply price; though I complain a little that I in particular
should be criticised for conceding a little to the other view by admitting that, when the
changes in effective demand to which I myself attach importance have brought about a
change in the level of output, the real-supply price for labour would in fact change in the
direction assumed by the theory I am opposingas if I was the first to have entertained
the fifty-year-old generalisation that, trend eliminated, increasing output is usually
associated with a falling real wage.

I urge, nevertheless, that we should not be too hasty in our revisions, and that further
statistical enquiry is necessary before we have a firm foundation of fact on which to
reconstruct our theory of the short period. In particular we need to know:

(i) How the real hourly wage changes in the short period, not merely in
relation to the money wage, but in relation to the percentage which actual
output bears to capacity output;

(ii) How the purchasing power of the industrial money wage in terms of its
own product changes when output changes; and

(iii) How gross profit per unit of output changes (a) when money costs
change, and (b) when output changes.

J. M. KEYNES