There is no truth more certain than that the employment of labour is small or great according to the proportion which capital bears to the number of labourers. Capital is the fund which supports la bour, and which must employ it or be unproductive ; and thus, if in any country capital be increasing more rapidly than the population, employment will be abundant and wages high ; if less rapidly, employment will be scarce and wages low. In the one case, capitalists will be bidding high for labour ; in the other, labourers will be bidding against each other for employment, Accumulation of capital is therefore highly conducive to the interests of the labouring population generally, and the use of machinery is especially favourable to accumulation, as may be shown by a simple example. Suppose a man to have a capital of 10,0001., which he is expending annually upon labour in a particular trade, and that his profits are ten per cent., or 10001. a-year. Each year his whole capital is expended, and his means of accumulation are thus restricted to a portion of his an nual profits only. But let him invent a machine to facilitate his business, and his position is immediately changed If this machine should cost 50001.. and the other 50001. be still expended in labour, he may be said to have saved one half of his entire capital in a single year ; for instead of spending the whole of it as before, in labour, he is possessed of a durable pro perty which, at a small annual cost, will last for ten or probably twenty years. Nor can it be said that this saving is effected at the expense of labour ; for the owner of the machine is placed in a new position in respect to his profits, which prevents him from securing to himself the difference between the amount paid now and that previously paid for labour. To gain a profit of ten per cent. it had been necessary for him, before the inven tion of the machine, to realize 11,0001. annually, being his whole capital and the profits upon it : but now, in order to ob tain the same profit, it is sufficient if he realize 65001. only : viz., 5001. profit upon his fixed capital of 50001. ; 5001. for repairs, and wear and tear, calculated at ten per cent. ; and 55001. to replace the sum spent upon labour with a profit of ten per cent. He would realize the whole 11,0001. as before, if he were able ; but he is restrained by competition, which levels the profits of trade. For some time he will most probably obtain more than ten per cent. profit, and so long as he is able to do this, his means of accumulating fresh capital in addition to his machine will be increased, which capital will be expended upon additional labour. But when his profits have been reduced to their former level by competition, society has gained in the price of his goods 45001. a year,
being the difference between 11,0001. for merly realized by him, and 65001. his present return. But is this amount thus gained by society lost to the labourer ? Unquestionably not. As a consumer, he participate* in the advantage of low prices, while the amount saved by the community in the purchase of one com modity must be expended upon others which can only be produced by labour. It cannot be too often repeated, that all capital is ultimately expended upon la hour; and whether it be accumulated by individuals in large sums, or distri buted in small portions throughout the community, directly or indirectly it passes through the hands of those who labour. If a manufacturer accumulates by means of higher profits, he employs more labour ; if the community save by low prices, they employ more labour in other forms. So long as the capital is in existence it is certain to have an influence upon the ge neral market for labour.
tr We are now speaking not of the inter ests of particular workmen to whose tem porary sufferings caused by the use of machinery we have already adverted, but of the general and permanent interests of the working population of a country. As regards these, the statistics of British in dustry amply confirm all reasoning from principles, and prove beyond a doubt that machinery has had a beneficial influence upon the employment and wages of la bour. Any one who will reflect upon the facts which have been noticed above, as disclosed by the Census [CENsus], cat scarcely fail to arrive at the conclusion that without machinery England could not have supported her present population, or could only have supported them in po verty and wretchedness. Nor must the degradation of a part of the manufac turing population be thoughtlessly attri buted to machinery, instead of to moral and social causes, which are independent of it. Into these causes it would be out of place, at present, to inquire ; hut enough has been said to show, 1st, that machi nery by increasing production .multiplies the sources of enjoyment, and places them within the reach of a greater num ber of persons ; and 2ndly, that by giving increased employment to labour it enables more persons to enjoy those comforts which it has itself created. These are the elements of social prosperity, and if evils have sprung up with it, like tares with wheat, it is not machinery which has caused them. Wherever the influence of machinery has been felt, wealth has advanced with rapid strides ; and though in too many cases religion, virtue, and enlightenment may have lagged behind, She tardiness of their progress is to be as cribed, not to machinery, but to the faulty institutions of men.