_General Consumption as affected by a Specific Increase of Productive Power._--Consumption in the generic--the use of consumers' goods of every kind--grows as the power to make the good increases; but a point that is of great importance is that any _specific_ increase of productive power brings about a _general_ increase of consumption. It brings about a greater all-round creating and using of commodity. If we can hereafter make the _A'''_ of our table with the expenditure of half as much labor and capital as we have heretofore used in creating it, the liberated agents of production become available for making whatever is most needed, and they will, in fact, be used for increasing the supply of all three types of consumers' goods represented in the table. They will give us more of _A'''_, _B'''_, and _C'''_ in quantities adjusted by the laws of value. The outcome of this is that an economy in making _A'''_ actually gives us more of _A'''_, _B'''_, and _C'''_. We become larger consumers of everything because of the cheapening of anything which enters into our list of articles for personal use. This presents a further aspect of the process of moving labor and capital from group to group, in which the possibility of hardship for particular persons inheres. The conclusion to which a fair weighing of the effects of mechanical progress has already led us is that there are very few, even of the workers who suffer displacements of this kind, who do not during their lives gain far more than they lose by general progress; and the effects of cheapening capital goods at one point, and so liberating capital for use at other points, increases this beneficent effect. The special costs of making the new kinds of machinery have been large in the earlier stages of the process, but have afterward grown smaller; and as machinery has come into general use the liberating of capital by the cheapening of the machines has become a more and more important factor. Some of the capital liberated at _A_ goes to assist labor in furnishing the additional amount of _B'''_ and _C'''_ which enlarged consumption requires.