Essentials of Economic Theory: As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public PolicyClark, John Bates
General
Essentials of Economic Theory: As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public Policy
Clark, John Bates
Economics
Secondly, it must be possible to demand separate and independent
returns for the different increments of goods, so that cutting the
rate charged for one part of the traffic does not entail cutting the
rate charged for the other. In the case of a manufacturer this is
secured, either by carrying some goods to a remote and entirely
independent market, or by producing some new kind of goods the low
price of which will have no effect on the sales or the prices of the
other kinds. In the case of the carrier it is accomplished in a
variety of similar ways. He can take return cargoes at a low rate. If
he stops at different ports along his route he can charge less for
goods landed at certain ports than for those landed at others. He can
classify his freight and carry some of it at a rate at which he could
not afford to carry the whole. With the growth of traffic, however,
this condition tends to disappear. Its existence requires that the
carrier should have facilities only partially used. As the ship
acquires fuller and fuller cargoes, it ceases to be advantageous to
fill the hold with goods which pay lower rates than others; just as a
mill, which may have run for a time partly on goods that yield a large
return and partly on those which yield a small one, gradually discards
the making of the cheaper goods as the demand for the dearer kind
increases. The vessel which can get full cargoes of profitable
merchandise will cease to devote any space to what is less profitable.
In the end the ship in our illustration will be transporting in both
directions all the first-class freight it can take, and will accept
neither the stone nor the merchandise consigned to ports to which it
can be carried only at the cheap rates.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account