Principles of Political Economy, Vol. 2Roscher, Wilhelm
General
Principles of Political Economy, Vol. 2
Roscher, Wilhelm
Economics
In every income which has anything to do with other incomes, it is
necessary to distinguish its immediately productive side, and its profit
or acquisition side. It is necessary, in the first place, that all the
products made by private parties should, so to speak, be put into the
common treasury of the national economy, and that each should thence
draw his own private revenue. Justice requires that there should be a
perfect correlation between the two; that each should enjoy precisely
the quota of the national income to the production of which his person
or his property contributed. A just appreciation of the relative
productive power of the divers branches of labor constitutes one of the
chief bulwarks against the inroads of destructive socialistic theories.
The person who calls a good doctor or a good judge unproductive should,
to be consistent, call those who by their greater intelligence are
fitted to superintend agricultural and industrial enterprises
unproductive, also, as is done by the coarser socialists with their
apotheosis of mere manual labor. Unfortunately, such a settlement as is
above contemplated among the different factors of production, whose
owners are desirous to divide the common product among them, is possible
only where the factors of production are either of the same kind, or can
be reduced to a common denominator.[148-1] But if justice pure and
simple were meted out, no man could subsist. Love or charity must
supplement justice in order to assist those (and especially such as
without any fault of theirs) who are not able to produce anything, or
enough to supply those wants, for instance, children and the poor.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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