My dear Malthus,
After the most attentive consideration which I can give to your book[268], I cannot agree with you in considering labour, in the sense in which you use it, as a good measure of value. Neither can I discover exactly what connexion the constant labour necessary to produce the wages and profits on a commodity has with its value. If it be a good measure for one commodity, it must be for all commodities; and, as well as valuing wheat by the constant quantity of labour necessary to produce the particular quantity given to the workman, together with the profit of the farmer on that particular quantity, I might value cloth or any other thing by the same rule.
I know, indeed, that I might make out a table[269] precisely such as yours, in which the only alteration would be the word cloth instead of the word wheat, and you would probably then ask me whether your principle were not of universal application. I should answer that it contains in it that radical objection which you make against the proposed measure of your opponents. You may, if you please, arbitrarily select labour as a measure of value, and explain all the science of political economy by it, in the same way as any other man might select gold or any other commodity; but you can no more connect it with a principle or show its invariability than he could. Let me suppose that cloth could not be made in less than two years; the first line of my table must be altered, and the figures would stand in the following order:—
150, 100, 25 per cent. 7½, 2½, 10, 10, 15.
They would do so because ten pieces of cloth would, with the accumulation of profit for two years, be of the same value as a commodity, the result of the same quantity of labour, which could be produced in two years. I do not know how you will treat this objection, but in my opinion it is fatal to your whole theory.
I have the same objection to your measure, which I have always professed; you choose[270] a variable measure for an invariable standard. Who can say that a plague which should take off half our people would not alter the value of labour? We might, indeed, agree to transfer the variation to the commodities, and to say that they had fallen and not that labour had risen, but I can see no advantage in the change.
We might again discover modes by which the necessaries of the labourer might be produced with uncommon facility; and, in consequence of the stimulus which the good situation of the labourers might give to population, the reward of the labour in necessaries might be no higher than before; would it be right in this case, in which nothing had really altered but necessaries and labour, to say that they only had remained steadily at the same value, and, because a given quantity of corn or of labour will exchange only for (perhaps) 3/4 of the former quantity of linen, cloth, or money, to declare that it was the linen, cloth, or money which had risen in value, not labour and corn which had fallen?
Two countries are equally skilful and industrious; but in one the people live on the cheap food of potatoes, in the other on the dear food, wheat. You will allow that profits will be higher in the one country than the other. You will allow, too, that money may be nearly of the same value in both, if we choose anything else as a measure of value but labour. You will further agree that there might be an extensive trade between such countries. If a man sent a pipe of wine from the potato[271] country, which cost £100 and which might be sold at £110 in the wheat country, you would say that the wine was at a higher value in the country from which it was exported, merely because, in that country, it could command more labour. You would say this although the wine would not only exchange for more money but for more of every other commodity in the wheat country. I contend that this is a novelty which cannot be considered an improvement; it would confound all our usual notions, and would impose upon us the necessity of learning a new language. All mankind would say that wine was dearer in the wheat than in the potato country, and that labour was of less value in the latter. In page 31 there is a long passage on the reason for choosing labour as a standard, with which I am not satisfied. A piece of cloth is 120 yards in length and is to be divided between A and B; it is obvious that in proportion as much is given to A less will be given to B and vice versa. This will be true, although the value of the whole 120 yards be £100, £50, or £5. Is it not then a begging of the question to assume the constant value because the quantity is constant, and because it is always to be divided between two persons?
Allowing you your premises, I see very few instances in which I can quarrel with your conclusions. I agree with all you say concerning the glut of commodities; allow to you your measure, and it is impossible to differ in the result.
I hope soon to see you. I have hardly been able to find time to write this letter, I am so busily engaged. I am serving on a committee.