Though it were true that the immediate and certain effect of regulations controlling the competition of foreign and domestic fabrics was an increase of price, it is universally true that the contrary is the ultimate effect with every successful manufacture. When a domestic manufacture has been brought to perfection and has engaged in the prosecution of it a competent number of persons it invariably becomes cheaper. * * * The internal competition which takes place soon does away with anything like monopoly, and by degrees reduces the price of the article to the minimum of reasonable profit on the capital. (Treasury Report Dec. 1791.)—Fortnightly Review, 1873.
It is not merely your misapplication of the principles of political economy to which I object; I also object to the over-bearing way in which you thrust down the throat of your opponent the opinions of your favourite political economists, as if they were infallible and settled the question beyond all possibility of further argument. This is especially the case when you quote Mill. Now Mill is no doubt an eminently able and powerful writer; but he is deplorably subject to mistakes. He constantly contradicts himself, and is contradicted by political economists equally able and more reliable than himself. For example, Professor Bonamy Price[19] accuses Mill of introducing utter confusion into the topic of Wages.
Cossa speaks of Mill’s “ardent concessions to socialism more apparent than real;” of his “narrow philosophic utilitarianism.”
Also, speaking of Thornton, Cossa says:[20]—
“His book on labour is an excellent one; it made a great impression on Mill, and caused him to abandon his theory of wages fund; which has also been opposed by Lange, by the American Economist Walker, and by Bretano.”
Many of the inaccuracies of Mill have been exposed by Professor Cairnes.[21]
Mr. Cook says:—
“Mill, however, is said to have abandoned the seesaw theory in his latest and yet unpublished essays.”[22]
Macleod also, in writing on the question of rent says:—