| Labourers receive their share | as Wages, |
| Capitalists | as Profits, |
| Land-owners | as Rent. |
We proceed first to Rent, for reasons which will appear when we treat of Wages and Profits; and, for the sake of clearness, shall confine our Summary to the explanation of Land-Rent.
Summary of Principles illustrated in this Volume.
The total Rent paid by a farmer includes real Rent, and much besides; viz. the profits of the capital laid out by the land-owner upon the estate.
Real Rent is that which is paid to the land-owner for the use of the original, indestructible powers of the soil.
Land has these powers in different degrees.
The most fertile being all appropriated, and more produce wanted, the next best soil is brought into cultivation; then land of the third degree, and so on, till all is tilled that will repay tillage.
An unequal produce being yielded by these different lands, the surplus return of all above the lowest goes to the land-owner in the form of Rent.
The same thing happens when repeated applications of capital are made to the same land for the sake of increasing its productiveness. The produce which remains over the return to the least productive application of capital, goes to the land-owner in the form of Rent.
Rent, therefore, consists of that part of the return made to the more productive portions of capital, by which it exceeds the return made to the least productive portion.