(2.) If efficiency and the cost of producing food remain the same as at first, suppose a change to occur which raises the quantity of corn each laborer receives from 1,000 to 1,100, or, as it is called, increases his real wages—then the account will be:
500 men, each producing 1,200 yards, give a total product of 600,000 yards.
500 men, each paid 1,100 bushels, cause an outlay of 550,000 yards.
Profit: 50,000 yards.
(3.) If efficiency and real wages remain the same, suppose such an increase in the cost to the employers of obtaining corn that they are obliged to give one and one tenth yard of their goods for one bushel of corn (1,000 bushels of corn costing them 1,100 yards of cloth), then the statement will read:
500 men, each producing 1,200 yards, give a total product of 600,000 yards.
500 men, each paid 1,000 bushels, cause an outlay of 550,000 yards.
Profit: 50,000 yards.
Chapter VI. Of Rent.
§ 1. Rent the Effect of a Natural Monopoly.
The requisites of production being labor, capital, and natural agents, the only person, besides the laborer and the capitalist, whose consent is necessary to production, and who can claim a share of the produce as the price of that consent, is the person who, by the arrangements of society, possesses exclusive power over some natural agent. The land is the principal of the natural agents which are capable of being appropriated, and the consideration paid for its use is called rent. Landed proprietors are the only class, of any numbers or importance, who have a claim to a share in the distribution of the produce, through their ownership of something which neither they nor any one else have produced. If there be any other cases of a similar nature, they will be easily understood, when the nature and laws of rent are comprehended.