Three Lectures On The Rate Of Wages - Nassau William Senior

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DEFINITION OF HIGH AND LOW WAGES.

The labourers form the mass of every community. The inquiry into the causes affecting wages is, therefore, the most important branch of political economy. In the following Lectures I propose, first, to explain some ambiguities in the terms high and low wages; secondly, to state the proximate cause which regulates the amount of wages; and, lastly, to expose some prevalent errors respecting that cause; leaving the remoter causes, the causes of the proximate cause, for discussion in a subsequent course.

Wages are the remuneration received by the labourer in recompense for having exerted his faculties of mind and body; and they are termed high or low, in proportion to the extent of that remuneration. That extent has been estimated by three different measures; and the words high and low wages have, consequently, been used in three different senses.

First. Wages have been termed high or low, according to the amount of money earned by the labourer within a given period, without any reference to the commodities which that money would purchase; as when we say that wages have risen since the reign of Henry VII., because the labourer now receives 1s. 6d. or 2s. a day, and then received only 4Ѕd.

Secondly. They have been termed high or low, according to the quantity and quality of the commodities obtained by the labourer, without any reference to his receipts in money; as when we say that wages have fallen since the reign of Henry VII., because the labourer then earned two pecks of wheat a day, and now earns only one.

Thirdly. They have been termed high or low, according to the share or proportion which the labourer receives of the produce of his own labour, without any reference to the total amount of that produce.

The first nomenclature, that which measures wages simply by their amount in money, is the popular one. The second, that which considers wages simply with reference to the quantity and quality of the commodities received by the labourer, or to speak more correctly, purchasable with his money wages, was that generally adopted by Adam Smith. The third, that which considers wages as high or low, simply with reference to the labourer's share or proportion of what he produces, was introduced by Mr. Ricardo, and has been continued by many of his followers.

This last use of the words high and low wages has always appeared to me one of the most unfortunate of Mr. Ricardo's many innovations in the language of political economy. In the first place, it has a tendency to withdraw our attention, even when we are considering the subject of wages, from the facts which most influence the labourer's condition. To ascertain whether his wages are high or low, we are desired to inquire, not whether he is ill or well paid,—not whether he is well or ill fed, or clothed, or lodged, or warmed, but simply what proportion of what he produces comes to his share. During the last four or five years, many a hand-weaver has received only 8s. 3d. for producing, by a fortnight's exertion, a web that the capitalist has sold for 8s. 4d. A coal-merchant often pays his men two guineas a week, and charges his employers for their services two guineas and a half. But, according to Mr. Ricardo's nomenclature, the wages of the weaver, at 4s. 1Ѕd. a week, are much higher than those of the coal-heaver at two guineas, since the weaver receives 99 percent. of the value of his labour, while the coal-heaver had only 80 per cent.

And, even if the nomenclature in question were free from this objection—even if the point on which it endeavours to fix the attention were the most important, instead of being the least important incident to wages, it still would be inconvenient from its obscurity. No writer can hope to be consistent in the use of familiar words in a sense always different from their established meaning, and often directly opposed to it; still less can he hope to be always understood....

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