THOMAS HODGSKIN AND ECONOMIC PROGRESS; A RADICAL RECONSTRUCTION OF HIS ENDOGENOUS GROWTH THEORY F.G. Day PhD 2009 THOMAS HODGSKIN AND ECONOMIC PROGRESS; A RADICAL RECONSTRUCTION OF HIS ENDOGENOUS GROWTH THEORY Frederick George Day A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements of the Manchester Metropolitan University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Economics The Manchester Metropolitan University June 2009 1 Declaration I confirm that no part of this thesis has been submitted for the award of a qualification at this or any other university. 2 Abstract By means of a close reading of early 19th century economic works, and by reconstructing aspects of Thomas Hodgskin‘s political economy, this thesis presents an exposition of those parts of his work that contributed to his position on growth. Rather than concentrating on his ideas on capital, we have centred on his concept of political economy as a science concerned with labour as the sole creator of wealth. We present his political economy as having labour as its focal point within a hypothetical pure market economy. From here he sought a foundation to economic growth derived from human action rather than capital or other material circumstances. Hodgskin saw human knowledge and the use of technology as the starting point that would, from his perspective, lead inevitably to those economic conditions that produce improvements in economic welfare and by doing so allow for an increase in population. In order to demonstrate his ideas on growth, we reconstruct his concepts of what was natural and artificial to equate to the modern notions of endogenous and exogenous. Improvements to knowledge and technology that stemmed from the very temper of humanity and its tendency to multiply, were the endogenous fount of growth. In this way as Hodgskin stressed ―necessity was the mother of invention‖. We also illustrate how, from Hodgskin‘s perspective, exogenous issues were the non-economic influences such as governments, legal (rather than natural) laws and tithes that tended to act counter-productively to human progress. Our reconstruction also resolves some of the dissonance that has long been associated with Hodgskin‘s economics, by addressing some of the apparent contradictions that otherwise persist. 3 Acknowledgements. To Dr. Susan Pashkoff for introducing me to Thomas Hodgskin and Manchester Metropolitan University. To Keith for being there, listening to me and getting me through all this work. To John on Melton Mowbray‘s Market book stall, and all the other booksellers and all the librarians who have helped me find all the books I‘ve needed and read. To my children, Fred, Charlotte, Simon, Chris and Luke for putting up with me over all these years. 4 Contents Chapter Title 1 Introduction 11 Agenda 11 Focus 16 Methodological Preamble 17 A Radical Reconstruction 21 The Mechanics of a Life 22 Early Writings 24 Introducing Mr. Hodgskin 26 Background and Context 28 Contemporaries and their Concerns 30 Utilitarianism 31 Property 32 William Godwin 33 Property Rights 37 William Paley 39 Lockean Foundations 41 Social Perception 42 Historical Works 44 Outline of Chapters 45 Typographical Note 46 Abbreviations used 47 2 Political Economy 48 Agenda 48 Introduction 49 2.1 Hodgskin’s Methodology 52 Hodgskin as a Classical Economist 52 Hodgskin‘s Lecturing 54 The Progress of Society 56 Political Economy as a Tool 57 J.S. Mill and Hodgskin 61 The Education of Hodgskin and Mill 64 Mill and Socialism 65 Subsequent Subjects 66 2.2 Political Economy as a Science 67 Agenda 67 Art or Science 67 Changing Attitudes 70 The Need for a Scientific Political Economy 74 5 2.3 In Defence of Political Economy 76 Agenda 76 Polarised Opinions 76 Attacks on Political Economy 77 Explanations Provided 79 The Trades‘ Newspaper 81 The Spitalfields Acts 83 Hodgskin‘s Response to The Trades‟ Newspaper 86 2.4 The Subject Matter of Political Economy 91 Agenda 91 Humanistic Economics 91 The Scope of Political Economy 92 Separation from the Physical 93 Moral Science 94 Mill‘s Concluding Definition of Political Economy 96 Hodgskin‘s definition of Political Economy 97 Social Economy 99 Consumption 99 2.5 The Source and the Cause of Wealth 101 Agenda 101 Daniel Raymond 102 Fountain of Wealth 103 Naïve Productivity Theory of Production 104 Richard Jones 106 Efficient Cause 108 3 Nature and the Natural 111 Agenda 111 J.S. Mill‘s Nature 112 3.1 Nature 113 Introduction 113 Defining Nature 113 Utilitarian Nature 115 An Object‘s Nature 117 Nature as the ―About-to-be‖ 118 Nature and the Artificial 119 Hodgskin‘s Artifice 122 Natural Society 123 The Social 125 Hodgskin‘s Natural Laws 126 Nature‘s Beneficence 128 The Perfectibility Debate 132 Nature as Prime Cause 136 Hodgskin‘s Notion of Progress 138 6 3.2 The Natural 141 Introduction 141 A Qualified Nature 141 The Scope of Popular Political Economy 142 Deductive or Inductive Reasoning 143 A Hypothetical Science 145 Imaginary Constructions 145 The Pure Market Economy 147 4 Labour 149 Agenda 149 Introduction 149 Ambiguities over the Term Labour 150 Aims. 151 4.1 What was meant by the term Labour? 153 The Axiom of Labour 153 Beneficial Labour 154 The Sufficiency of Labour 156 A Problem Stated 157 Labour as Action 158 Labour or Work? 159 Two Species of Labour 160 Productive Labour 163 Malthus‘s Earlier View on Labour 164 The Inclusion of Profits 166 Hodgskin‘s Perspective 167 Extensive Labour 168 4.2 Contemporary Deliberations 171 J.R. McCulloch 171 The Edinburgh Connection 171 Introduction to A Treatise 175 Limits to the term Labourers 176 J.B. Say‘s Contribution 178 Non-Human Labour 178 The Direct Responses to Hodgskin 180 Thompson‘s critique of Hodgskin‘s Labour 181 Mental Labour in Thompson‘s Work 182 Thompson‘s Wealth and Utility 183 Thomas Cooper 185 Labour and Skill 187 7 5 The Produce of Labour 189 Agenda 189 5.1 Wealth, Utility and Commodities 190 Introduction 190 McCulloch on Wealth and Utility 190 Immaterial Wealth 193 Commodities and Services 195 Hodgskin on Motion 198 Market Economy Labour 198 5.2 The Whole Product of Labour 200 Introduction 200 Labour Defended 202 Hodgskin‘s Claim 203 The Problem of Interest 204 Profiteering Labourers 206 Labour Rewarded 207 Samuel Read‘s Response 211 Other Contemporary Reactions 215 Hodgskin‘s Reaction to the Diffusion Society 217 Anton Menger‘s Right to the Whole Produce 219 Menger‘s Conclusions 221 Later Expositions 223 Concluding Remarks 224 6 Value 225 Agenda 225 Hodgskin on Value 225 Hodgskin's Concept of Value 226 Hodgskin‘s Labour Theory of the Notion of Value 227 Contemporary Notions 229 De Quincey on Value 231 John Stuart Mill on de Quincey 232 De Quincy on Malthus 236 Principium Cognoscondi 237 7 Price 238 Agenda 238 7.1 A Scheme of Prices 239 Three categories of Price 239 Adam Smith‘s Prices 241 Hodgskin‘s Money Price 243 Market Price 245 Natural Price 246 8 Prime Costs 248 A Reconstructed Natural Price 250 Social Price 250 An Adding Up Notion of Price 253 The Payers of Price 255 7.2 The Behaviour of Natural Prices 259 Hodgskin's Criticism of Ricardo 259 Diminishing Returns in Agriculture 260 Corn as a Manufactured Commodity 261 Hodgskin's Assertions Addressed 263 Falling Prices 265 8 Growth 267 Introduction 267 8.1 A Reconstruction of Growth 269 Overview 269 Part One – Constituent factors 270 Population 270 Output 271 Productivity 272 Natural Price 273 Market Price 275 Part Two – Causes of Growth 278 Increasing Population 278 Knowledge 282 Hodgskin as a pre-Smithian Growth Theorist 286 Communication 288 Material Factors 290 Methodological Matters 292 Part Three - Indicators of Growth 293 Population and Pauperism 294 Prices 295 Crime Statistics 296 Marriage Statistics 299 8.2 Other Economic Changes 300 Exogenous Technological Change 300 Temporary Change 301 Governmental Intervention 303 Detrimental Consequences 306 Business Cycles 307 9 9 Concluding Remarks 310 Summation 310 Growth 311 Contradictions 313 Consonance 315 Bibliography 316 Tables Table 1: Population figures for Great Britain 295 10 Chapter 1 Introduction Agenda This thesis is a reconstructive exposition of Thomas Hodgskin‘s economic theory of endogenous growth. We aim to show that, contrary to the orthodoxy of mainstream economic thought adhered to by most of his contemporaries, Hodgskin presented an early portrayal of endogenous economic growth.1 For Hodgskin this growth would occur spontaneously, and thereby endogenously, as a result of what he saw as the natural conditions of man‘s social situation. The medium that enabled this economic growth was the human ingenuity evident in mankind‘s ever increasing knowledge and improving technology. From this perspective economic growth arose from man‘s ideas and mental abilities rather than the purely material circumstances of his existence. Hence we find in Hodgskin a concentration on human abilities and actions as the prime impetus to growth rather than the material characteristics of land or capital. Thus this thesis concentrates on this humanistic temper of Hodgskin‘s economics, rather than upon his capital theory that has generally received most academic attention. To this end we have dealt with his views on the character of the science of political economy, which were in advance of what was to become the more accepted concept of economics as a science rather than an art or guide to the 1 By endogenous we mean that growth, in Hodgskinřs scheme, arose from causes within, rather than outside, of a considered economy. We do not propose that Hodgskin held a strictly technical notion of endogeny as portrayed in modern theories of endogenous growth. Hodgskinřs ideas should rather be seen as dissonant to his contemporaries and as such conceptually preparatory to modern notions particularly as they relate to such issues as the importance of knowledge, technology, and human capital.