The Wages Question

Excerpt from The Wages Question: A Treatise on Wages and the Wages Class Wages a Question in the Distribution of Wealth. All the questions of Political Economy may, both conveniently and appropriately, be grouped under four titles, namely, the Production, the Distribution, the Exchange, and the Consumption of Wealth. All wealth has, of course, to be produced, in the first place; and, moreover, it is produced to be consumed, and for this end alone. Production and Consumption, therefore, are concerned with the entire sum of wealth. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

"Francis A. Walker's The Wages Question is generally credited as having demolished the prior, antiquated "wages fund" theory of wages [see Book I, Chapters VIII and IX]. In the process, Walker simultaneously laid the groundwork for John Bates Clark's definitive descriptions of the marginal products of labor and capital. His interest in the nature of the firm contributed to Frank H. Knight's work by clearly describing the factors of production and how to categorize their rewards into wages, rent, and profits."...