The Theory of International Trade: With Some of Its Applications to Economic Policy |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
actual advantage alteration amount applied argument barter bills bullion Cairnes cause chapter classes commodities comparative cost competition consequence cost of production course creditor currency debtor diminishing return distribution doctrine duction economic effect element Encyclopædia Britannica England English equation of indebtedness equilibrium existence export duties fact favourable foreign trade free-trade further gain gold impossible increase industry influence instance interest international exchange international trade international values J. S. Mill labour and capital law of cost law of diminishing loss manufacturers ment money-material movement nation natural necessary needed Nova Scotia obtained operation Political Economy position possible precious metals productive power profit Protectionism protectionist protective duties quantity of money reason reciprocal demand reduced regarded result revenue Ricardo scale of prices seigniorage specie-point supposed tariff terms of exchange ternational theory of international tion United wages Washington Capitol wealth Wealth of Nations
Popular passages
Page 42 - Gold and silver having been chosen for the general medium of circulation, they are, by the competition of commerce, distributed in such proportions amongst the different countries of the world, as to accommodate themselves to the natural traffic which would take place if no such metals existed, and the trade between countries were purely a trade of barter.
Page 71 - It is not to be understood that the natural price of labour, estimated even in food and necessaries, is absolutely fixed and constant. It varies at different times in the same country, and very materially differs in different countries.
Page 11 - By means of glasses, hotbeds, and hot-walls, very good grapes can be raised- in Scotland, and very good wine too can be made of them at about thirty times the expense for which at least equally good can be brought from foreign countries.
Page 11 - Two men can both make shoes and hats, and one is superior to the other in both employments ; but in making hats he can only exceed his competitor by one-fifth, or 20 per cent., and in making shoes he can excel him by one-third, or 33 per cent. ; will it not be for the interest of both that the superior man should employ himself exclusively in making shoes, and the inferior man in making hats?
Page 10 - The real price of everything, what everything really costs to the man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble of acquiring it. What everything is really worth to the man who has acquired it, and who wants to dispose of it or exchange it for something else, is the toil and trouble which it can save to himself, and which it can impose upon other people.
Page 123 - ... advantageous. Each new acre of vineyard planted in FRANCE, in order to supply ENGLAND with wine, would make it requisite for the FRENCH to take the produce of an ENGLISH acre, sown in wheat or barley, in order to subsist themselves; and it is evident that we should thereby get command of the better commodity.
Page 124 - No EXTENSION of foreign trade will immediately increase the amount of value in a country, although it will very powerfully contribute to increase the mass of commodities, and therefore the sum of enjoyments.
Page 42 - The natural price, therefore, is, as it were, the central price, to which the prices of all commodities are continually gravitating. Different accidents may sometimes keep them suspended a good deal above it, and sometimes force them down even somewhat below it. But whatever may be the obstacles which hinder them from settling in this center of repose and continuance, they are constantly tending towards it.
Page 11 - Between whatever places foreign trade is carried on, they all of them derive two distinct benefits from it. It carries out that surplus part of the produce of their land and labour for which there is no demand among them, and brings back in return for it something else for which there is a demand. It gives a value to their superfluities, by exchanging them for something else, which may satisfy a part of their wants, and increase their enjoyments.