be systematic monopoly, the theory of scarcity put into practice.
In the same way, a Chamber in which each person consults only his immediate interest as a consumer would lead to the systematic establishment of freedom, the suppression of all restrictive measures, and the overturning of all artificial barriers, in a word, the realization of the theory of abundance.
From this it follows:
That to consult the immediate interest of production alone is to consult an antisocial interest;
That to make the immediate interest of consumption the exclusive criterion is to adopt the general interest.
May I be allowed to stress this point of view once more at the risk of repeating myself?
There is radical antagonism between sellers and buyers.10
Sellers want the object of the sale to be scarce, in short supply and at a high price;
Buyers want it to be abundant, available everywhere at a low price.
The laws, which ought at least to be neutral, take the side of sellers against buyers, of producers against consumers, of high prices against low prices,11 and of scarcity against abundance.
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They act, if not intentionally, at least in terms of their logic, according to this given assumption: A nation is rich when it lacks everything.
For they say: “It is the producer we should favor by ensuring him a proper market for his product. To do this, we have to raise its price. To raise its price, the supply has to be restricted, and to restrict the supply is to create scarcity.” And look: let me suppose that right now when these laws are in full force a detailed inventory is taken, not in value but in weight, measures, volumes, and quantities of all the objects existing in France that are likely to satisfy the needs and tastes of her inhabitants, such as wheat, meat, cloth, canvas, fuel, colonial goods, etc.
Let me further suppose that on the following day all the barriers that prevent the introduction into France of foreign products are overturned.
Lastly, in order to assess the result of this reform, let me suppose that three months later, a new inventory is taken.
Is it not true that we would find in France more wheat, cattle, cloth, canvas, iron, coal, sugar, etc. on the second inventory than at the time of the first?
This is so true that our protective customs duties have no other aim than to prevent all of these things from reaching us, to restrict their supply and to prevent a decrease in their price and therefore their abundance.
Now, I ask you, are the people better fed under the empire of our laws because there is less bread, meat, and sugar in the country? Are they better clad because there is less yarn, canvas, and cloth? Are they better heated because there is less coal? Are they better assisted in their work because there is less iron and copper, fewer tools and machines?
But people will say: if foreigners swamp us with their products, they will carry off our money.
What does it matter? Men do not eat money; they do not clothe themselves with gold, nor heat themselves with silver. What does it matter if there is more or less money in the country, if there is more bread on the sideboard, more meat on the hook, more linen in the cupboards, and more wood in the woodshed?12
I will continue to confront restrictive laws with this dilemma:
Either you agree that you cause scarcity or you do not agree.
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If you agree, you are admitting by this very fact that you are doing the people as much harm as you can. If you do not agree, then you are denying that you have restricted supply and caused prices to rise, and consequently you are denying that you have favored producers.
You are either disastrous or ineffective. You cannot be useful.13
PUBLISHING HISTORY:
Original title: “Obstacle, cause.”
Place and date of first publication: JDE 11 (April 1845): 8–10.
First French edition as book or pamphlet: Economic Sophisms (First Series) (1846).
Location in Paillottet’s edition of OC: Vol. 4. Sophismes économiques. Petits pamphlets I, pp. 15–18.
Previous translations: 1st English ed., 1846; 1st American ed., 1848; FEE ed., 1964.
The obstacle taken for the cause—scarcity taken for abundance: this is the same sophism under another guise. It is a good thing to examine it from all sides.
Man originally lacks everything.
Between his destitution and the satisfaction of his needs there is a host of obstacles, which it is the purpose of work to overcome. It is an intriguing business trying to find how and why these same obstacles to his well-being have become in his eyes the cause of his well-being.
I need to transport myself a hundred leagues away. But between the points of departure and arrival there are mountains, rivers, marshes, impenetrable forests, evildoers, in a word, obstacles, and in order to overcome these obstacles I have to make a great deal of effort or, what comes to the same thing, others have to make a great deal of effort and have me pay the price for this. It is clear that in this respect I would have been in a better situation if these obstacles did not exist.
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To go through life and travel along the long succession of days that separates the cradle from the tomb, man needs to assimilate a prodigious quantity of food, protect himself against the inclemency of the seasons, and preserve himself from or cure himself of a host of ills. Hunger, thirst, illness, heat, and cold are so many obstacles that lie along his way. In his solitary state, he will have to combat them all by means of hunting, fishing, growing crops, spinning, weaving, and building houses, and it is clear that it would be better for him if there were fewer of these obstacles, or even none at all. In society, he does not have to confront each of these obstacles personally; others do this for him, and in return he removes one of the obstacles surrounding his fellow men.
It is also clear that, taking things as a whole, it would be better for men as a group, that is, for society, that the obstacles should be as insignificant and as few as possible.
However, if we examine social phenomena in detail, and the sentiments of men as they have been altered by trade, we soon see how they have managed to confuse needs with wealth and obstacles with causes.
The division of labor, a result of the ability to trade, has meant that each person, instead of combating on his own all the obstacles that surround him, combats only one, and this, not for himself but for the benefit of all his fellow men, who in turn render him the same service.
Now, the result of this is that this person sees the immediate cause of his wealth in the obstacle that it is his job to combat on other people’s account. The greater, more serious, more keenly felt this obstacle is, the more his fellow men will be ready to pay him for removing it, that is to say, to remove on his behalf the obstacles that stand in his way.
A doctor, for example, does not occupy himself in baking his bread, manufacturing his instruments, weaving, or making his clothes. Others do this for him, and in return he does battle with the illnesses that afflict his patients. The more numerous, severe, and recurrent these illnesses are, the more willing or even obliged people are to work for his personal advantage. From his point of view, illness, that is to say, a general obstacle to people’s well-being, is a cause of individual well-being. All producers reason in the same way with regard to things that concern them. Shipowners make their profit from the obstacle known as distance, farmers from that known as hunger, cloth manufacturers from that known as cold. Teachers live on ignorance, gem cutters on vanity, lawyers on greed,