Econlib

The Library

Other Sites

Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow CHAPTER VI.: ADVANTAGE BY ADDITION TO NATIONAL CAPITAL. - The Works of Jeremy Bentham, vol. 3

Return to Title Page for The Works of Jeremy Bentham, vol. 3

Search this Title:

Also in the Library:

Subject Area: Economics
Subject Area: Political Theory
Subject Area: Law

CHAPTER VI.: ADVANTAGE BY ADDITION TO NATIONAL CAPITAL. - Jeremy Bentham, The Works of Jeremy Bentham, vol. 3 [1843]

Edition used:

The Works of Jeremy Bentham, published under the Superintendence of his Executor, John Bowring (Edinburgh: William Tait, 1838-1843). 11 vols. Vol. 3.

Part of: The Works of Jeremy Bentham, 11 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


CHAPTER VI.

ADVANTAGE BY ADDITION TO NATIONAL CAPITAL.

Among the advantages promised by the proposed measure, may be reckoned the addition it promises to make to the mass of national productive capital, and thence to the mass of national wealth; viz. by the acceleration it will give to the operation of the existing funds, in respect of the redemption of the national debt.

That an addition to the mass of national capital—an addition to the value of £100—is the result of every £100 paid in discharge of the national debt, is a proposition which, though hitherto it seems to have engaged but little if any attention, will be assented to almost as soon as mentioned. That the putting of money into men’s hands on this occasion in lieu of the income they are obliged to part with, has no tendency to increase the ratio of the amount of money expended in the way of prodigality, to that of the money expended and employed in the way of thrift, is evident enough. But if, employing the money put into his hands in lieu of a source of income of which he is deprived, a man employ it otherwise than in the view of making it productive of a mass of income to equal amount, he employs it in the way of prodigality; and if he employ it with the view of making it productive of income, it must be either by expending it himself in the production or improvement of such articles as constitute a mass of capital to the amount of such expenditure, or by lending it directly or ultimately to somebody else, by whom it will be applied to that same purpose.

If the money thus put into the hands of the expelled annuitant in lieu of his annuity were taken from the mass employed in the shape of capital, there would be neither loss nor gain by the operation, on the score of addition to the mass of national wealth.* But the money thus employed by the existing sinking fund is not taken from any such mass. It is the produce of taxes—of taxes levied on income, either directly or through the medium of expenditure, and is taken out of that fund, the whole of which (after a small deduction on account of savings) would otherwise have been expended within the year, in the way of current expenditure: that is, in the purchase partly of unproductive labour, such as that of servants, coaches, horses, players, musicians, and the like—partly in the purchase of articles consumed mostly within the year, or some other such short periods of time, without having produced any equivalent increase.

Of the money thus put in the shape of capital into the hands of the public creditors on the redemption of their respective portions of the public debt, that part which is received by British subjects, will in general be employed in adding to the mass of capital contained within the limits of the British empire: on the other hand, that part which is received by foreigners, will as naturally be employed in adding to the mass of capital contained within the dominion of the states to which they respectively belong—in adding to the quantity of foreign, not of British capital.

Deducting, then, from the whole amount of the money payable on the redemption of the redeemable, but unredeemed portion of the funded debt, that part of it which is in the hands of foreigners, the remainder will be the sum that, in the year in which the last portion of the debt comes to be redeemed, will have been added to the mass of national capital from this source, independently of any effect produced by the proposed measure.

Whatever amount of profit the proposed measure may be attended with, this profit being also applied in aid of the other sinking funds to the redemption of the debt, will act in acceleration of that effect. It will therefore, in proportion to the acceleration, be productive of a distinguishable addition to the mass of national capital in proportion to the acceleration thus produced by it. In a rough way, the amount of this addition may be stated as equal to the interest at compound interest, at the rate at which the national capital is accumulating, upon the amount of the debt redeemed for the term of years struck off by the acceleration.

From the amount of restitution* thus made to capital, in any accurate computation would come to be subtracted that proportion of the national income, which, had it not been taken by taxes, and thence in the shape of redemption money added to capital, as it were by force, would have been saved up, and, without changing hands, have gone to capital of its own accord, and from the amount of profit by acceleration of the redemption of the debt, a similar proportion of the amount of such profit.

To the account of the addition thus promised to the mass of national capital, in respect of freed capital, and such other parts of the mass as are of an intrinsically productive nature, it may naturally enough be expected that I should add the augmentation promised in the shape of circulating capital;—viz. to that branch of it which consists of money.

That in certain circumstances an augmentation of this sort would be among the natural consequences, and even, unless prevented by special care, among the necessary consequences of the measure, is a proposition, the truth of which will, I think, appear with sufficient evidence: but far from taking credit for any such result in the account of advantages, probity requires that I should give warning of it as a source of danger. To point out the means of obviating this danger, will be the business of an ensuing chapter.

[* ]This supposition is actually realized in the case of money employed in the redemption or purchase of portions of the land-tax, and laid out in the purchase of masses of stock annuities on government account, to be added to the sinking fund. The money for a purchase of that sort cannot be supposed (unless here and there by accident) to be saved out of the income of the year, and defalcated from what would otherwise have been the unproductive expenditure of the year, unless in the case where, without any such call, a sum to the same amount would have been saved, and employed or lent out in the shape of capital. It is therefore so much taken from the mass of national capital:—on the other hand, when handed on to the stockholders of whom the stock is bought, and in payment for their stock, it is then so much added to the mass of national capital; being so much which would not have taken that course, had it not been for the measure. It therefore leaves the amount of national capital where it found it.

[* ]I say restitution; for as the amount is added to productive capital upon the redemption of the debt, so was it taken from productive capital on the creation of the debt. The case might be supposed, in which this restitution should be complete, and even more than complete. It must, however, still be remembered, that the parties into whose hands this new wealth is poured, are not the parties from whose hands the wealth expended in war was originally drawn;—that money given to A is no compensation for loss of money, of life, or of limbs to B;—that if the acquisition be made, it is made by no other means than that of the most cruel pinching;—and that if the money wrung from pleasurable expenditure had been added, the whole of it, in the first instance, to productive capital, instead of being consumed in misery-making expenditure, the addition to productive capital and wealth would have been so much the more abundant. It may be further observed, that from the influx, or rather reflux of capital upon the redemption of the debt, suffering and loss must inevitably ensue to those whose incomes are reduced by the fall in the rate of interest of money. But this consideration may serve to reconcile the public in general, and the parties affected by it, that such would have been their suffering, and still greater, had there been neither borrowing nor redeeming, but had the country been reposing all the while in a state of uninterrupted peace.