THE SCIENCE OF WEALTH By J. A. Hobson

"This Volume contains a study of the structure and working of the modern business world in which wealth is made and distributed as income to those who have made it or can lawfully get hold of it. It describes the ways in which the productive powers of Labour, Ability, Land, Capital and Society are applied in the various trades, arts and professions, for the production of material goods and services, and the ways in which the payment for this work is regulated and carried out. No knowledge of economic facts or principles is presumed, except such as every intelligent man or woman acquires in the ordinary experience of life.



So brief a presentation of so large a subject will suffer necessary defects. It will be apt to be too unqualified in statement and too dogmatic in mode of argument. It will shirk some important points of controversy.



Since the line of interpretation taken here has been more fully defended in a larger volume entitled The Industrial System, I may be permitted to refer to it those readers who may wish to follow out the argument in more detail.



STUDENTS Desiring to follow the growth of the Science of Wealth in this country will begin with Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, following with Ricardo's Principles, and J. S. Mill's Principles of Political Economy for the “classical “ theory. In Jevons' Theory of Political Economy they will find a challenge to the older theory, and a new interpretation of economic “value.” The best authoritative statement of modern “orthodox” theory is in Marshall's Principles of Economics (Macmillan), while Philip H. Wicksteed's Common Sense of Political Economy (Macmillan) presents a valuable psychological interpretation.



A reliable brief account of the growth of the science may be found in L. L. Price's Political Economy in England (Methuen), whilst E. Cannan presents a very useful criticism of much of the earlier work in his Theories of Production and Distribution (P. S. King). In Foxwell's Introduction to Menger's Right to the Whole Produce of Labour is found an interesting account of the beginnings of socialistic theory in England, in connection with which Hyndman's Economics of Socialism and Bernstein's Evolutionary Socialism may be read.



For a fuller statement of the method of description and interpretation adopted in this volume I may refer to my Evolution of Modern Capitalism (Scott) and The Industrial System (Longmans). Among innumerable special studies of the facts and problems of modern industry, I would refer among the larger works to Booth's Life and Labour in London (Macmillan)and Rowntree's Poverty (Macmill



loss's Methods of Industrial Remuneration (Williams and Norgate), Dr. Shadwell's Industrial Efficiency (Longmans), and Brassey and Chapman's Work and Wages (Longmans). But the largest ordered mass of information upon present-day industrial conditions lies in the Reports of the Poor Law Commission.



On Finance two excellent elementary textbooks may be found in Withers' The Mcaning of Money (Methuen), and Armitage Smith's Principles and Methods of Taxation (Murray)."