Essays on some unsettled Questions of Political Economy
- Language:
- English
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~52,600 words · 250 passages
Cite this work
- APAJohn Stuart Mill. (n.d.). Essays on some unsettled Questions of Political Economy. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/john-stuart-mill/essays-on-some-unsettled-questions-of-political-economy
- MLAJohn Stuart Mill. Essays on some unsettled Questions of Political Economy. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/john-stuart-mill/essays-on-some-unsettled-questions-of-political-economy.
- ChicagoJohn Stuart Mill. Essays on some unsettled Questions of Political Economy. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/john-stuart-mill/essays-on-some-unsettled-questions-of-political-economy.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
Five essays on economics written at twenty-five and published fifteen years later.
Context and history
The fifth, on method, is the one that matters: it introduces the famous 'economic man' — man conceived solely as a wealth-maximiser — and Mill says plainly that this is a **useful fiction**, not a description of anyone. That it was later taken for the other thing is not his fault.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
proportion of their money incomes as before, will suffice to supply their other wants, and the remainder, being increased one-tenth in amount, will enable them to purchase one-tenth more cloth than before, even though cloth had not fallen. But it has fallen: so that they are doubly gainers. If they do not choose to increase their consumption of cloth, this does not prevent them from being gainers. They purchase the same quantity with less money, and have more to expend upon their other wants. In England, on the contrary, general money-prices have fallen. Linen, however, has fallen more than the rest; having been lowered in price, by importation from a country where it was cheaper, whereas the others have fallen only from the consequent efflux of money. Notwithstanding, therefore, the general fall of money-prices, the English producers will be exactly as they were in all other respects, while they will gain as purchasers of linen. The greater the efflux of money required to restore the equilibrium, the greater will be the gain of Germany; both by the fall of cloth, and by the rise of her general prices. The less the efflux of money requisite, the greater will be the gain of England; because the price of linen will continue lower, and her general prices will not be reduced so much. It must not, however, be imagined that high money-prices are a good, and low money-prices an evil, in themselves. But the higher the general money-prices in any country, the greater will be that country's means of purchasing those commodities which, being imported from abroad, are independent of the causes which keep prices high at home. 3. We have hitherto supposed the carriage to be performed without labour or expense. If we abandon this supposition, we must correct the statement of the case in a slight degree.…
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