Page:Report on Manufactures (Hamilton).djvu/22

 To illustrate this last idea, let it be supposed that the difference of price in two countries of a given quantity of manual labor requisite to the fabrication of a given article is as 10, and that some mechanic power is introduced into both countries which, performing half the necessary labor, leaves only half to be done by hand, it is evident that the difference in the cost of the fabrication of the article in question. in the two countries, as far as it is connected with the price of labor, will be reduced from 10 to 5 in consequence of the introduction of that power.

This circumstance is worthy of the most particular attention. It diminishes immensely one of the objections most strenuously urged against the success of manufactures in the United States.

To procure all such machines as are known in any part of Europe can only require a proper provision and due pains. The knowledge of several of the most important of them is already possessed. The preparation of them here is, in most cases, practicable on nearly equal terms. As far as they depend on water some superiority of advantages may be claimed from the uncommon variety and greater cheapness of situations adapted to mill seats, with which different parts of the United States abound.

So far as the dearness of labor may be a consequence of the greatness of profits in any branch of business, it is no obstacle to its success. The undertaker can afford to pay the price.

There are grounds to conclude that undertakers of manufactures in this country can at this time afford to pay higher wages to the workmen they may employ than are paid to similar workmen in Europe. The prices of foreign fabrics in the markets of the United States, which will for a long time regulate the prices of the domestic ones, may be considered as compounded by the following ingredients: The first cost of materials, including the taxes, if any, which are paid upon them where they are made; the expense of grounds, buildings, machinery, and tools; the wages of the persons employed in the manufactory; the profits on the capital or stock employed; the commissions of agents to purchase them where they are made; the expense of transportation to the United States, including insurance and other incidental charges; the taxes or duties, if any, and fees of office, which are paid on their exportation; the taxes or duties and fees of office which are paid on their importation.

As to the first of these items—the cost of materials—the advantage upon the whole is at present on the side of the United States, and the difference in their favor must increase in proportion as a certain and extensive domestic demand shall induce the proprietors of land to devote more of their attention to the production of those materials. It ought not to escape observation, in a comparison on this point, that some of the principal manufacturing countries of Europe are much more dependent on foreign supply for the materials of their manufactures than would be the United States, who are capable of supplying themselves with a greater abundance as well as a greater variety of the requisite materials.

As to the second item—the expense of grounds, buildings, machinery, and tools—an equality at least may be assumed, since advantages in some particulars will counterbalance temporary disadvantages in others.