Page:Thoughts on the Corn laws, addressed to the working classes of the county of Gloucester.djvu/15

11 diamond: or it may require the employment of great capital to fit it for sale.

In goods imported from abroad in the finished state, such as tea, tobacco, coarse cotton goods, the price of the articles is not in the slightest degree affected by the wages of labour in England. The only English labour bestowed upon it is in carrying it to the warehouse, and from thence to the retail dealer.

But let us suppose that, on an average, the price of each article is made up of an equal amount of the value of raw material—of the profits upon the capital employed—and of wages paid for the labour employed in its production. Then if the article sold for fifteen shillings, the stuff out of which the article was made would be five shillings—the profits upon the capital employed would be five shillings—and the wages paid for the labour in it would also be five shillings.

Well, let us now suppose the rate of wages falls one-fifth: then a labourer who before earned ten shillings a week will now only get eight. But on the other hand, he can get as much bread, potatoes, or bacon for eightpence, as he before paid tenpence for.

He next goes to the village shop to buy a stock of tea, tobacco, coats, petticoats, or blankets. He finds that he can purchase now for fourteen shillings what he was before obliged to pay fifteen shillings