seven per cent of the new $2,400 would be added to the wages-fund. It is worth while calling attention to this, if for no other reason than to show that in this way a change can be readily made in the wages-fund by natural movements; and that no one can be so absurd as to say that it is absolutely fixed in amount. But it certainly is “predetermined” in the economic sense, in that any reinvestments, as well as former funds, must necessarily be distributed according to the above general principles, independent of the “higgling” in the labor market. The following is Mr. Cairnes's statement of the amount and “predetermination” of the wages-fund:
“I believe that, in the existing state of the national wealth, the character of Englishmen being what it is, a certain prospect of profit will ‘determine’ a certain proportion of this wealth to productive investment; that the amount thus ‘determined’ will increase as the field for investment is extended, and that it will not increase beyond what this field can find employment for at that rate of profit which satisfies English commercial expectation. Further, I believe that, investment thus taking place, the form which it shall assume will be ‘determined’ by the nature of the national industries—‘determined,’ not under acts of Parliament, or in virtue of any physical law, but through the influence of the investor's interests; while this, the form of the investment, will again ‘determine’ the proportion of the whole capital which shall be paid as [pg 182] wages to laborers.”166 In this excellent and masterly conception, the doctrine of a wages-fund is not open to the objections usually urged against it. Indeed, with the exception of Professor Fawcett, scarcely any economist believes in an absolutely fixed wages-fund. In this sense, then, and in view of the above explanation, it will be understood what is meant by saying that wages depend upon the proportion of the wages-fund to the number of the