Reviewing (hyping up) The National Gain (Anders Chydenius, 1765)

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What, why?

I was researching Anders Chydenius for my Where I’m from essay’s part about my home town. And then Wikipedia just kept hyping the man up.

From the Wikipedia page on The National Gain ¹:

In this thesis Chydenius argues in favour of free export trade rights for the province of Ostrobothnia and lays down the principles of liberalism and the free markets – for example, free trade and industry – eleven years before Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations (1776). The book also includes a description of what Smith later dubbed the “invisible hand”.

From the Wikipedia page on Anders Chydenius ²:

one of the most important champions of democratic development in 18th-century Sweden, known as the leading classical liberal of Nordic history. He championed free trade, freedom of the press, and the rights of servants, labourers and the rural poor

From the Wikipedia page on the Swedish Freedom of the Press Act ³:

The Freedom of the Press Act is derived from the Freedom of the Press Act of 1766; the legislation is regarded as the world’s first law supporting the freedom of the press and freedom of information

The Ostrobothnian priest Anders Chydenius was a driving force and author behind one of the three pleas for freedom of the press submitted to the Riksdag.[5] In his writing, he concluded:

No evidence should be needed that a certain freedom of writing and printing is one of the strongest bulwarks of a free organization of the state, as, without it, the estates would not have sufficient information for the drafting of good laws, and those dispensing justice would not be monitored, nor would the subjects know the requirements of the law, the limits of the rights of government, and their responsibilities. Education and ethical conduct would be crushed; coarseness in thought, speech, and manners would prevail, and dimness would darken the entire sky of our freedom in a few years.

Anders Chydenius was a driving force in the committee preparing the freedom of the press, but he was expelled from the Riksdag in July 1766 and did not participate when the law was finalized during the autumn.

So, what did Chydenius think, in his own words?

The first section:

It is not to be gainsaid that every Nation has gain as the chief object of its Economic and Political statutes, but if we consider the expedients each one has resorted to in order to secure gain, we shall notice incredible discrepancies.

Each vies with the other to arrive first; but they steer different courses and carry quite different sails, though almost the same wind fills them all.

They try to get to windward of one another and use special sailors’ tricks to run into one another, though there is space and depth enough for them to sail abreast. It seems as if now one of the ships, now the other, was without a Pilot and a Helmsman.

Nobody can deny that in this way the work follows different rules. Either the Compass is unreliable or the Chart must be wrong.

A new guide is now put before the eyes of the Reader. It is quite a small one, so that everyone may be able to carry it in his pocket. It is new as well, I said, for it hardly conforms to any other in Europe. And I think it is reliable, too, for I have attempted to found it upon reason and experience. Let us first agree as to the words.

I really do appreciate philosophers and political thinkers who understand the importance of shortness.

… I was reading up on this Finnish political philosopher and politician from the 18th century, Anders Chydenius. Guy is a Classical Liberal and has incredibly Abadarian vibes.

It is not to be gainsaid that every Nation has gain as the chief object of its Economic and Political statutes, but if we consider the expedients each one has resorted to in order to secure gain, we shall notice incredible discrepancies.

…

Man thrives when he enjoys his needs and comforts, which, according to our ordinary way of speaking, are called goods. Nature produces them, but they can never be of use to us without labour.

No commodity exists, but that it cannot be changed into these Metals by commerce, nor can any commodity be obtained in the absence of other commodities desirable to the seller; and the quantity of money that must be paid for the commodity is called its value. .. Our wants are various, and nobody has been found able to acquire even the necessaries without the aid of other people, and there is scarcely any Nation that has not stood in need of others. The Almighty himself has made our race such that we should help one another. Should this mutual aid be checked within or without the Nation, it is contrary to Nature. …

If we imagine that there were a State that had neither agriculture nor mining, neither cattlebreeding nor shipping, but only made an abundance of crockery from earth or clay, which was in great demand all over Europe, and hence obtained not only all its wants, but also received 2 Millions in gold and silver every year, would not these 2 Millions undeniably be the gain of that Nation?

But if one-third of the same Nation, after the example of others, were to abandon this trade of theirs and become farmers with the intention of thereby producing bread for themselves and their fellow-citizens, thinking that they would gain more in this way, but that the corn produced was 1 Million less in value than the former production of the same one-third, it is obvious that by this they would have caused the Nation 1 Million reduction in gain or, which is the same thing, an equally great loss.

From this it leaps to the eye that a Nation does not gain through being occupied with many different trades, but through working in those that pay best, that is, in which the least number of people can produce commodities to the highest value. …

Thus the wealth of a Nation consists in the multitude of products or, rather, in their value; but the multitude of products depends on two chief causes, namely, the number of workmen and their diligence. Nature will produce both, when she is left untrammelled.

5:

I intend to found thereon the following proposition, i.e. that every individual spontaneously tries to find the place and the trade in which he can best increase National gain, if laws do not prevent him from doing so.

Every man seeks his own gain. This inclination is so natural and necessary that all Communities in the world are founded upon it. Otherwise Laws, punishments and rewards would not exist and mankind would soon perish altogether. The work that has the greatest value is always best paid, and what is best paid is most sought after.

..

It is thus undoubtedly a loss to the Nation when somebody is forced or is encouraged by public rewards to work in a trade other than the one in which he earns the highest profit; for this does not happen without such inducements, just as a merchant does not sell his Wares for less than what is offered him.

..

If he whose work someone has been forced to do gains as much as the worker has lost, it is not National gain; but if he gains more, only the difference is the gain of the Nation, but obtained through the oppression of its citizens.

Thus it is obvious that, when somebody conducts an enterprise by the work of others, but neither pays nor is able to pay without loss as much as the workers can earn in some other trade, the deficiency in their wages must then be a National loss.

(Section 6 is a practical math example, and not very quotable3)

Section 7:

Finally, is there not an evidence of National loss in the complaints and poverty of the workmen and peasantry at and around the Ironworks, from being under compulsion, and desirous of using their time and abilities on what would be more useful to them and the Realm at the present time?

Here I am by no means talking about such works as exist without any disadvantage to the peasantry and workmen; they are just as precious jewels of the Nation as ever Farming, Trade and Manufacture.

..

Section 8:

From this it follows of itself that it is quite unnecessary for the Government to draw workmen from one trade into another by means of laws.

Nevertheless, how many Statesmen are there that have busied themselves with this? Almost all Europe is making efforts to draw the people from their previous trades and put them into others either by force or by granting them privileges. They boast of a National gain as great as the value of the new production, and often forget that the workmen employed in this production might if free, have produced goods in their former trade, to an equal or higher value, and in the first case there was no gain, but in the second a real loss to the Nation.

If ten men produce goods to the value of 100 Daler a day in one trade, but in another to a value of not more than 80, it is obvious that in the latter eventuality the Nation will lose 20 Daler a day on those ten men’s work. Whether these ten workmen be at liberty to sell their produce or be free to negotiate for daily wages with those who conduct the trade in question, the difference in their wages will always be in the said proportion, and then it is certain that they will enter the former as being more profitable to the Nation and to themselves.

But if these workmen are forced to remain in the other trade at 20 per cent. less wages, this 20 per cent. is their loss and the Nation’s. How unnecessary laws seem to be in such cases!

(food for thought):

Sen suurimmassa filosofisessa teoksessa, “Kansallinen Voitto”, on ihan bänger aloitus.

On kiistämätöntä, että voitto on jokaisen kansakunnan taloudellisten ja valtiollisten säädösten päätavoite. .. Ihminen voi hyvin silloin, kun hän tyydyttää tarpeitaan ja mukavuudenhaluaan tavaroilla, kuten niitä yleisen puhetavan mukaan kutsum¬ me. Luonto synnyttää ne, mutta ilman työtä emme pääse koskaan hyötymään niistä.

Tää teksti on todella tiivistä ja tässä ei oo mitään turhaa lätinää. Ehkä kirjotan tästä reaktiopostauksen omaan blogiin.