An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith [e book reader pdf TXT] 📗
- Author: Adam Smith
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it towards the discharge of the debt. Another million,
accordingly, was paid in the course of last year ; but at the
same time, a large civil-list debt was left unpaid, and we are
now involved in a new war, which, in its progress, may prove as
expensive as any of our former wars.{It has proved more expensive
than any one of our former wars, and has involved us in an
additional debt of more than one hundred millions. During a
profound peace of eleven years, little more than ten millions of
debt was paid; during a war of seven years, more than one hundred
millions was contracted.} The new debt which will probably be
contracted before the end of the next campaign, may, perhaps, be
nearly equal to all the old debt which has been paid off from the
savings out of the ordinary revenue of the state. It would be
altogether chimerical, therefore, to expect that the public debt
should ever be completely discharged, by any savings which are
likely to be made from that ordinary revenue as it stands at
present.
The public funds of the different indebted nations of Europe,
particularly those of England, have, by one author, been
represented as the accumulation of a great capital, superadded to
the other capital of the country, by means of which its trade is
extended, its manufactures are multiplied, and its lands
cultivated and improved, much beyond what they could have been by
means of that other capital only. He does not consider that the
capital which the first creditors of the public advanced to
government, was, from the moment in which he advanced it, a
certain portion of the annual produce, turned away from serving
in the function of a capital, to serve in that of a revenue ;
from maintaining productive labourers, to maintain unproductive
ones, and to be spent and wasted, generally in the course of the
year, without even the hope of any future reproduction. In return
for the capital which they advanced, they obtained, indeed, an
annuity of the public funds, in most cases, of more than equal
value. This annuity, no doubt, replaced to them their capital,
and enabled them to carry on their trade and business to the
same, or, perhaps, to a greater extent than before; that is, they
were enabled, either to borrow of other people a new capital,
upon the credit of this annuity or, by selling it, to get from
other people a new capital of their own, equal, or superior, to
that which they had advanced to government. This new capital,
however, which they in this manner either bought or borrowed of
other people, must have existed in the country before, and must
have been employed, as all capitals are, in maintaining
productive labour. When it came into the hands of those who had
advanced their money to government, though it was, in some
respects, a new capital to them, it was not so to the country,
but was only a capital withdrawn from certain employments, in
order to be turned towards others. Though it replaced to them
what they had advanced to government, it did not replace it to
the country. Had they not advanced this capital to government,
there would have been in the country two capitals, two portions
of the annual produce, instead of one, employed in maintaining
productive labour.
When, for defraying the expense of government, a revenue is
raised within the year, from the produce of free or unmortgaged
taxes, a certain portion of the revenue of private people is only
turned away from maintaining one species of unproductive labour,
towards maintaining another. Some part of what they pay in those
taxes, might, no doubt, have been accumulated into capital, and
consequently employed in maintaining productive labour ; but the
greater part would probably have been spent, and consequently
employed in maintaining unproductive labour. The public expense,
however, when defrayed in this manner, no doubt hinders, more or
less, the further accumulation of new capital; but it does not
necessarily occasion the destruction of any actually-existing
capital.
When the public expense is defrayed by funding, it is defrayed by
the annual destruction of some capital which had before existed
in the country; by the perversion of some portion of the annual
produce which had before been destined for the maintenance of
productive labour, towards that of unproductive labour. As in
this case, however, the taxes are lighter than they would have
been, had a revenue sufficient for defraying the same expense
been raised within the year ; the private revenue of individuals
is necessarily less burdened, and consequently their ability to
save and accumulate some part of that revenue into capital, is a
good deal less impaired. If the method of funding destroys more
old capital, it, at the same time, hinders less the accumulation
or acquisition of new capital, than that of defraying the public
expense by a revenue raised within the year. Under the system of
funding, the frugality and industry of private people can more
easily repair the breaches which the waste and extravagance of
government may occasionally make in the general capital of the
society.
It is only during the continuance of war, however, that the
system of funding has this advantage over the other system. Were
the expense of war to be defrayed always by a revenue raised
within the year, the taxes from which that extraordinary revenue
was drawn would last no longer than the war. The ability of
private people to accumulate, though less during the war, would
have been greater during the peace, than under the system of
funding. War would not necessarily have occasioned the
destruction of any old capitals, and peace would have occasioned
the accumulation of many more new. Wars would, in general, be
more speedily concluded, and less wantonly undertaken. The people
feeling, during continuance of war, the complete burden of it,
would soon grow weary of it; and government, in order to humour
them, would not be under the necessity of carrying it on longer
than it was necessary to do so. The foresight of the heavy and
unavoidable burdens of war would hinder the people from wantonly
calling for it when there was no real or solid interest to fight
for. The seasons during which the ability of private people to
accumulate was somewhat impaired, would occur more rarely, and be
of shorter continuance. Those, on the contrary, during which that
ability was in the highest vigour would be of much longer
duration than they can well be under the system of funding.
When funding, besides, has made a certain progress, the
multiplication of taxes which it brings along with it, sometimes
impairs as much the ability of private people to accumulate, even
in time of peace, as the other system would in time of war. The
peace revenue of Great Britain amounts at present to more than
ten millions a-year. If free and unmortgaged, it might be
sufficient, with proper management, and without contracting a
shilling of new debt, to carry on the most vigorous war. The
private revenue of the inhabitants of Great Britain is at present
as much incumbered in time of peace, their ability to accumulate
is as much impaired, as it would have been in the time of the
most expensive war, had the pernicious system of funding never
been adopted.
In the payment of the interest of the public debt, it has been
said, it is the right hand which pays the left. The money does
not go out of the country. It is only a part of the revenue of
one set of the inhabitants which is transferred to another ; and
the nation is not a farthing the poorer. This apology is founded
altogether in the sophistry of the mercantile system; and, after
the long examination which I have already bestowed upon that
system, it may, perhaps, be unnecessary to say anything further
about it. It supposes, besides, that the whole public debt is
owing to the inhabitants of the country, which happens not to be
true ; the Dutch, as well as several other foreign nations,
having a very considerable share in our public funds. But though
the whole debt were owing to the inhabitants of the country, it
would not, upon that account, be less pernicious.
Land and capital stock are the two original sources of all
revenue, both private and public. Capital stock pays the wages of
productive labour, whether employed in agriculture, manufactures,
or commerce. The management of those two original sources of
revenue belongs to two different sets of people; the proprietors
of land, and the owners or employers of capital stock.
The proprietor of land is interested, for the sake of his own
revenue, to keep his estate in as good condition as he can, by
building and repairing his tenants houses, by making and
maintaining the necessary drains and inclosures, and all those
other expensive improvements which it properly belongs to the
landlord to make and maintain. But, by different land taxes, the
revenue of the landlord may be so much diminished, and, by
different duties upon the necessaries and conveniencies of life,
that diminished revenue may be rendered of so little real value,
that he may find himself altogether unable to make or maintain
those expensive improvements. When the landlord, however, ceases
to do his part, it is altogether impossible that the tenant
should continue to do his. As the distress of the landlord
increases, the agriculture of the country must necessarily
decline.
When, by different taxes upon the necessaries and conveniencies
of life, the owners and employers of capital stock find, that
whatever revenue they derive from it, will not, in a particular
country, purchase the same quantity of those necessaries and
conveniencies which an equal revenue would in almost any other,
they will be disposed to remove to some other. And when, in order
to raise those taxes, all or the greater part of merchants and
manufacturers, that is, all or the greater part of the employers
of great capitals, come to be continually exposed to the
mortifying and vexatious visits of the tax-gatherers, this
disposition to remove will soon be changed into an actual
removing. The industry of the country will necessarily fall with
the removal of the capital which supported it, and the ruin of
trade and manufactures will follow the declension of agriculture.
To transfer from the owners of those two great sources of
revenue, land, and capital stock, from the persons immediately
interested in the good condition of every particular portion of
land, and in the good management of every particular portion of
capital stock, to another set of persons (the creditors of the
public, who have no such particular interest ), the greater part
of the revenue arising from either, must, in the long-run,
occasion both the neglect of land, and the waste or removal of
capital stock. A creditor of the public has, no doubt, a general
interest in the prosperity of the agriculture, manufactures, and
commerce of the country ; and consequently in the good condition
of its land, and in the good management of its capital stock.
Should there be any general failure or declension in any of these
things, the produce of the different taxes might no longer be
sufficient to pay him the annuity or interest which is due to
him. But a creditor of the public, considered merely as such, has
no interest in the good condition of any particular portion of
land, or in the good management of any particular portion of
capital stock. As a creditor of the public, he has no knowledge
of any such particular portion. He has no inspection of it. He
can have no care about it. Its ruin may in some cases be unknown
to him,
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