1. Not the fixity of the physical amount of agents, but the economic supply is significant. There is danger of confusion between these two ideas. The statement that "land" cannot be created and that therefore "the supply is fixed" involves a fallacy. The word supply means the amount that is available at the moment or during the period spoken of. The land in Greenland is not, and probably never can be, a part of the supply of land in England. The land in America for centuries was not, but now has become, for some purposes, a part of the supply in the same market as the land of England. The question of importance in economic discussion is not whether the physical material can be brought into existence, but whether the economic "supply" can be increased. The existence of coal-mines in Venus or Mars is of no economic importance to us, but coal-mines on the earth, yet undiscovered, present a potential supply that at any moment may be realized.

Physical amount vs. economic supply.

Discovery enlarges the supply of natural resources.

2. Discovery of new lands and of new natural deposits continually enlarges the economic supply of the agents most nearly fixed in physical amount. This proposition states a historical fact. Any explanation of the economic occurrences of the last five centuries or of the immediate future, that ignores this fact of the increasing supply of many kinds of land and natural resources in the markets of the civilized world, must lead to false conclusions. The rate of this movement has been more rapid in the past century than theretofore, and perhaps more rapid than it will be henceforward; but that this development will continue in large measure and for a long period, is not open to question. Undeveloped areas will be opened to the world, and new geologic realms will be explored. Yet the notion criticized above is found in all the older text-books. The idea arose in England in the first quarter of the nineteenth century when land and food were rapidly rising in price, and it has vitiated a large part of both the economic theory and the practical conclusions on this subject.

The effective supply grows by invention.

3. Invention, including new modes of transportation and new processes, increases the economic supply of most scarce goods and provides substitutes for the others. Some inventions increase economic supply by making available the uses in goods that were before unavailable. Subsoil ploughing annexes to agricultural land new layers of soil that are just as important as new acres added to the surface. If land could be used three times as deep, it would be as good for many purposes as if it were of three times the extent. New trade routes and new means of transportation add to the supplies available in the older countries as effectively as if their areas were increased. The building of railroads in western America had an effect on English rents identical in nature with that which would have been produced had an equal area of somewhat less fertile land touching England, risen out of the ocean. Every country in Europe has repeatedly felt the shock of these great economic changes which have compelled the recapitalization on a lower plane, of nearly all kinds of their landed wealth. Where the same agents have not been multiplied, substitutes have been found that are just as effective in meeting the economic need. It is the result, the gratification, that man seeks: any particular good is but the means to an end.

4. Increasing wealth and new labor make possible the increase of the agents that appear most nearly fixed in supply. When the need arises men turn to new enterprises. The reclaiming of land in Holland is a striking but far from isolated example. Among the larger undertakings of this kind are the draining of the Haarlem Lake in 1840-58, by which 40,000 acres of rich land were made available, and the draining of the Zuyder Zee, which is adding 1,300,000 acres. Though there have been many minor undertakings of the kind, the area reclaimed is relatively small compared with the whole area of the land in the world used for agricultural purposes. There are still great areas of fens, swamps, and marshlands, such as those on the Jersey coast in this country, which with moderate effort could be reclaimed. While the possibility must be recognized, the increase of the area of available agricultural land by means of such physical changes is relatively small.

Production of land by physical change.

The work ot the pioneer, as a producer ot a supply or land, is, however, of the greatest importance. The pioneer annexes new areas to the economic world and to the market in which he has lived. This is recognized of late by writers that perhaps do not fully mark its significance to economic theory. The work of the explorer and prospector is that of a producer of mineral resources, and daily market quotations reflect the changes in "the supply" of these natural stores.

And by the work of pioneers.

Successive utilization of various grades of agents.

5. Limitation of the supply appears first in the better qualities, and efforts to increase wealth are then directed to making available the poorer grades. Great quantities of the poorer grades of wealth, even of those things that are relatively fixed in supply, lie unused. Great areas on the edge of civilization still await the pioneer, the prospector, and the miner. Here is a source of wealth and a field for enterprise. The growth of society may cause some of the poorer agents in time to become the best. When men crossed the ocean to settle on Manhattan Island, it was a wilderness; but the growth of commerce has caused the land in New York city to become more valuable than that in London. Changes are still in progress, for of late the smaller ports to the south have increased their trade at a more rapid pace than New York has.

Goods ranged on a scale of in-creasable-ness.

The difference in increasableness of the various forms of wealth is of importance in considering various social questions such as the effects of an increase of population, and the kinds of taxation most equitable and most favorable to the progress of society. Account must be taken of the fact that the number of bricks can be increased more easily than the amount of land; but there must not be overlooked the possibility of increase in any of these forms of wealth, nor the limits to the increase of any one of them. When one wishes to save or increase wealth, he turns to these great unappropriated fields, unused things or things imperfectly used, and tries to convert them into effective agents. The different forms of wealth may be ranged on a scale according to the ease with which they can be increased by effort. They may therefore be classed as relatively fixed and relatively in-creasable. Some natural resources belong at one end, and some at the other end of this scale. No hard and fast line divides the different kinds of goods, but the difference in degree of increasableness is a fact of great social importance, affecting the direction in which industry can and must progress.

Questions On Chapter 18. Relatively Fixed And Relatively Increasable Forms Of Capital

1. Why not raise seals in California and fruit in Alaska?

2. Has the rainfall any relation to the density of population?

3. Has the isothermal line any relation to the number of millionaires?

4. What physical reasons account for the greatness of ancient Egypt, of Venice, of Holland, of England, of the United States?

5. Is all land useful? Is all land wealth?

6 Is there a different term for land that is wealth and land that is not?

7. Are there different economic terms for hewn and unhewn blocks of stone? What makes the difference?

Note

A meritorious though fragmentary essay to rethink the old conception of natural resources and to express them in new terms, is Natural Economy, by A. H. Gibson, 1901, reviewed by the writer in Journal of Political Economy, March, 1902.