An inquiry into the nature and causes of the wealth of

102

The Wealth of Nations

ket than would otherwise be suitable to its nature. Stockings, in

many parts of Scotland, are knit much cheaper than they can any-

where be wrought upon the loom. They are the work of servants

and labourers who derive the principal part of their subsistence

from some other employment. More than a thousand pair of Sh-

etland stockings are annually imported into Leith, of which the

price is from fivepence to seven-pence a pair. At Lerwick, the small

capital of the Shetland islands, tenpence a-day, I have been as-

sured, is a common price of common labour. In the same islands,

they knit worsted stockings to the value of a guinea a pair and

upwards.

The spinning of linen yarn is carried on in Scotland nearly in

the same way as the knitting of stockings, by servants, who are

chiefly hired for other purposes. They earn but a very scanty sub-

sistence, who endeavour to get their livelihood by either of those

trades. In most parts of Scotland, she is a good spinner who can

earn twentypence a-week.

In opulent countries, the market is generally so extensive, that

any one trade is sufficient to employ the whole labour and stock

of those who occupy it. Instances of people living by one employ-

ment, and, at the same time, deriving some little advantage from

another, occur chiefly in pour countries. The following instance,

however, of something of the same kind, is to be found in the

capital of a very rich one. There is no city in Europe, I believe, in

which house-rent is dearer than in London, and yet I know no

capital in which a furnished apartment can be hired so cheap.

Lodging is not only much cheaper in London than in Paris; it is

much cheaper than in Edinburgh, of the same degree of goodness;

and, what may seem extraordinary, the dearness of house-rent is

the cause of the cheapness of lodging. The dearness of house-rent

in London arises, not only from those causes which render it dear

in all great capitals, the dearness of labour, the dearness of all the

materials of building, which must generally be brought from a

great distance, and, above all, the dearness of ground-rent, every

landlord acting the part of a monopolist, and frequently exacting

a higher rent for a single acre of bad land in a town, than can be

had for a hundred of the best in the country; but it arises in part

from the peculiar manners and customs of the people, which oblige

every master of a family to hire a whole house from top to bot-

tom. A dwelling-house in England means every thing that is con-

tained under the same roof. In France, Scotland, and many other

parts of Europe, it frequently means no more than a single storey.

A tradesman in London is obliged to hire a whole house in that

part of the town where his customers live. His shop is upon the

ground floor, and he and his family sleep in the garret; and he

endeavours to pay a part of his house-rent by letting the two middle

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103

Adam Smith

storeys to lodgers. He expects to maintain his family by his trade,

and not by his lodgers. Whereas at Paris and Edinburgh, people

who let lodgings have commonly no other means of subsistence;

and the price of the lodging must pay, not only the rent of the

house, but the whole expense of the family.

P

P

P

P

PAR

AR

AR

AR

ART II.

T II.

T II.

T II.

T II. — Inequalities occasioned by the Policy of Europe.

Such are the inequalities in the whole of the advantages and

disadvantages of the different employments of labour and stock,

which the defect of any of the three requisites above mentioned

must occasion, even where there is the most perfect liberty. But

the policy of Europe, by not leaving things at perfect liberty, occa-

sions other inequalities of much greater importance.

It does this chiefly in the three following ways. First, by restrain-

ing the competition in some employments to a smaller number

than would otherwise be disposed to enter into them; secondly,

by increasing it in others beyond what it naturally would be; and,

thirdly, by obstructing the free circulation of labour and stock,

both from employment to employment, and from place to place.

First, The policy of Europe occasions a very important inequal-

ity in the whole of the advantages and disadvantages of the differ-

ent employments of labour and stock, by restraining the competi-

tion in some employments to a smaller number than might other-

wise be disposed to enter into them.

The exclusive privileges of corporations are the principal means

it makes use of for this purpose.

The exclusive privilege of an incorporated trade necessarily re-

strains the competition, in the town where it is established, to

those who are free of the trade. To have served an apprenticeship

in the town, under a master properly qualified, is commonly the

necessary requisite for obtaining this freedom. The bye-laws of

the corporation regulate sometimes the number of apprentices

which any master is allowed to have, and almost always the num-

ber of years which each apprentice is obliged to serve. The inten-

tion of both regulations is to restrain the competition to a much

smaller number than might otherwise be disposed to enter into

the trade. The limitation of the number of apprentices restrains it

directly. A long term of apprenticeship restrains it more indirectly,

but as effectually, by increasing the expense of education.

In Sheffield, no master cutler can have more than one appren-

tice at a time, by a bye-law of the corporation. In Norfolk and

Norwich, no master weaver can have more than two apprentices,

under pain of forfeiting five pounds a-month to the king. No

master hatter can have more than two apprentices anywhere in

England, or in the English plantations, under pain of forfeiting;

five pounds a-month, half to the king, and half to him who shall

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