number would be perfectly free, and might
be carried on to and from all parts of the
world with every possible advantage. Among
those commodities would be comprehended
all the necessaries of life, and all the materials
of manufacture. So far as the free importation
of the necessaries of life reduced their
average money price in the home market, it
would reduce the money price of labour, but
without reducing in any respect its real recompense.
The value of money is in proportion
to the quantity of the necessaries of life which
it will purchase. That of the necessaries of
life is altogether independent of the quantity
of money which can be had for them. The
reduction in the money price of labour would
necessarily be attended with a proportionable
one in that of all home manufactures, which
would thereby gain some advantage in all
foreign markets. The price of some manufactures
would be reduced, in a still greater
proportion, by the free importation of the raw
materials. If raw silk could be imported
from China and Indostan, duty-free, the silk
manufacturers in England could greatly undersell
those of both France and Italy. There
would be no occasion to prohibit the importation
of foreign silks and velvets. The cheapness
of their goods would secure to our own
workmen, not only the possession of a home,
but a very great command of the foreign
market. Even the trade in the commodities
taxed, would be carried on with much more
advantage than at present. If those commodities
were delivered out of the public warehouse
for foreign exportation, being in this
case exempted from all taxes, the trade in them
would be perfectly free. The carrying trade,
in all sorts of goods, would, under this system,
enjoy every possible advantage. If these
commodities were delivered out for home consumption,
the importer not being obliged to
advance the tax till he had an opportunity of
selling his goods, either to some dealer, or to
some consumer, he could always afford to sell
them cheaper than if he had been obliged to
advance it at the moment of importation.
Under the same taxes, the foreign trade of
consumption, even in the taxed commodities,
might in this manner be carried on with much
more advantage than it is at present.
It was the object of the famous excise
scheme of Sir Robert Walpole, to establish,
with regard to wine and tobacco, a system
not very unlike that which is here proposed.
But though the bill which was then brought
into Parliament, comprehended those two
commodities only, it was generally supposed
to be meant as an introduction to a more extensive
scheme of the same kind. Faction,
combined with the interest of smuggling merchants,
raised so violent, though so unjust a
clamour, against that bill, that the minister
thought proper to drop it; and, from a dread
of exciting a clamour of the same kind, none
of his successors have dared to resume the
project.
The duties upon foreign luxuries, imported
for home consumption, though they sometimes
fall upon the poor, fall principally upon
people of middling or more than middling
fortune. Such are, for example, the duties
upon foreign wines, upon coffee, chocolate,
tea, sugar, &c.
The duties upon the cheaper luxuries of
home produce, destined for home consumption,
fall pretty equally upon people of all
ranks, in proportion to their respective expense.
The poor pay the duties upon malt,
hops, beer, and ale, upon their own consumption;
the rich, upon both their own consumption
and that of their servants.
The whole consumption of the inferior
ranks of people, or of those below the middling
rank, it must be observed, is, in every
country, much greater, not only in quantity,
but in value, than that of the middling, and
of those above the middling rank. The whole
expense of the inferior is much greater than
that of the superior ranks. In the first place,
almost the whole capital of every country is
annually distributed among the inferior ranks
of people, as the wages of productive labour.
Secondly, a great part of the revenue, arising
from both the rent of land and the profits of
stock, is annually distributed among the same
rank, in the wages and maintenance of menial
servants, and other unproductive labourers.
Thirdly, some part of the profits of stock belongs
to the same rank, as a revenue arising
from the employment of their small capitals.
The amount of the profits annually made by
small shopkeepers, tradesmen, and retailers
of all kinds, is everywhere very considerable,
and makes a very considerable portion of the
annual produce. Fourthly and lastly, some
part even of the rent of land belongs to the
same rank; a considerable part to those who
are somewhat below the middling rank, and a
small part even to the lowest rank; common
labourers sometimes possessing in property an
acre or two of land. Though the expense of
those inferior ranks of people, therefore, taking
them individually, is very small, yet the
whole mass of it, taking them collectively,
amounts always to by much the largest portion
of the whole expense of the society; what
remains of the annual produce of the land and
labour of the country, for the consumption of
the superior ranks, being always much less,
not only in quantity, but in value. The taxes
upon expense, therefore, which fall chiefly upon
that of the superior ranks of people, upon
the smaller portion of the annual produce, are
likely to be much less productive than either
those which fall indifferently upon the expense
of all ranks, or even those which fall
chiefly upon that of the inferior ranks, than