The Hocking sentinel. [volume] (Logan, Ohio) 1871-1906, 1895-06-20

is an aid of labor and Of land.
There are other distinctions be-
tween the common and economic
use of the word rent. In common
speech we speak only of rent when
owner and user are different persons
but in the economic sense there is
rent where the owner and user are
the same person. In the last named
case the part of his income he might
obtain by letting the land to an
other, is rent. That part obtained
in return for his labor, is wages,
ard the remainder, is interest on his
capital, between which and labor
and land the profits are divisible and
the share of each clearly fixed.
There is also fourth form of ex-
pressed rent found in the selling
price of land, the cost of ownership
being nothing.more and nothing less
ethan commuted, or capitalized
rent"
If lanl be bought for small
price and held until it sell for
large price the buyer and seller has
become rich, not by wages for his
labor, or by interest on his capital,
but by the increment of rent, for
as wages is the reward of labor and
interest alone is due to capital, the
other factor of production land can
claim for itself rent alone as its share
of the profits. The increase, there,
fore, from a small to large price, is
due to the rent that has been allowed
to accumulate until it equals the diff
ference between the cost and the
selling price.
Being the most important factor in
the trinity of production and there
fore of wealth, and the word rent,
representing its value, while wages
represent that of labor and interest
that of capital, let us epitomize the
phazes Of rent us heretofore explain
cd.
First, tho price paid for use of land
without including houses, or other i'm
proycments.
Second, when owner and user, are
distinct persons.
Third, when owner and user, is the
same person, and
Fourth, when expressed in the sell
ing price.
THE LAW OF RENT,
Is basel upon that principle ofman
which seeks to crafty his desires with
the least excrtion. This principle is
to political economy what the law of
is to physics. 1t is the
law of rent. Since tho writing of
Ricardo IL has been fully recognized,
but not so it's oorollaries. Yet, is it
not as plain us the most simple geom-
etrical demonstration, that the coro!-
larry of rent is the law of wages when
tho division is between rent and
wages? Is it not the law of both wa
ges and capital when the division is
between rent, wages and interest?
Let us be sure of the foundation on
which, the affirmative questions
stands of these.
Itis universally conceded fact
fully recognized by all writer's on po-
litical economy that land, labor and
capital, in the last analysis, are the
factors of all production, or wealth.
Equally conceded and indisputa-
BILE is the fact that the product of
land is rent, the product of labor is
wages and the product Of capital is
Therefore the entire pro-
luct of land, labor and interest, is
equal to rent, wages and interest,
Stated in algebraic form it stands as
follows:
Product equals rent plus wages plus
interest: therefore product minus rent
minus interest equals wages: and pro-
iuct minus rent minus wages equals
interest.
1t is seen by this demonstration
hat neither wages, nor interest de-
pend upon the produce of labor, or
,apital, but upon what is left, after
,ent is taken.
1t is legitimate to assume the part
eft to wages and interest," is no great
II than tho produce they could obtain
Without paying rent, or from the poor
,st land in use, but capable, with the
addition of labor and capital, to pay
hese factors a sum equal to that left
hem if they paid rent for better land.
1t is equally Legitimate to assume
hat it is no matter how limitless and
great the increase in productive
power, if the increase in rent keeps
,ace with it,neither wages nor interest
IAN increase.
Having now evidently struck the
rail of the Monster, drawn the lines
If distribution between the partners
n production, and found the land end
# the firm holding the Others in
'heck, in the next chapter We will
make search through the forests Of
interest and the jungles of spurious
'apital, and the sage brush of wages,