The science of social adjustment / by Sir Josiah Stamp.

  • Stamp, Josiah, Sir, 1880-1941.
Date:
1937
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The science of social adjustment / by Sir Josiah Stamp. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    may be broadly classified as the ‘ work creators ’ and the ‘ work savers The latter save time, work, and money by enabling tlie existing supply of particular commodities to be produced more easily, and therefore at lower cost, and finally at lower prices. People can spend as much money as before upon them and get larger quantities, or they can continue to buy their existing requirements at a lower cost. In this second event they ‘ save money ’ and their purchasing power is released for other purposes. By a parallel process, producing or labouring power is released through un¬ employment. The released working force and released purchasing power can come together again in an increased demand for other products which, to this extent, have not been hitherto within effective demand. The supply of this increase may go part or all of the way to absorb the displaced labour. But this process takes time, and the labour displaced is not at once of the right kind or in the right place. More important, however, is the invention of quite new objects of public demand, which may be desired in addition to the supply of old ones. This brings to¬ gether released labour and released purchasing power in the most decisive way. In other words, we are seeking a balance between two classes of scientific discovery, that which accelerates or makes easier the production of existing economic goods, and that which creates new kinds of economic satisfactions—the derivative and the direct. Let us suppose that in a static society a million people are employed making boots, and that the gramophone has not been invented. Then let a labour-saving device be invented, such that the same quantity of boots can be made by lialf the workers, and boots are half the price. Assuming that