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Writing: The National Gain

The National Gain, § 15

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§ 15

The time may now have come to examine more closely what kind of regulations transfer people from one occupation to another.

Among them are all those that directly or indirectly offer certain advantages in one occupation rather than another. That is done directly when the terms of the regulation expressly include them but indirectly when it becomes a necessary consequence of carrying the regulation into effect.

They thus include all economic privileges, not only the exclusive ones but also any others that offer some specific advantage to a tradesman, namely, all classifications of occupations that are established by law; for nature produces its own classification, which is the most reliable one, but as soon as anything is legally added to or subtracted from it, distortions arise that favour certain people but hinder others in the conduct of their business. Also included among them are all bounties on production and exports as well as all limitations on the freedom of residence and trade in the towns and rural regions.

What else are these but dams that concentrate the people in certain places, removing them from one place and moving them to another, without it being possible to say in which place they will be most useful and increase or reduce the national profit, as has been demonstrated above?

When the stream is allowed to run evenly, every drop of water is in motion. When there are no obstacles in the way, every worker competes for his livelihood and thereby increases the profit to the nation. By means of regulations, people are concentrated in certain groups, the opportunities to move into industry are reduced and a small number of people within each group rise above the majority, whose well-being is presented as evidence of the prosperity of the whole kingdom.

 

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