By the English Government, very ample rewards are offered to him who shall discover the most perfect and practicable mode of ascertaining a ships longitude at sea.One effect of this reward is to divert from their employments a multitude of artists and students in various branches of physical science, of whom a few only can be recompensed for their expense and labour.To pay all that would try, might probably be impracticable; but the benefit of the service appears to counterbalance this inconvenience; and in point of fact, the persons who can suppose themselves qualified to contend in such a race are so few, that this inconvenience can scarcely be very considerable.Were the same reward to be given for running, boxing, or wrestling, the common businesses of life would be deserted, and all the world would become runners, boxers, and wrestlers.
Amongst the Athenians, rewards not vastly inferior, considering the difference in the value of money and the common rate of living, were actually given to such athletic exercises.But the Athenians were as much in the right so to do, as we should be in the wrong to imitate them.In those days, when success in war depended almost entirely upon bodily address and vigour, encouraging the performance of these exercises was disciplining an army, and the national wealth could suffer little, since the labours of agriculture were chiefly carried on by slaves.
The advantages resulting from the most unlimited freedom of competition therefore are---1.Chance of success increased according to the number of competitors; 2.Chance of the highest success increased by invigorating the increased effort of each competitor; 3.Equality established;4.Number of works multiplied; 5.Latent talents developed.
The cases to which this principle may be applied are much more extensive than might at first view be imagined: it covers a great part of the field of legislation; it may be applied to ecclesiastical, to fiscal, to administrative, and to constitutional laws.This rule is in direct opposition to the fundamental principle of Hindoo legislation.
In that country, every man belongs to a caste from which he cannot separate himself.To each caste belongs the exercise of certain professions: there is a caste of learned men, a caste of warriors, and a caste of labourers.
Emulation is thus reduced within the narrowest bounds, and the energies of the people are stifled.
This principle is opposed to those ecclesiastical regulations, by which all who refuse to sign certain articles of belief, or refuse to pronounce a certain number of words concerning theological subjects, are excluded from certain professions.The greater the number of individuals thus excluded.the greater the loss sustained by the diminution of competition in the performance of those services.
This principle is in direct contradiction to a multitude of fiscal and administrative laws, establishing exclusive privileges in favour of certain branches of commerce and trade; fixing the price of commodities, and the places at which they are to be bought and sold; prohibiting the entry or the exit of various productions of agriculture or of manufactures.
These are so many expedients limiting competition, and are injurious to the national wealth.
The father of political economy has from this principle in a manner created a new science: the application he has made of it to the laws relating to trade, has nearly exhausted the subject ( Wealth of Nations ).
By two opposite competitions, prices are fixed.
Competition among the purchasers secures to the producers a sufficient compensation for the outlay of their capital and labour: competition among the sellers, serving as a counterpoise to the other, produces a cheap market, and reduces the prices of commodities to the lowest sum for which it is worth while to produce them.The difference between a low price and a high price is a reward offered to the purchaser by one seller for the service he will render to him, by granting what remains to be gained, to him instead of to his competitor who requires more.
In all trades, and in all arts, competition secures to the public, not only the lowest price but the best work.Whatever degree of superiority is possessed by one commodity over another of the same description, meets with its reward either in the quantity sold, or in the price at which it is sold.
As to stores of every description of which the public stands in need, why is not the competition left open to all who may choose to undertake the supply? It is not difficult to find the determining reason: it is more convenient to serve a friend, a dependent, or a partizan, than a person unknown, or perhaps an enemy.But this is not an avowable reason: for the public, some other must be sought.Open competition would, it is said, produce a multitude of rash contractors.
The terms in appearance most advantageous to governments would commonly be offered by some rash adventurer who, in the end would be found unable to fulfil his engagements.When the time came for the performance his part of the contract, the stores in question would not be provided, and the service would suffer irreparable injury.It is important that the men with whom we deal should be well known.In some cases these reasons may not be without foundation but they are most frequently illusory.
