The Theory of Wages in Classical Economics

Book excerpt: '. . . there is much is Stirati's discussion of the natural wage which is of interest, and she explores quite carefully the role of institutional, cultural and social factors in the determination of the long-run wage rate.' - John Vint, Journal of the History of Economic Thought This important new book is the first specific study on the classical theory of wages to appear for more than 50 years and as such fills an important gap in the literature. Antonella Stirati argues that the wage-fund theory played no part in the theory of wages expounded by Ricardo and his predecessors. Classical wage theory is shown to be analytically consistent but very different from contemporary theory, particularly as it did not envisage an inverse relationship between employment and the real wage level, and hence a spontaneous tendency to full employment of labour. The author bases her approach not only on a reinterpretation of Smith and Ricardo, but also on the writings of Turgot, Necker, Steuart, Hume, Cantillon and other pre-classical economists.