Note 36 — Chapter VII · ON THE DEFINITION AND APPLICATION OF TERMS, BY MR. MACCULLOCH, IN HIS “PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL ECONOMY.”

This is very justly stated in Mr. Mill’s “Elements of Political Economy,” ch. iv. sec. i. p. 219, 2d edit.: both Mr. Ricardo and Mr. Mill, indeed, fully allow the distinction between productive and unproductive labour. M. Say, though he calls the labour of the menial servant productive, makes a distinction between the labour which is productive of material products and the labour which is productive of immaterial products. Of the latter products he says, “En favorisant leur multiplication, on ne fait rien pour la richesse, on ne fait que pour la consommation.”—Table Analytique, liv. i. ch. 13. This is a most characteristic difference; and though I prefer the classification of Adam Smith, as more simple, I should allow that, on these principles, the causes of the wealth of nations may be clearly explained. But I own myself utterly at a loss to conceive how they can be explained, if all labour be considered as equally productive.