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Welfare Policy and Economic Development: A Comparative Historical Perspective*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 February 2011

Gaston V. Rimlinger
Gaston V. Rimlinger
Affiliation:
Rice University
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Extract

Over a century ago the American economist Henry C. Carey wrote that the masters of slaves “feel that they consult their own interests in feeding, clothing, and lodging them well, because wealth increases faster than population, and their labor becomes daily more valuable.” The change in the wealth/labor ratio which Carey noted is a fundamental aspect of economic growth. Carey saw its consequences in terms of the better care bestowed upon the slave by his master, but with appropriate modifications the same consequences apply to the free worker in a maturing industrial society.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 26 , Issue 4 , December 1966 , pp. 556 - 571
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1966

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