Proportions of Factors—Advantage and Size

Abstract

Diminishing Return, in social and static sense, points to bad proportions of labor to equipment, 594; in the social-dynamic sense, to changes in this proportion, 595.—Malthus' emphasis, 596.—The competitive-static law, 596; still a law of proportions, (a) in the technological sense, (b) in the value sense; the latter the important aspect, 598; relations of substitution and of complementarity for competitive purposes, 599.—Is the threefold classification of factors pertinent? 600.—Does the law apply only where land is used? 602.—Is the main reference to prices and to changes in prices? 603.—The applications to Distribution, 604; applications in general, 606.—Increasing Return restated as Law of Advantage (or Disadvantage) and Size, 610.—Not antithetical to the Law of Proportions, 612.—Readily mistaken for one aspect of Law of Proportions, 615.—Not dependent upon question of proportions, 616.—The applications, 617.