First edition. Carey vigorously appeals for tariff protection and attacks the Ricardian theory of rent. He argues that ‘the historical sequence of cultivation at least in the United States was the exact reverse of the one proposed by Ricardo, namely, from inferior to superior land, apparently because returns from the application of capital to land yield increasing rather than diminishing returns’ (Blaug). The similarity of ideas between Bastiat and Carey is well documented, particularly the close parallelism in their theories of the origin of land value. However, Haney observes that ‘Carey impresses the reader as decidedly the more original, and on the whole his work antedated Bastiat’s’ (p. 338). His ideas caused much controversy and were refuted by Mill in his Principles of Political Economy (1848).

Einaudi 886; Goldsmiths’ 35490; Kress C.7314; Sraffa 782. See Blaug, Great Economists before Keynes, pp. 39–40; and Haney, History of Economic thought, pp. 337–338.