tegwick
fecc2fd4fa
Implements markitect/llm/ package with concrete LLMAdapter implementations:
- OpenRouterAdapter: HTTP via urllib with retry/backoff on 429/5xx
- ClaudeCodeAdapter: subprocess-based Claude CLI with stdin piping
- Factory pattern: create_adapter("openrouter") or create_adapter("claude-code")
- API key resolution chain: constructor > env var > project-root key file
- 42 unit tests, 2 integration tests (gated on API key / CLI availability)
Also adds the infospace-with-history example with Wealth of Nations VSM
analysis pipeline, templates, schemas, source chapters, and processed
output for chapters 1-2. process_chapters.py now supports --provider
and --model flags for automatic LLM-driven processing.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
170 lines
11 KiB
Markdown
170 lines
11 KiB
Markdown
---
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id: book-1-chapter-03
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title: "THAT THE DIVISION OF LABOUR IS LIMITED BY THE EXTENT OF THE MARKET."
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book: "1"
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chapter: 3
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artifact_type: content
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---
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CHAPTER III.
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THAT THE DIVISION OF LABOUR IS
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LIMITED BY THE EXTENT OF THE MARKET.
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As it is the power of exchanging that gives occasion to the division of
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labour, so the extent of this division must always be limited by the
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extent of that power, or, in other words, by the extent of the market.
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When the market is very small, no person can have any encouragement to
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dedicate himself entirely to one employment, for want of the power to
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exchange all that surplus part of the produce of his own labour, which is
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over and above his own consumption, for such parts of the produce of other
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men’s labour as he has occasion for.
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There are some sorts of industry, even of the lowest kind, which can be
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carried on nowhere but in a great town. A porter, for example, can find
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employment and subsistence in no other place. A village is by much too
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narrow a sphere for him; even an ordinary market-town is scarce large
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enough to afford him constant occupation. In the lone houses and very
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small villages which are scattered about in so desert a country as the
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highlands of Scotland, every farmer must be butcher, baker, and brewer,
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for his own family. In such situations we can scarce expect to find even a
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smith, a carpenter, or a mason, within less than twenty miles of another
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of the same trade. The scattered families that live at eight or ten miles
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distance from the nearest of them, must learn to perform themselves a
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great number of little pieces of work, for which, in more populous
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countries, they would call in the assistance of those workmen. Country
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workmen are almost everywhere obliged to apply themselves to all the
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different branches of industry that have so much affinity to one another
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as to be employed about the same sort of materials. A country carpenter
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deals in every sort of work that is made of wood; a country smith in every
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sort of work that is made of iron. The former is not only a carpenter, but
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a joiner, a cabinet-maker, and even a carver in wood, as well as a
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wheel-wright, a plough-wright, a cart and waggon-maker. The employments of
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the latter are still more various. It is impossible there should be such a
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trade as even that of a nailer in the remote and inland parts of the
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highlands of Scotland. Such a workman at the rate of a thousand nails
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a-day, and three hundred working days in the year, will make three hundred
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thousand nails in the year. But in such a situation it would be impossible
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to dispose of one thousand, that is, of one day’s work in the year. As by
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means of water-carriage, a more extensive market is opened to every sort
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of industry than what land-carriage alone can afford it, so it is upon the
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sea-coast, and along the banks of navigable rivers, that industry of every
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kind naturally begins to subdivide and improve itself, and it is
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frequently not till a long time after that those improvements extend
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themselves to the inland parts of the country. A broad-wheeled waggon,
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attended by two men, and drawn by eight horses, in about six weeks time,
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carries and brings back between London and Edinburgh near four ton weight
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of goods. In about the same time a ship navigated by six or eight men, and
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sailing between the ports of London and Leith, frequently carries and
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brings back two hundred ton weight of goods. Six or eight men, therefore,
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by the help of water-carriage, can carry and bring back, in the same time,
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the same quantity of goods between London and Edinburgh as fifty
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broad-wheeled waggons, attended by a hundred men, and drawn by four
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hundred horses. Upon two hundred tons of goods, therefore, carried by the
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cheapest land-carriage from London to Edinburgh, there must be charged the
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maintenance of a hundred men for three weeks, and both the maintenance and
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what is nearly equal to maintenance the wear and tear of four hundred
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horses, as well as of fifty great waggons. Whereas, upon the same quantity
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of goods carried by water, there is to be charged only the maintenance of
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six or eight men, and the wear and tear of a ship of two hundred tons
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burthen, together with the value of the superior risk, or the difference
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of the insurance between land and water-carriage. Were there no other
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communication between those two places, therefore, but by land-carriage,
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as no goods could be transported from the one to the other, except such
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whose price was very considerable in proportion to their weight, they
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could carry on but a small part of that commerce which at present subsists
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between them, and consequently could give but a small part of that
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encouragement which they at present mutually afford to each other’s
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industry. There could be little or no commerce of any kind between the
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distant parts of the world. What goods could bear the expense of
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land-carriage between London and Calcutta? Or if there were any so
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precious as to be able to support this expense, with what safety could
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they be transported through the territories of so many barbarous nations?
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Those two cities, however, at present carry on a very considerable
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commerce with each other, and by mutually affording a market, give a good
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deal of encouragement to each other’s industry.
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Since such, therefore, are the advantages of water-carriage, it is natural
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that the first improvements of art and industry should be made where this
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conveniency opens the whole world for a market to the produce of every
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sort of labour, and that they should always be much later in extending
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themselves into the inland parts of the country. The inland parts of the
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country can for a long time have no other market for the greater part of
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their goods, but the country which lies round about them, and separates
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them from the sea-coast, and the great navigable rivers. The extent of the
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market, therefore, must for a long time be in proportion to the riches and
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populousness of that country, and consequently their improvement must
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always be posterior to the improvement of that country. In our North
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American colonies, the plantations have constantly followed either the
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sea-coast or the banks of the navigable rivers, and have scarce anywhere
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extended themselves to any considerable distance from both.
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The nations that, according to the best authenticated history, appear to
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have been first civilized, were those that dwelt round the coast of the
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Mediterranean sea. That sea, by far the greatest inlet that is known in
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the world, having no tides, nor consequently any waves, except such as are
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caused by the wind only, was, by the smoothness of its surface, as well as
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by the multitude of its islands, and the proximity of its neighbouring
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shores, extremely favourable to the infant navigation of the world; when,
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from their ignorance of the compass, men were afraid to quit the view of
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the coast, and from the imperfection of the art of ship-building, to
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abandon themselves to the boisterous waves of the ocean. To pass beyond
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the pillars of Hercules, that is, to sail out of the straits of Gibraltar,
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was, in the ancient world, long considered as a most wonderful and
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dangerous exploit of navigation. It was late before even the Phoenicians
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and Carthaginians, the most skilful navigators and ship-builders of those
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old times, attempted it; and they were, for a long time, the only nations
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that did attempt it.
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Of all the countries on the coast of the Mediterranean sea, Egypt seems to
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have been the first in which either agriculture or manufactures were
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cultivated and improved to any considerable degree. Upper Egypt extends
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itself nowhere above a few miles from the Nile; and in Lower Egypt, that
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great river breaks itself into many different canals, which, with the
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assistance of a little art, seem to have afforded a communication by
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water-carriage, not only between all the great towns, but between all the
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considerable villages, and even to many farm-houses in the country, nearly
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in the same manner as the Rhine and the Maese do in Holland at present.
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The extent and easiness of this inland navigation was probably one of the
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principal causes of the early improvement of Egypt.
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The improvements in agriculture and manufactures seem likewise to have
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been of very great antiquity in the provinces of Bengal, in the East
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Indies, and in some of the eastern provinces of China, though the great
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extent of this antiquity is not authenticated by any histories of whose
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authority we, in this part of the world, are well assured. In Bengal, the
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Ganges, and several other great rivers, form a great number of navigable
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canals, in the same manner as the Nile does in Egypt. In the eastern
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provinces of China, too, several great rivers form, by their different
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branches, a multitude of canals, and, by communicating with one another,
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afford an inland navigation much more extensive than that either of the
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Nile or the Ganges, or, perhaps, than both of them put together. It is
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remarkable, that neither the ancient Egyptians, nor the Indians, nor the
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Chinese, encouraged foreign commerce, but seem all to have derived their
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great opulence from this inland navigation.
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All the inland parts of Africa, and all that part of Asia which lies any
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considerable way north of the Euxine and Caspian seas, the ancient
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Scythia, the modern Tartary and Siberia, seem, in all ages of the world,
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to have been in the same barbarous and uncivilized state in which we find
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them at present. The sea of Tartary is the frozen ocean, which admits of
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no navigation; and though some of the greatest rivers in the world run
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through that country, they are at too great a distance from one another to
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carry commerce and communication through the greater part of it. There are
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in Africa none of those great inlets, such as the Baltic and Adriatic seas
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in Europe, the Mediterranean and Euxine seas in both Europe and Asia, and
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the gulfs of Arabia, Persia, India, Bengal, and Siam, in Asia, to carry
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maritime commerce into the interior parts of that great continent; and the
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great rivers of Africa are at too great a distance from one another to
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give occasion to any considerable inland navigation. The commerce,
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besides, which any nation can carry on by means of a river which does not
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break itself into any great number of branches or canals, and which runs
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into another territory before it reaches the sea, can never be very
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considerable, because it is always in the power of the nations who possess
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that other territory to obstruct the communication between the upper
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country and the sea. The navigation of the Danube is of very little use to
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the different states of Bavaria, Austria, and Hungary, in comparison of
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what it would be, if any of them possessed the whole of its course, till
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it falls into the Black sea.
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