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Productivity of Labour in Canadian Agriculture*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 November 2014

W. J. Anderson
W. J. Anderson*
Affiliation:
University of British Columbia
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Extract

This paper is concerned with measuring and comparing the value of the productivity of a similar unit of labour in the agricultural and the non-agricultural sectors of the economy. In such a study the term “productivity of labour” may have several meanings. It may mean the gross value of the product of a given combination of labour with other factors of production, divided by the number of units of labour employed. Or, secondly, it may refer to the inherent ability or the willingness on the part of a person to contribute his efforts. Thirdly, the term may refer to the value of the incremental product resulting from the addition of one unit of labour to a fixed quantity of other factors, given the demand for the product, the inherent ability of the worker, and the nature of the production function. Economic theory has identified this third concept as the marginal product of labour; it is the increment to the value of the total product contributed by an additional unit of labour in the particular circumstances in which it is being used. It is this concept which has meaning in the solution of the problem of the best allocation of factors within an industry or among industries. Notwithstanding the crudeness of the method which I have been forced to use to measure productivity of labour it is this third concept which I have in mind for this study.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science/Revue canadienne de economiques et science politique , Volume 21 , Issue 2 , May 1955 , pp. 228 - 236
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association 1955

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Footnotes

*

The article has been drawn from the writer's doctoral dissertation entitled “The Efficiency of Canadian and British Columbian Agriculture,” the University of Chicago, 1952. I am indebted to D. Gale Johnson, Clifford Hildreth, and Proctor Thomson for their advice and criticisms; and to the President's Committee on Research of the University of British Columbia for research grants to carry out the project.

References

1 Douglas, Paul H., The Theory of Wages (New York, 1934), chap, VGoogle Scholar; Johnson, D. Gale, “Contribution of Price Policy to the Income and Resource Problems in Agriculture,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXVI, 11, 1944, 649–53Google Scholar; Earl O. Heady, “Production Functions from a Random Sample of Farms,” ibid., XXVIII, Nov., 1946, 989-1004; Gerhard Tintner and O. H. Brownlee, “Production Functions Derived from Farm Records,” ibid., XXVI, Aug., 1944; Harries, H., “The Development and Use of Production Functions for Firms in Agriculture,” Scientific Agriculture, XXVII, 10, 1947, 487–95.Google Scholar

2 See Stigler, George J., Production and Distribution Theories (New York, 1941), 320–87Google Scholar; Samuelson, Paul A., Foundations of Economic Analysis (Cambridge, Mass., 1947), 83–9Google Scholar; Chamberlin, Edward H., “Proportionality, Divisibility, and Economies of Scale,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, LXII, 02, 1948, 229–62CrossRefGoogle Scholar; A. N. McLeod, F. H. Hahn, and E. H. Chamberlin, “Proportionality, Divisibility, and Economies of Scale: Two Comments, Reply,” ibid., LXIII, Feb., 1949, 128-43.

3 See Douglas, The Theory of Wages, chaps, V, VI; and Johnson, D. Gale, “Allocation of Agricultural Income,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXX, 11, 1948.Google Scholar

4 Samuelson, , Foundations of Economic Analysis, 87, 88.Google Scholar

5 “Allocation of Agricultural Income.”

6 Five per cent was the long-term mortgage rate charged by the Canadian Farm Loan Board during this period.

7 Five per cent is the rate on three- to ten-year loans under the Farm Improvement Loans Act.

8 Douglas, The Theory of Wages, chaps, V, VI. It is of course a question how closely this estimate applies to Canadian industry at this date. There is the consolation, however, that the sum involved is small relative to total wages and salaries.

9 Johnson, D. Gale, “Functioning of the Labor Market,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXXIII, 02, 1951, 76–9.Google Scholar

10 Ibid., footnote 9, p. 78.

11 Ibid.