SECTION CLVI.. Influence of Advancing Civilization on Rent.

INFLUENCE OF ADVANCING CIVILIZATION ON RENT.

Advancing civilization contributes in three different ways to raise rents.[156-1] The growth of population necessitates either a more intensive agriculture (higher farming), or causes it to extend over less fertile parcels of land, or parcels less advantageously situated.[156-2] If the growth of population be attended by an increase of capital, this happens in a still higher degree. The people now consume, if not more, at least wheat of finer quality, more and better fed live stock; the consequence of which is, that the demands made on the land are increased. Lastly, if the population be gradually concentrated in large cities, this fact also must contribute to raise rents, because it requires a multitude of costly transportations of agricultural produce and so increases the cost of production (up to the time of consumption) on the less advantageously situated land.[156-3] [156-4]

As most of the symptoms of a higher civilization become apparent earliest, and in the most striking manner, in large cities, so also a rise in rents is first felt in them. The building of houses may be considered as the most intensive of all cultivation of land and that which is most firmly fixed to the soil.[156-5] Rent has nowhere an unsurpassable maximum any more than a necessary minimum.

===============+============+============+============+========== District. | 1849. | 1864. | 1849. | 1858. ---------------+------------+------------+------------+---------- | Thalers. | Population | | per square mile Königsberg, | 0.73 | 1.16 | 2076 | 2298 Gumbinnen, | 0.59 | 0.76 | 2059 | 2249 Danzig, | 1.02 | 1.51 | 2656 | 2926 Marienwerder, | 0.63 | 1.06 | 1944 | 2135 Posen, | 0.69 | 1.07 | 2789 | 2857 Bromberg, | 0.69 | 1.10 | 2116 | 2322 Stettin, | 1.07 | 1.73 | 2355 | 2614 Cöslin, | 0.83 | 1.30 | 1735 | 1940 Stralsund, | 0.95 | 1.50 | 2347 | 2549 Breslau, | 1.19 | 1.45 | 4733 | 5034 Liegnitz, | 1.17 | 1.75 | 3676 | 3763 Oppeln, | 0.86 | 1.20 | 3973 | 4433 Potsdam, | 1.08 | 1.59 | 3317 | 3640 Frankfort, | 1.29 | 2.00 | 2446 | 2660 Magdeburg, | 2.31 | 2.98 | 3290 | 3508 Werseburg, | 2.35 | 3.03 | 3934 | 4270 Erfurt, | 2.04 | 2.55 | 5621 | 5735 Münster, | .... | 2.03 | 3192 | 3299 Minden, | 2.48 | 2.62 | 4841 | 4808 ===============+============+============+============+==========

Compare the review of rents in the states of the Zollverein, in v. Viehbahn, Statistik, II, 979. It is difficult to compare different countries with one another in this respect, because it is seldom certain whether the word rent means exactly the same thing in them. Besides, it should not be overlooked, how difficult it is to ascertain what rent, in the strict sense of the term, as used by Ricardo, is.]

The amount of rents in Prussia, Krug assumed to be in 1804, 50,000,000 thalers, and von Viebahn, Zollverein Statistik, II, 974, in 1862, 116,500,000 thalers. Lavergne assumed the rents of France after 1850 to be 1,600,000,000 francs (Revue des deux Mondes, Mars, 1868); and Dutot, Journal des Economistes, Juin, 1870, in 1870, at 2,000,000,000. In Norway, the capitalized value of all the land was assessed at 13,000,000,000 thalers in specie, in 1665; in 1802, at 25,500,000; in 1839, at 64,000,000 thalers. Blom, Statistik von Norwegen, I, 145. The older such estimates are, the more unreliable they are.]