Conflict between Alfred Marshall’s Illumination of the Distinctiveness of Labour and His Neoclassicist Faith

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This article comprehensively examines Alfred Marshall's thoughts on labour and elucidates the conflict between his illumination of the distinctiveness of labour and his neoclassicist faith. Marshall viewed a rise in the 'standard of life' as key to workers' progress, and in this context, he stressed the significance of labour as an end in life. Furthermore, Marshall attached importance to the effect of labour activity as such on workers' welfare and their subjectivity towards labour performance. Marshall's illuminating insights here could conduce to a perception of the nature of capitalistic labour that generally rules out the market determinacy of wages and other working conditions and renders the intervention of socio-political forces in their determination inevitable, although Marshall himself did not gain this awareness, and his theory of labour markets was flawed. Marshall also specified certain peculiarities regarding labour. Nevertheless, he believed in a general economic law that autonomously regulates labour markets as well as other markets into equilibrium cum normal wages. On this neoclassicist faith, Marshall criticised trade unionists' actions and the legal regulation of industrial relations as major obstacles to the operation of that law. He applied this attitude to his discussions on 'fair wages'. Marshall's adherence to neoclassicist tenets on the properties of labour markets thwarted the development of his thoughts on capitalistic industrial relations founded on his insights into the distinguishing features of labour. Marshall's illumination of the distinctiveness of labour and his neoclassicist faith thus constituted a deep conflict. Close inquiry into this issue is greatly important for appreciating not only the characteristics of Marshall's economic thinking but also the evolution of neoclassical economics.

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