A Chinese Story
Mises Daily: Friday, November 16, 2012 by Frederic Bastiat
There is nothing that is not pretended by the writers in favor of protection to be established as an aid to the working classes — there is positively no exception, not even the custom house. You fancy, perhaps, that the custom house is merely an instrument of taxation like property taxes or the toll bar! Nothing of the kind. It is essentially an institution for promoting the march of civilization, fraternity, and equality. What would you be at? It is the fashion to introduce, or affect to introduce, sentiment and sentimentalism everywhere, even into the toll gatherer's booth.
The custom house, we must allow, has a very singular machinery for realizing philanthropical aspirations.
It includes an army of directors, subdirectors, inspectors, subinspectors, comptrollers, examiners, heads of departments, clerks, supernumeraries, aspirant supernumeraries, not to speak of the officers of the active service; and the object of all this complicated machinery is to exercise over the industry of the people a negative action, which is summed up in the word obstruct.
Observe, I do not say that the object is to tax, but to obstruct. To prevent, not acts that are repugnant to good morals or public order, but transactions that are in themselves not only harmless but fitted to maintain peace and union among nations.
And yet the human race is so flexible and elastic that it always surmounts these obstructions. And then we hear of the labor market being glutted.
If you hinder a people from obtaining its subsistence from abroad it will produce it at home. The labor is greater and more painful, but subsistence must be had. If you hinder a man from traversing the valley he must cross the hills. The road is longer and more difficult, but he must get to his journey's end.
This is lamentable, but we come now to what is ludicrous. When the law has thus created obstacles, and when in order to overcome them society has diverted a corresponding amount of labor from other employments, you are no longer permitted to demand a reform. If you point to the obstacle you are told of the amount of labor to which it has given employment. And if you rejoin that this labor is not created, but displaced, you are answered in the words of the Esprit Public, "The impoverishment alone is certain and immediate; as to our enrichment, it is more than problematical."
This reminds me of a Chinese story, which I will relate to you.
There were in China two large towns, called Tchin and Tchan. A magnificent canal united them. The emperor thought fit to order enormous blocks of stone to be thrown into it for the purpose of rendering it useless.
On seeing this, Kouang, his first mandarin, said to him, "Son of Heaven! This is a mistake."
To which the emperor replied, "Kouang, you talk nonsense."
I give you only the substance of their conversation.
At the end of three months the celestial emperor sent again for the mandarin, and said to him, "Kouang, behold!"
And Kouang opened his eyes, and looked.
And he saw at some distance from the canal a multitude of men at work. Some were excavating, others were filling up hollows, leveling and paving. And the mandarin, who was very cultivated, said to himself, They are making a highway.
When another three months had elapsed, the emperor again sent for Kouang and said to him, "Look!"
And Kouang looked.
And he saw the road completed, and from one end of it to the other he saw here and there inns for travelers erected. Crowds of pedestrians, carts, litters, came and went, and innumerable Chinese, overcome with fatigue, carried back and forth heavy burdens from Tchin to Tchan, and from Tchan to Tchin. And Kouang said to himself, It is the destruction of the canal that gives employment to these poor people. But the idea never struck him that their labor was simply diverted from other employments.
Three months more passed, and the emperor said to Kouang, "Look!"
And Kouang looked. And he saw that the hostelries were full of travelers, and that to supply their wants there were grouped around them butchers' and bakers' stalls, shops for the sale of edible bird nests. He also saw that, the artisans having need of clothing, there had settled among them tailors, shoemakers, and those who sold parasols and fans; and as they could not sleep in the open air, even in the Celestial Empire, there were also masons, carpenters, and slaters. Then there were officers of police, judges, fakirs; in a word, a town with its suburbs had risen round each hostelry.
And the emperor asked Kouang what he thought of all this.
And Kouang said that he never could have imagined that the destruction of a canal could have provided employment for so many people; for the thought never struck him that this was not employment created but labor diverted from other employments, and that men would have eaten and drunk in passing along the canal as well as in passing along the highroad.
However, to the astonishment of the Chinese, the Son of Heaven at length died and was buried.
His successor sent for Kouang, and ordered him to have the canal cleared out and restored.
And Kouang said to the new emperor, "Son of Heaven! You commit a blunder."
And the emperor replied, "Kouang, you talk nonsense."
But Kouang persisted, and said, "Sire, what is your object?"
"My object is to facilitate the transit of goods and passengers between Tchin and Tchan, to render carriage less expensive, in order that the people may have tea and clothing cheaper."
But Kouang was ready with his answer. He had received the night before several numbers of the Moniteur Industriel, a Chinese newspaper. Knowing his lesson well, he asked and obtained permission to reply, and after having prostrated himself nine times, he said, "Sire, your object is, by increased facility of transit, to reduce the price of articles of consumption, and bring them within reach of the people; and to effect that you begin by taking away from them all the employment to which the destruction of the canal had given rise. Sire, in political economy, nominal cheapness—"
The emperor: "I believe you are repeating by rote."
Kouang: "True, Sire; and it will be better to read what I have to say."
So, producing the Esprit Public, he read as follows:
In political economy, the nominal cheapness of articles of consumption is only a secondary question. The problem is to establish an equilibrium between the price of labor and that of the means of subsistence. The abundance of labor constitutes the wealth of nations; and the best economic system is that which supplies the people with the greatest amount of employment. The question is not whether it is better to pay four or eight cash for a cup of tea, or five or ten taels (Chinese money) for a shirt. These are puerilities unworthy of a thinking mind. Nobody disputes your proposition. The question is whether it is better to pay dearer for a commodity you want to buy, and have, through the abundance of employment and the higher price of labor, the means of acquiring it; or whether it is better to limit the sources of employment, and with them the mass of the national population, in order to transport, by improved means of transit, the objects of consumption, cheaper, it is true, but taking away at the same time from many of our people the means of purchasing these objects even at their reduced price.
Seeing the emperor still unconvinced, Kouang added, "Sire, deign to give me your attention. I have still the Moniteur Industriel to bring under your notice."
But the emperor said, "I don't require your Chinese journals to enable me to find out that to create obstacles is to divert and misapply labor. But that is not my mission. Go and clear out the canal; and we shall reform the custom house afterwards."
And Kouang went away tearing his beard, and appealing to his God, "O Fo! Take pity on thy people; for we have now got an emperor of the English school, and I see clearly that in a short time we shall be in want of everything, for we shall no longer require to do anything."
一个中国故事
Mises Daily: Friday, November 16, 2012
作者：弗雷德里克•巴斯夏
翻译：卢学英
校对：@风灵_
就赞同建立保护机制以帮助工人阶级的作家看来，没有什么不是另有用意的——绝对毫无例外，即使是海关。也许，你会幻想海关不过是个征税的机构，就像征收财产税（的机构）或收费站一样！可根本不是这样。它本质上是一个用来促进文明、友爱和平等发展的制度。你认为它是什么？它时下引发了或影响了无处不在的感伤情绪，（这样的情绪）甚至进入了收费者的控制室。.
我们必须承认，海关有一个非凡的机制来实现慈悲为怀的愿望。
它包括了一支有着主管、副主管、检查员、副检查员、审计员、检验员、部门主任、文员、后备人员、候补的后备人员的队伍，还不说主动服务的官员；如此复杂机制的所有目标是将负面行动施加于人们所从事的产业，用一个词概括就是“设置障碍”。
注意，我并不是说它的目标是收税，而是“设置障碍”。（它）不是阻止那些败坏良好道德和公共秩序的行为，而是阻止了那些不仅无害，而且适于维护和平和国家之间联合的交易。
然而，人类如此灵活应变，经常能越过这些阻碍。于是，我们得知劳动力市场供过于求了。
如果你阻止某人从国外得到生活必需品，那他就将会在国内生产。这将更费时费力，但必需品必须得有。如果你阻止一个人通过山谷，他就必须要穿越群山。这条路更长更难，但他必须到达他旅行的目的地。
这真是可悲，但我们的现实已是荒唐可笑。因此，当法律设置了障碍后，为了克服这些障碍，社会已经从其他职业转移了相应数量的劳动力（到被限制进口的行业），你就不能要求改变了。你指出人为设置的障碍，然后你被告之它所提供的工作岗位的数量。而如果你反驳说，这些工作不是凭空创造出来的，而是取代了别的职位，他们会用Esprit Public上的话来回答你“个体（失业）的贫穷确定无疑且迫在眉睫；至于我们能否致富，尚有诸多疑问。”.
这让我想起了一个中国故事，我讲给你听。
中国有两个很大的城镇，叫做A 和 B。一条宏伟的运河连接它们。皇帝下令将巨大的石块投入运河，以使运河丧失作用。
见此情景，他的首相寇昂对皇帝说：“天子，这是个错误。”
皇帝回答道：“寇昂，你胡说！”
我只告诉你他们谈话的主要内容。
三个月后，天朝皇帝再次传召这位首相，并对他说：“寇昂，注意看！”
寇昂睁眼望去。他看到在离开运河一段距离之外，有许多人在工作。有些在挖掘，其他人在填补凹陷、水平测量和铺设道路。而这个儒雅聪明的首相明白了，他们是在修公路。
又过了三个月，皇帝再次传召寇昂，对他说：“看”！
他看见路已经修完了，从路的一头到另一头，到处都有为旅行者修建的小旅馆冒出来。成群的行人、手推车、轿子，来来往往。无数的中国人，运着沉重的东西在A和B之间奔波不息，疲惫不堪。寇昂告诉自己，摧毁了运河为这些穷人创造了就业机会。但是他从没想过，他们的劳动只是从别的职业转移而来。
再过了三个月，皇帝对寇昂说：“看！”
寇昂看到旅店住满了旅客，为了满足他们的需要，周围还有许多卖肉的和面包师的小摊、卖燕窝的商店。他还看到，工匠需要衣服，于是就有了裁缝、鞋匠，还有那些卖阳伞和扇子的人。而且即使是“天朝上国”，人们也不能露宿街头，所以有石匠、木匠和瓦工。然后，又有了警察、法官、僧侣等等；总之，每个旅馆的周围，都出现了一个城镇，以及它的郊区。
皇帝问寇昂他对这一切怎么看？
寇昂说，他从来没有想象到，摧毁一条运河，会为这么多的人提供就业岗位。（但他不知道），这是因为他从来没有想到，这没有创造就业，而只是劳动力从其他工作转移过来，人们在经行运河时，与经行公路时一样要吃要喝。.
然而，令中国人震惊悲痛的是，天子最终驾崩下葬了。.他的继承人传召寇昂，命令他清除运河并将它修复。
寇昂对新皇帝说：“天子，你犯了大错。”"
皇帝回答道：“寇昂，你胡说！”
但是寇昂坚持道：“陛下，你的目标是什么？”
“我的目标是便利A和B之间货物与旅客运输，降低运费，让人民能得到更便宜茶叶和衣服。
但寇昂有备而来。头天晚上，他收到了几张名为“工业监控器”的中国报纸。他很清楚自己的主张，他请求（就皇帝的旨意）答辩，并获得许可。三跪九叩大礼参拜后，他说：“陛下，您的目标是，通过增加运输便利，降低消费品的价格，使其为人们所能承受；但是，为达成这一效果，您以剥夺他们从摧毁运河中得到的所有工作岗位为开端。陛下，在政治经济学中，名义的廉价——”
皇帝说：“我相信你在重复死记硬背的教条。”
寇昂说：“是的，陛下。它（书中）所言比我说的更好。”
于是，他引用Esprit Public，读道：
“根据政治经济学，消费品名义的廉价只是一个次要问题。重要的是在劳动力价格和生活必需品的价格之间建立均衡。丰富的劳动力构成国家的财富；而最好的经济体制是给人们提供最多的就业岗位。问题不在于为一杯茶支付四块钱是否比支付八块钱更好，或者一件衬衫卖五两银子是否比卖十两更好。这些都是不值得考虑的愚蠢问题。没人否定您的主张。问题在于，商品的价格更高是否更好？通过充分的就业和更高的劳动力价格，能否达到您的目的？或者，限制就业资源是否更好？随之而来的是国内大量人口（失业），为了运输，通过改进运输方式，消费品将会变得更便宜，这没错，但与此同时，这剥夺了我们的人民购买这些商品的手段，即使它们降价了。”
看到皇帝仍未被说服，寇昂说道：“陛下，恳请屈尊关注我的建议，我还有‘工业监控器’来让您信服”。
但是皇帝说：“不需要你的中国刊物，我就能发现，制造障碍其实是转移和滥用劳动力。这不是我对你的旨意。去清除运河，然后我们将改革海关。”
寇昂扯着胡子（气呼呼）地走了，他呼天抢地：“天啊，请怜悯天下苍生吧！我们现在有了个英国学派的皇帝，我能清楚地看到，不久后我们就会缺衣少食，因为我们将不再需要干任何事了。”
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