Sisyphism

Sisyphism is a term used by Frédéric Bastiat to ridicule those that think that greater productivity causes poverty by increasing unemployment. In his work "What is Free Trade?", Bastiat stated:

We have seen that between our wants and their gratification many obstacles are interposed. We conquer or weaken these by the employment of our faculties. It may be said, in general terms, that industry is an effort followed by a result.But by what do we measure our well-being? By our riches? By the result of our effort, or by the effort itself? There exists always aproportion between the effort employed and the result obtained. Does progress consist in the relative increase of the second or of the first term of this proportion--between effort or result?

Both propositions have been sustained, and in political economy opinions are divided between them.

According to the first system, riches are the result of labor. They increase in the same ratio as _the result does to the effort. Absolute perfection, of which God is the type, consists in the infinite distance between these two terms in this relation, viz.,effort none, result infinite. The second system maintains that it is the effort itself which forms the measure of, and constitutes, our riches. Progression is the increase of the proportion of the effect to the result. Its ideal extreme may be represented by the eternal and fruitless efforts of Sisyphus. [in footnote] We will therefore beg the reader to allow us in future, for the sake of conciseness, to designate this system under the term of Sisyphism, from Sisyphus, who, in punishment of his crimes, was compelled to roll a stone up hill, which fell to the bottom as fast as he rolled it to the top, so that his labor was interminable as well as fruitless. [From What Is Free Trade?, by Frédérick Bastiat, Translated by Emile Walter, Chapter III available at [http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/world/readfile?fk_files=187068&pageno=10 Project Gutenberg] ]

References