Profits or Prosperity? First Edition - Henry Fairchild - Bauman Rare Books

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Profits or Prosperity?

Henry FAIRCHILD

Item#: 103639 We're sorry, this item has been sold

Profits or Prosperity?

"THE UNRESTRAINED STRUGGLE FOR PROFITS"

FAIRCHILD, Henry Pratt. Profits or Prosperity? New York and London: Harper & Brothers, 1932. Octavo, original blue cloth, paper labels, original dust jacket and bellyband.

First edition of prominent sociologist and economist Fairchild's attack on the profit motive, an especially fine copy in original dust jacket and rarely found publisher's bellyband with a quote by Theodore Dreiser.

In this major work by prominent sociologist and economist Fairchild, he confronts the "paradox of poverty" and argues: "the tap root of the difficulty is the unrestrained struggle for profits in an economic system where general and unlimited profits, particularly money profits, are mathematically impossible." Fairchild taught at Yale (1910-18) before his tenure at New York University (1919-45), where he was Chairman of the Department of Sociology. Here, as in many of his works, he supports a "'limited socialism' and consumptionist economics" (Hoff, State and the Stork, 90). In his address as the 26th president of the American Sociological Society (1936), Fairchild "contended that the sociologist's role is to analyze the integration of social elements in the business process, while economics analyzes the productive aspects. Thus, it is essential that sociologists and economists work side by side" (Bogardus, American Sociological Review). First edition, with key pieces such as: "The Fallacy of Profits," "Machines Don't Buy Goods," "Exit the Gospel of Work" and "The Great Economic Paradox," which were variously serialized in Virginia Quarterly Review and Harper's (1931-32). Original dust jacket with rarely found bellyband containing a quote by Theodore Dreiser: "I am delighted with it. It has more of the new and necessary facts, and a new mental approach. It should be profitable reading for thousands."

An exceptionally scarce fine copy in original dust jacket and bellyband.

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Aquatint Copperplate process by which the plate is “bitten” by exposure to acid. By changing the areas of the plate that are exposed and the length of time the plate is submerged in the acid bath, the engraver can obtain fine and varying shades of gray that closely resemble watercolor washes. Although the name contains the word “tint”, this is a black-and-white printing process; aquatint plates can often be hand colored, however.
Armorial Used to describe a binding bearing the coat of arms of the original owner, or with bookplates incorporating the owner’s arms.
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Wood-Engraving Engraving made with the graver or burin on the cross-section of a piece of boxwood; the harder wood and finer tools allow for more delicate, finely detailed images, while the block can still be set in the page alongside text and printed on the same stock as the text. While much older, wood engravings enjoyed an important renaissance in the late eighteenth century through Thomas Bewick and continued in popularity thorugh the nineteenth century.
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