Originally written in 1882, The State in Relation to Labour is a treatise discussing the rights of workers (specifically blue-collar or factor workers) and how certain workers or jobs should be governed, both by factory owners and labor laws. Author W. Stanley Jevons discusses the principles of factory legislation, interference in industry by both the government and labor unions, acts and laws that directly affect laborers, and methods of cooperation and compromise between laborers and their superiors. Jevons wrote several books that dealt with issues of the industrial age, and this would have come at a time when industrial laborers greatly needed an advocate. Jevons avoids supporting either side, striving for a neutral conclusion as to how the state and laborers should interact, resulting in an interesting study of labor policies for history buffs and political science students.



English economist and logician WILLIAM STANLEY JEVONS (1835-1882) was born in Liverpool. He studied chemistry and botany at University College, London, and was later professor of logic and political economy at Owens College, Manchester. He is also the author of The Theory of Political Economy (1871) and The State in Relation to Labour (1882).