total, therefore, embodies the difficulties of the paradox of value;
in some cases increased value reflects a growing scarcity and not
greater abundance.[5]

For example, between 1900 and 1915, with the growth of population, the
total number of improved acres in farms in the United States increased
but little, and the per capita number diminished. At least in part
as a result of this fact, the prices of nearly all kinds of food rose
rapidly, as did also the price of farm land. The prices (and estimated
values) of farm lands are the expression of the individual capitals,
which formed each year an increasing statistical total of so-called
wealth. The people had less land per capita, and were poorer per
capita as respects this item of landed-wealth, had less meat per
capita, and had to give more labor in exchange for food, at the same
time that the statistical per capita of land values increased.

So it may be as respects forests, coal, cotton, and eventually iron,
copper, and many other things. When forests were plentiful, lumber and
fire wood were free goods in many neighborhoods. Forests entered into
the total of national "wealth" in 1850 and 1860 at a comparatively
small sum. But in 1910 when the forests had been half used up they
appeared as a greater total and probably as a greater per capita
item of "wealth" than in 1850. The figures reflect changes in the
paradoxical section of the scale of values, and express scarcity
rather than wealth.

Altho the wealth of a nation may not be expressed as a single sum of
values that accurately reflects the weal-bringing things composing its
environment, some conception of the situation is to be gained by an
enumeration of goods in their kinds and quantities and by studying