The Size of the Nation and the Cost of Administration

Abstract

Any consideration of the advantages and disadvantages of large size in their application to the size of nations would clearly be incomplete if it did not include some discussion of the effects of size upon the costs of administration of the nation itself as a nation, upon the costs of the provision of social services, and upon the costs of defence. Yet, so far as I can discover, this is an almost virgin field in economic analysis. If I have failed to find predecessors of whose writings I should have been aware, I apologize in advance. I have consulted others better informed than myself, and they would appear as unfamiliar as I with any substantial earlier work in this field.