"Close on a century after the event, this interpretative error re-evokes the error Marshall made in relation to the theory of Ricardo, and of the classical economists in general. Marshall, as we well know, held that they were aware of only one of the two blades of the scissors determining price –the supply side, but not the demand side. In this case, too, classical analysis was rendered comparable to the analysis in terms of demand and supply equilibrium by introducing the assumption of constant returns. Such an assumption, however, cannot be held to represent a general constitutive element of classical analysis: classical economists had quite different ideas on returns to scale, and moreover conceived them in the context of a dynamic analysis. Let us recall, for example, Smith’s ideas about the relationship connecting division of labour (and hence productivity) to the size of the market, or the role played by decreasing returns in agriculture in the analyses of Malthus, West, Torrens, Ricardo and a host of others. Sraffa, who in his critical edition of Ricardo’s Works and Correspondence had, among other things, also disputed Marshall’s interpretation, foresaw quite clearly that the same error would once again crop up in connection with his own analysis. Indeed, he appeared ready to accept the inevitable, though up to a point."