Four factors of production are labor, capital, land, and entrepreneurship. The importance of them is founded on their contribution to the production process, economic growth, and competitiveness.
Explanation:
Economics is an essential power that has been directing people throughout history. Humanity faced a plethora of hardships, crises, and obstacles that various economic theories and approaches aimed to solve.
The issue of production has always been a crucial part of the economy as it is a vital source of necessary goods and services that people need to consume. However, the scholar dimension has never had a unified theory on production accepted by every theorist. Despite this, there might be a common and relatively approved concept on the circumstances affecting the production process – factors of production.
Today’s approach to defining factors of production is based on the neoclassical economists’ ideas. It combines past views on economic theory; for instance, labor as an essential element of the production process derived from socialists’ concepts. The foundation for the development of any country’s economy is production, which is based on the interdependence and intersection of four factors of production.
These crucial phenomena may be listed as follows: labor, capital, land, and entrepreneurship. Investopedia states, “factors of production is an economic term that describes the inputs used in the production of goods or services in order to make an economic profit.” Thus, for the profit-orientated modern world, reasonable exploitation of the factors is essential.
Labor is a human activity aimed at gaining remuneration and satisfying needs and requiring mental and physical efforts. The value of work depends on employees’ practical skills, quality of education, and will to demonstrate excellent performance. Land might be considered not only as of the place where the enterprise and labor are situated but also all the natural resources that are located on it.
Capital is the means of production and monetary accumulations used in the process of the creation of goods and services. It represents the primary means of production, that is, buildings, equipment, and infrastructure. A summary of four factors concludes that “unlike land or labor, capital must be created by humans and designed for use by humans.”
Entrepreneurship is the initiative and actions of the business owner aimed to make the economic activities of the enterprise successful and profitable. Entrepreneurs bring together the other three factors and find innovative ways of their interaction, pursuing the profit. The more they provide consumers with the creation of something new and unique, the more markets are diversified and based on competitiveness, which is essential for the economy.
In order to produce products and services, all four factors are essential, as none of them might independently create something special and subsequently make a profit. They intersect with each other, so the production process is their combination and close interaction. All entrepreneurs aim to balance the use of the factors to maximize profits. For example, if one wants to increase the yield of rice, he or she needs to create plenty of combinations of land, labor, and capital.
It might be important to understand that each factor may become interchangeable; for instance, the employees’ work can be replaced with advanced technologies. The importance of four factors might also be in their contribution not only to business prosperity but in a country’s economic growth and development as they significantly maintain competitiveness.
It is a crucial prerequisite to goods and services’ quality improvement and internationalization. Entrepreneurs all around the world compete with each other in inventing new combinations of the factors developing international standards of production.