Legal Definition and Related Resources of Profits

An excess of the value of returns over the value of expenditures. The net amount made after deducting any proper expenses incident to the transaction. 2 Sneed (Tenn.) 452; 15 Minn. 519. The expenses to be deducted are ordinarily the current expenses incident to the business; not such items as the depreciation of buildings in which the business is carried on. 94 U. S. 500. This is a word of very extended signification. In commerce, it means the advance in the price of goods sold beyond the cost of purchase. In distinction from the wages of labor, it is well understood to imply the net return to the capital or stock employed, after deducting all the expenses, including not only the wages of those employed by the capitalist, but the wages of the capitalist himself for superintending the employment of his capital or stoCk. Smith, Wealth of Nations, bk. i. c. 6, and McCulloch’s notes; Mill, Pol. Econ. c. 15. After indemnifying the capitalist for his outlay, there commonly remains a surplus, which is his profit, the net income from his capital. 1 Mill, Pol. Econ. c. 15. The word “profit” is generally used by virriters on political economy to denote the difference between the value of advances and the value of returns made by their employment. The profit of the farmer and the manufacturer is the gain made by the sale of produce or manufactures, after deducting the value of the labor, materials, rents, and all expenses, together with the interest of the capital employed, whether land, buildings, machinery, instruments, or money. The rents and profits of an estate, the income or the net income of it, are all equivalent expressions. The, income or the net income of an estate means only the profit it will yield after deducting the charges of management. 5 Me. 202, 203; 35 Me. 420, 421. Under the term “profit” is comprehended the produce of the soil, whether it arise above or below the surface; as, herbage, wood, turf, coals, minerals, stones; also fish in a pond or running water. Profits are divided into profits a prendre, or those taken and enjoyed by the mere act of the proprietor himself, and profits a vendre, namely, such as are received at the hands of and rendered by another. Hammond, N. P. 172. Profits are divided by writers on political economy into gross and net, gross profits being the whole difference between the value of advances and the value of returns made by their employment, and net profits being so much of that difference as is attributable solely to the capital employed. What remains as the clear gains in any business venture after deducting the capital invested, the -expense incurred and the loss sustained. 83 Mich. 63. The remainder of the difference, or in other words, the gross profits minus the net profits, has no particular name; but it represents the profits attributable to industry, skill, and enterprise. See Malthus, Def. Pol. Econ.; McCulloch, Pol. Econ. (4th Ed.) 563. But the word “profit” is generally used in a less extensive signification, and presupposes an excess of the value of returns over the. value of advances.

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This definition of Profits is based on the The Cyclopedic Law Dictionary . This entry needs to be proofread.

Vocabularies (Semantic Web Information)

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Profits in the Economic Activity

An introductory concept of Profits may be: total revenues minus total costs