Lots of entertaining thoughts to pursue. I might get into assembling my own thoughts. Right now, I'll pick up one bit that particularly stuck out to me:

It is not the actual greatness of national wealth, but its continual increase, which occasions a rise in the wages of labour. It is not, accordingly, in the richest countries, but in the most thriving, or in those which are growing rich the fastest, that the wages of labour are highest.

How then can USA Congres still justify the continuous stagnation on labour wages? Didn't the USA GDP grow altogether? bonddad on DKos (one of the authors I still track) had a good post on that some two days ago, in which he also discussed the growing inequality within the States, another subject repeatedly flagged there and here.

I also read that union power in China has begun building, and unions are starting to clamour for higher wages and educate workers on their rights...

Now, show me that graph. And one... And two... And...