While tools are critical to productivity, so also is specialisation. It is almost impossible to conceive a society in which there is no specialisation whatsoever. Our species is organised so that females give birth and males cannot accomplish this task. Notwithstanding this gender bias, there are other specialisations in which we are engaged. In the Stone Age community, individuals with varying degrees of health and physical and mental ability probably contributed to the community effort based on their specific abilities. An older man, less able to hunt, might try to specialise in making better tools for a specialist Hunter, who might be willing to concede some of his “kill” to the toolmaker. Alternatively, he might engage in some farming, while others specialised in water gathering or cooking or tailoring etc.

In a more modern society, with a larger number of people, this specialisation is more apparent. One individual might decide that the society needs timber for housing and tools. He might decide to make a career for himself as a lumberjack and supply the community’s need for wood. If he does nothing other than harvest trees, then he will die of thirst and starvation. So, he will need to be able to exchange the wood for other products. If an exchange can be agreed, then it is likely to be worthwhile for the community to have a specialist lumberjack supplying wood. The lumberjack, through specialising in his job, will develop techniques which will make him better at this task than an inexperienced person. As he practices, he will become better at the job in other ways and will be able to produce more with the same effort, or the same amount with less effort. He will become more productive.

A person with better access to a river might find fish easy to catch and might be able to produce a surplus that could be used to exchange for some other goods, that he is less able to produce. As the number of people in the community rises, the need for each person to satisfy all his needs independently may fall. This will likely happen if there is a way for people to exchange any over-production for what they under-produce. This is how the trades and professions such as fishermen, farmers, healers, artists, builders, carpenters, entertainers, cooks, tailors, weavers etc. all emerged. A sophisticated society with advanced specialisation can only develop if there is an agreed upon exchange system. Without such a system, there is no incentive for individuals to over-produce in one area, with a view to acquiring something that they are less capable of producing.

The degree of specialisation is somewhat dependent on the size of the society. If only 1 plough is ever needed, then an individual cannot specialise in plough production, but if 50 ploughs a year are needed, then such a specialisation might make sense. So as the society grows, opportunities to specialise increase (there will be further elaboration on this later). As tools become more sophisticated, a single individual may be able produce as much or more than many could achieve. But such a tool may not be valuable unless there is sufficient demand for the produce. If such a demand does not exist then the tool will likely not be created.

Specialisation is also somewhat dependent on the complexity of the tools available. A specialist at bolting an engine into a car is not very productive unless a factory brings each chassis to him, so that the engine can be inserted. Specialisation often involves repetitive tasks such as production line operatives. Other specialisations such as a software development may be more creative, but the engineer will still repetitively produce different pieces of code, each solving a different problem.

Primitive man involves himself in the production of many goods. His primitive society has a very small number of specialisations. Each individual will find it difficult to overproduce in any area of production. His lack of ability to over-produce shelter, clothing or food makes him poor. He and his society are close to edge of survival. As people specialise, they become able to over-produce beyond their own needs in that limited specialisation. In our modern society, we often over-produce far beyond our needs in the area in which we specialise. In fact we might not produce anything we need and exchange all the output from our production for all the other necessities and conveniences of life.