Johann Heinrich von Thünen was a Mecklenburg landowner and economist. In 1826 he published the first part of Der isolirte Staat, The Isolated State. The second part followed in 1850, the year he died. In it he looked for the naturgemäße Arbeitslohn, the natural wage. He did not mean the wage the market happened to pay. He meant a wage that could be derived. His answer was a formula, the square root of A times P. A is the value of what labor and capital produce. P is what the worker and his family need to live. Thünen wished the formula to be placed on his gravestone. It is there today.