A third motive is the desire for consideration which is at the bottom of many other desires—at the bottom even of the desire for money itself. For if we analyze the desire for money we shall perceive that it includes two very different motives: the motive of prudence—the desire to secure the comforts and luxuries of life; and the motive of ambition, or the desire for the consideration of others. Now the former is the first in time, for a man must begin by securing the material things of life. But once these are secured the motive that keeps men making money is desire for consideration. And this desire, though evil when excessive, is in moderation one of the greatest of human virtues; for it sets men upon deserving the affection of their neighbors and promotes unselfishness and self-sacrifice. One of the curses of the competitive system is that the desire for consideration, which in its essence is a virtue, is converted by our money system into a vice, because money is the chief instrument in securing consideration.[147] More will have to be said on this subject later. Here we may content ourselves with noting that in a Socialist society consideration will be secured not meretriciously through money, but deservedly through service. The inventor who shortens hours of labor for the community will belong to the Honor Roll. He will secure this recognition not after having forced his invention on the capitalist and fought its merits through the courts, created unemployment for his fellows, and crushed competition out of the field his patent covers—but directly from the industry he has benefited, without the waste that attends the establishing of patent rights to-day. The inventor under Socialism will have a stronger stimulus than he has to-day; for the chances of securing livelihood and consideration are certainly not more than one in a hundred, whereas under Socialism they will be a hundred to one. There will not be the opposition of invested capital to overcome; nor the hostility of his fellow-workman; nor the villainy of the infringer. If his invention can reduce the hours of labor or otherwise benefit the community, it will be hailed with delight and honor. And so even though he need no stimulus he will under Socialism have it; for his reward will be prompt and secure.
Moreover, as Professor Ely has pointed out, the tendency of invention in a Socialist state would be to replace work which now involves drudgery by machinery that would tend to lessen or eliminate it.
If it were conceivable that a law could be made or enforced requiring that millionaires, and none but millionaires, were to serve as stokers, there is no doubt that all the ingenuity in the land would at once be put to making the work of stoking less detestable than it now is; if necessary, naval architecture would be so reformed from top to bottom, as to reduce the work of stoking to that pressure of a finger upon a button which is the only physical work imposed by modern conditions upon the millionaire to-day.
The improvements due to invention would in a Socialist society differ, perhaps, in character but not in quantity, for invention obeys the particular stimulus which gives rise to it. Thus Karl Marx points out[148] that mechanical traction was not introduced into mines until a law forbade the use of women and children there, and the "half-time system stimulated the invention of the piecing-machine," thereby replacing child labor in woolen-yarn manufacture. Again, immense improvements have been made in charging and drawing gas retorts, owing to labor troubles, and there is no doubt that all arduous work would soon be made less arduous if we all had to take a turn at it.
The objection that Socialism, would destroy the stimulus to invention has been treated at what may seem disproportionate length on account of its extreme importance. For it is owing to human inventiveness that production to-day tends to outstrip consumption. Of all the speculations upon the possible advantages of a new social order those which concern themselves with the shortening of the average working day are the most fascinating, yet the most dangerous. They are fascinating because, of the many afflictions of the present order it is the excessive workday that we feel most, for it is that which robs so many of us or our need of personal life; and we know that any reduction of the hours of labor would mean an immediate increase in the quantity, and an ultimate increase in the quality, of our life. But they are dangerous speculations because they probe to the very heart of that wonderfully complicated economic process which we call Capitalism. To make any scientific estimate of the social labor time required to produce the commodities socially necessary for our health and happiness would require an elaborate and intimate investigation of the most secret details of industry, trade, and transportation, such as there is little likelihood of ever being made. Nevertheless, it is possible, in the light of some data already at our command, to get a suggestive glimpse into the probabilities of the situation.
The 13th Annual Report of the Bureau of Labor is an exhaustive study of the actual time required to produce some 600 different commodities, ranging all the way from apple trees to loaves of bread and shingles. The principal object of this Report was to compare the cost of production by hand with the cost of production by machine; and it has demonstrated the enormous progress that has been made in the art of production by the substitution of machine for hand labor. For example, before the introduction of machine labor it took about sixty-three hours and a half to produce thirty bushels of barley; whereas to-day, with the use of machinery, the same amount can be produced in two hours and forty-two minutes (p. 24-5). The Report, in estimating the cost of producing, includes breaking the ground, sowing and covering seed and pulverizing topsoil, hauling water and fuel for engine, reaping, threshing, measuring, sacking and hauling to the granary (p. 432-3).
Having these figures it would seem to be a very simple matter to ascertain the total time required to produce the various commodities consumed by the average workingman's family. It would seem as though all we had to do was to make out a list of these commodities, get the time cost of each from the Report and add these together to get the total. Unfortunately, however, the Report does not cover all the items which would have to be included in this list of necessaries; and to make an estimate from a single commodity or from two or three commodities would be a little dangerous, because some of the commodities have much higher time values than others and would therefore introduce many elements of uncertainty.
But we may approach the question from another standpoint. The Report does furnish the time value of ten of the principal crops and of bituminous coal. Let us, then, restate the problem in the following form:
Assuming social ownership of land (including bituminous coal lands) and modern machinery, how many hours' labor per day would be required to produce enough of the principal crops to sell at farm or mine for a sum sufficient to buy the necessaries of existence for the average family?
The first step, obviously, is to determine what constitutes the necessaries of existence for the average American family. Here again we may resort to official statistics. In the year 1900-01 the U.S. Bureau of Labor entered upon an investigation of the income and expenditure of the average American family. Agents were sent out all over the country to collect data at first hand. These agents got reports from some 25,440 families, and the figures are tabulated and summarized in the 18th Annual Report of this Bureau.[149]