CHAPTER XV THE SURPLUS LABOUR MISTAKE
Many non-Socialists believe that the cause of poverty is "surplus labour," or over-population, and they tell us that if we could reduce our population we should have no poor.
If this were true, we should find that in thinly populated countries the workers fare better than in countries where the population is more dense.
But we do not find anything of the kind.
The population of Ireland is thin. There are more people in London than in all Ireland. Yet the working people of Ireland are worse off than the working people of England.
The population of Scotland is thinner than that of England, but wages rule higher in England.
In Australia there is a large country and a small population, but there is plenty of poverty.
In the Middle Ages the entire population of England would only be a few millions—say four or five millions—whereas it is now nearly thirty millions. Yet the working classes are very much better off to-day than they were in the eighth and ninth centuries.