◆2 Which action takes two chief forms—legislation, and combinations amongst the labourers. We will discuss both in the next chapter.
Wages naturally decline then, owing to an increase of population, when relatively to the population wealth declines also; but only then. ◆¹ On the other hand,—and this is the important point to consider,—so long as a country, under the existing system of production, continues, like our own, to grow richer in proportion to the number of labourers, of every fresh increase in riches the labourers will obtain a share, without any political action or corporate struggle on their part, merely by means of a natural and spontaneous process. And we have now seen in a broad and general way what the character of this process is. It may seem, however, to many people that a study of it and of its results can teach no lesson but the lesson of laisser faire, which practically means that the labourers have no interest in politics at all, and that all social legislation and corporate action of their own is no better than a waste of trouble, and is very possibly worse. But to think this is to completely misconceive the matter. Even a study of this process of natural distribution by itself would be fruitful of suggestions of a highly practical kind; but if we would understand the actual forces to which distribution is due, it must, as I have said already, not be studied by itself, but taken in connection with others by which its operation has been accelerated. I spoke of these as consisting of deliberate and concerted actions in contradistinction to individual and spontaneous actions; ◆² and these, speaking broadly, have been of two kinds—the one represented by the organisation of Labour in Trade Unions, the other by certain legislative measures, which, in a vague and misleading way, are popularly described as “Socialistic.” Let us proceed to consider these.
CHAPTER IV
Of Socialism and Trade Unionism—the Extent and Limitation of their Power in increasing the Income of Labour.
◆1 Legislation of the kind just alluded to is commonly called Socialistic:
◆2 But this way of describing it is inaccurate;
◆¹ I will speak first of the kind of legislation, popularly called Socialistic, which certain people now regard with so much hope, and others with corresponding dread; and I shall show that both of these extreme views rest on a complete misconception of what this so-called Socialism is. For what is popularly called Socialism in this country, so far as it has ever been advocated by any political party, or has been embodied in any measure passed or even proposed in Parliament, ◆² does not embody what is really the distinctive principle of Socialism. Socialism, regarded as a reasoned body of doctrine, rests altogether on a peculiar theory of production, to which already I have made frequent reference—a theory according to which the faculties of men are so equal that one man produces as much wealth as another; or, if any man produces more, he is so entirely indifferent as to whether he enjoys what he produces or no, that he would go on producing it just the same, if he knew that the larger part would at once be taken away from him. Hence Socialists argue that the existing rewards of Ability are altogether superfluous, and that the existing system of production, which rests on their supposed necessity, can be completely revolutionised and made equally efficacious without them.
◆1 As all the so-called Socialistic legislation in this country rests on the very system of production which professed Socialists aim at destroying.
But whatever may be the opinions of a few dreamers or theorists, or however in the future these opinions may spread, the fundamental principle of Socialism, up to the present time, has never been embodied in any measure or proposal which has been advocated in this country by any practical party. ◆¹ On the contrary, the proposals and measures which are most frequently denounced as Socialistic—even one so extreme as that of free meals for children at Board Schools—all presuppose the system of production which is existing, and thus rest on the very foundation which professed Socialists would destroy.[55] They merely represent so many ways—wise or unwise—of distributing a public revenue, which consists almost entirely of taxes on an income produced by the forces of Individualism.
Now, so far as the matter is a mere question of words, we may call such proposals or measures Socialistic if we like. On grounds of etymology we should be perfectly right in doing so; but we shall see that in that case, with exactly the same propriety, we may apply the word to the institution of Government itself. The Army, the Navy, and more obviously still the Police Force, are all Socialistic in this sense of the word; nor can anything be more completely Socialistic than a public road or a street. In each case a certain something is supported by a common fund for the use of all; and every one is entitled to an equal advantage from it, irrespective of his own deserts, or the amount he has contributed to its support.