Page:David Atkins - The Economics of Freedom (1924).pdf/137

 able components of value; and either soon through quickening perception, or later through intolerable friction, we shall come to employ them for the foundation of economic science, for the determination of basic national value and for the construction of an unimpairable measure of value.

The net occupancy-value of national area, in a given time, this is the only index of basic value. Taxation, the hourly responsibility for the maintenance of order—a pre-requisite of value—and currency, a token and pledge of that value expressed in similar terms—these must be measured by the same gauge if we are to compass freedom.

The continuous effort toward freedom, in a measurable region of order—this is the vital thing to comprehend. The physical character of the area in which this effort is exerted and the thin layers of old time and labor are no more important, as far as measurement is concerned, than the paint and varnish on a pressure gauge.