Page:Proletarian and Petit-Bourgeois (1912?).pdf/47

Rh are the definitions, and the ideas and standards for "earning" are incomplete. Always the thought is there in its most general form, carrying with it the possibility of revolt against any economic order which denies to a man the right to his full earnings.

The economic conflict in the United States will eventually develop between property owners and the producers of wealth. A student of current American economic facts is led to the inevitable conclusion that there is only one economic contrast that can be made clear cut and definite—the contrast between service income and property income; between income secured as a return for effort, and income secured in return for property ownership.

The facts in the case point clearly to the distinction between service income and property income. The line of future contrast and of future conflict is the line which separates these two ideas.

The student will search in vain through the annals of economic history for a situation more fraught with destructive possibilities than those now confronting the American people. The recipients of property income (derived from property ownership) and of service income (paid for the expenditure of effort) face each other and prepare for the conflict. Those who have put forth the effort, declare their right to the products of that effort. Those who own property hold fast to their property and to the prerogatives which are inseparable from them.

Law, custom, and business practice have made property income a first charge on industry. There can be no considerable readjustment of income values until the pre-eminent position of property is overbalanced by some social action.

The present tendency should greatly increase the total amount of property income and the proportion of property income paid with each passing decade. Land values should continue to rise; as population grows