Page:The Scientific Monthly vol. 3.djvu/377

 OUB NATIONAL PROSPERITY 371

Taking the per capita production at $300 and the per capita saving at $100^ then the per capita consumption is $200 with the major part of the population consuming at a rate well below this figure.

In connection with saving it is interesting to note that while econo- mists repeatedly tell us that interest® is the reward of abstinence or postponed consumption, practically all the saving is done by those few who are already rich, and to whom saving rather than abstinence, is sheer inabiliiy to consume. It will be objected that man's desires being unlimited, any portion of even the largest incomes that is not consumed must be accredited to abstinence. But this is to say that there is no objective standard of abstinence, and without this the eco- nomics of the case becomes impossible. If the poor man who curtails his food consumption in order to lay by for a rainy day does not abstain in a far greater degree than the millionaire who goes without a steam yacht — then the word abstinence has lost meaning. It is true that if a poor man is to become rich he must begin by abstaining, but, as he becomes richer, although he saves faster and faster, he abstains less and less. That is to say, the amount saved bears no relation to the amount of abstinence. The one is no more a function of the other than the heat energy liberated by a fire is a function of the energy expended in rubbing the match that started the fire. Of the capital or permanent wealth annually saved by the nation but an insignificant part can be attributed to abstinence. Here again we see the law of the ^^multipli- cation of effects'' in almost sinister operation. The less necessity for saving the easier to save. Those that are rich must become more rich, while those that are poor will just subsist. Economic life to-day seems to be of the nature of a game in which the loser and the winner do not get the gains in proportion to their ability or effort, but the winner gets all the gains. This is strongly reflected in the phraseology of the day in which we speak of the ''game of business," or when we speak of money-making as a profession or business in itself. Just as if car- pentry was one trade and money-making another. A writer on eco- nomics in justifying large fortunes says :

It Ib useless to decry the great American fortunes as the result of railway diBcriminationB, extortion, oppression of labor, monopoly, etc. They are with hardly an exception the result of superior ability. We may criticize some of the methods,. . . but we can not deny that at the outset each one of Mr. Boekef eller 'a associates had the same opportunity to take this advantage of the railroads that he had, nor that his remarkable success shows conclusively hia greater skiU at the game of business.^

The opportunity here mentioned is not to produce, but to '' take advan- tage." The truth of the statement lies not in the justification, but in the assertion of fact, the fact that skill of the kind mentioned does,

s Interest in the broad sense, as synonymous with property income. • "Economics of Business," by Edward Sherwood Mead, Chap. VIII.

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