The following chart classifies about every kind of
wealth that man requires, and also "personal services,"
which, though as useful as wealth, do not crystallize in
material products — such services as those of
lawyers, barbers, doctors, teachers, actors, and so on:
[chart]
The circle of variegated colors represents the
commercial reservoir into which Wealth is poured by
production, and from which it is drawn for consumption,
each color typifying the kind of wealth or service named
in it. Now, let us suppose that Personal Servants tap the
commercial reservoir for food.70 They do it by applying
at retail stores for what will relieve their poverty as
to food, and food flows out to them" as indicated by the
blue arrow, which we now insert in the chart: [chart]
Let us now complete this chart. When we began it a
distinction was noted between Personal Servants, who
render mere intangible services, and the other classes,
who produce tangible wealth. But essentially there is no
difference. By referring to the chart and observing the
course of the arrows, Food-makers are seen working for
Personal Servants precisely as Personal Servants work for
Luxury-makers. We may therefore abandon the distinction.
This makes it no longer necessary to mention particular
classes of products in the chart; it is enough to
distinguish the different kinds of labor.76 Thus:
[chart]
76. "This, then, we may say is the great
law which binds society — 'service for service.'
"— Dick's Outlines, p. 9.
For simplicity the workers have been divided into
great classes, and each class has been supposed to serve
only one other class. But the actual currents of trade
are much more complex. It would be practically impossible
to follow them in detail, or to illustrate their
particular movements in any simple way. And it is
unnecessary. The principle illustrated in the chart is
the principle of all division of labor and trade, however
minute the details and intricate the movement; and any
person of ordinary intelligence who wishes to understand
will need only to grasp the principle as illustrated by
the chart to be able to apply it to the experiences of
everyday industrial life. All legitimate trade is the
interchange of Labor for Labor.77
77. In the light of this principle how
absurd are some of the explanations of hard times.
Overproduction! when an infinite variety
of wants are unsatisfied which those who are in want
are anxious and able to satisfy for one another.
Hatters want bread, and bakers want hats, and farmers
want both, and they all want machines, and machinists
want bread and hats and machines, and so on without
end. Yet while men are against their will in partial or
complete idleness, their wants go unsatisfied! Since
producers are also consumers, and production is
governed by demand for consumption, there can be no
real overproduction until demand ceases. The apparent
overproduction which we see — overproduction
relatively to "effective demand" — is in fact a
congestion of some things due to an abnormal
underproduction of other things, the underproduction
being caused by obstructions in the way of labor.
Scarcity of capital! when makers of
capital in all its forms are involuntarily idle.
Scarcity of capital, like scarcity of money, is only an
expression for lack of employment. But why should there
be any lack of employment while men have unsatisfied
wants which they can reciprocally satisfy?
Too much competition! when
competition and freedom are the same. It is not freedom
but restraint, not competition but protection, that
obstructs the action and reaction of demand and supply
which we have illustrated in the
chart.
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