Note 22 — Chapter XII

A letter was sent me by a friend in America, from a writer who, commenting on my late addresses in that country, said that in the main he entirely agreed with my arguments, as against socialism; but that he could not divest himself of the belief that labour as a whole got less than it produced, and was thus as a whole suffering a chronic wrong. He suggested, however, a method, fundamentally analogous to that set forth in the text, of computing what labour, as such, does produce in reality. He gave his own opinion as to actual facts, as an impression merely; but how misleading impressions may be can be seen from his statements "that all very great fortunes, at all events, must be derived from the underpayment of labour." Had he only considered the case in detail, he would have seen that labour received the highest wages from some of the richest employers. According to his theory the wages of labour, in such cases, would touch the minimum.