Note 16 — Chapter IV

This classification of houses may perhaps be objected to; but from the above point of view it is correct. Houses represent an annual income of one hundred and thirty-five million pounds. Not more than thirty-five million pounds are spent annually in building new houses; whilst the whole are counted as representing a new one hundred million pounds every year. It is plain, therefore, that if we estimate the entire annual value as above, the sum in question stands not for the houses, but for the use of them. Even more clearly does the same reasoning apply to railways and shipping. Whether we send goods by these or are conveyed by them ourselves, all that we get from them is the mere service of transport. On transport and travelling by railway about seventy million pounds are spent annually: by ship about thirty million pounds; by trams about two million pounds.