ave directed
special attention to the unearned incomes of the "idle" landlord and
shareholder, because these are the typical feature of the modern system
of distribution, which indeed has come to the front since the time of
Marx, and because they furnish the answer to those who contend that
wealth is at present distributed approximately in accordance with
personal capacity or merit, and tacitly assume that "the rich" are all
of them great captains of industry who by enterprise and ability have
actually created their vast fortunes.[53] Indeed we might say that we do
not mind conceding to our opponents all the wealth "created" by superior
brains, if they will let us deal with the unearned incomes which are
received independent of the possession of any brains, or any services at
all!

But although we regard the case of the capitalist employer as relatively
negligible, and although we prefer to concentrate our attack on the
least defensible side of the capitalist system--and already the State
recognises that unearned incomes should pay a larger proportion in
income-tax, that property which passes at death, necessarily to those
who have not earned it, should contribute a large quota to the public
purse, and that unearned increment on land should in part belong to the
public--that does not mean that we have any tenderness for the
entrepreneur. Him we propose to deal with by the favourite Fabian method
of municipalisation and nationalisation. We take over his "enterprise,"
his gasworks and waterworks, his docks and trams, his railways and
mines. We secure for the State the profits of management and the future
unearned increment, and we compensate him for his capital with
interest-bearing securities. We force him in fact to become the idle
recipient of unearned income, and then we turn round and upbraid him and
tax him heavily precisely because his income is unearned! If there is
any special tenderness in this treatment, I should prefer harshness. To
me it seems to resemble the policy of the wolf towards the lamb.[54]

I will proceed with quotations from Mr. Barker, because the view of a
historian of thought is weightier than anything I could say.

"But collectivism also demands in the second place expert government. It
demands the 'aristocracy of talent' of which Carlyle wrote. The control
of a State with powers so vast will obviously need an exceptional and
exceptionally large aristocracy. Those opponents of Fabianism who d