nnection between them is by
no means simple or direct. That is because the wage earners share in a
product to the making of which other agents contribute. In our present
industrial system work is done under direction, and by the aid of tools
and machinery; it is highly subdivided. It is impossible to determine
the contribution to total production of any group of workmen, or of all
workmen. The product is a joint result in which the part played by any
one group, instrument, or factor of production cannot be traced. Who,
for example, is able to say how much productive activities have been
aided by the invention of the telephone and the growth of the telephone
system? The problem of the distribution of the product of modern
industry is so difficult and so much to the fore because so many
different people contribute in some way or other to the product and have
a claim upon it.

Wage incomes may be affected by changes in the volume of the product, no
matter what the cause or nature of the change. If suddenly some new
chemical fuel were discovered in the laboratory, or some business
efficiency expert were to discover some formula which made motors go
round, the labor now spent in coal mining could be turned to other
tasks. The volume of economic goods produced would be increased. The
product to be distributed would be greater, and wage incomes would rise.
A similar result would ensue if the magic formula of the expert endowed
all workingmen with greater skill and energy. Any addition to or
subtraction from the capacity of any agent of production tends to affect
not only its own income, but that of all claimants. The reward of any
one agent of production, for example, labor, depends not only on its own
part in production, but upon the contribution of all other factors. A
craftsman in the United States may be no abler than his fellow workman
in France, but may receive twice his wage.

This line of reasoning must be qualified in one respect. There is some
competition for employment between the several agents of production.
Their relative efficiency will affect the demand for them, and so will
also affect the share of the product each receives most directly. That
is a phase of the subject that will be considered at greater length at
another point.[15]

4.--Given an industrial society at work like the United States,
producing each year a varied flow of commodities and services, the
question arises as to what determines the sh