of the existing
method of distributing economic fruits will bring with it regrettable
wounds and losses. But provided they are incurred for the benefit of the
American people as an economic whole, they are worth the penalty. The
national economic interest demands, on the one hand, the combination of
abundant individual opportunity with efficient organization, and on the
other, a wholesome distribution, of the fruits; and these joint
essentials will be more certainly attained under some such system as the
one suggested than they are under the present system.

The genuine economic interest of the individual, like the genuine
political interest, demands a distribution of economic power and
responsibility, which will enable men of exceptional ability an
exceptional opportunity of exercising it. Industrial leaders, like
political leaders, should be content with the opportunity of doing
efficient work, and with a scale of reward which permits them to live a
complete human life. At present the opportunity of doing efficient
industrial work is in the case of the millionaires (not in that of their
equally or more efficient employees) accompanied by an excessive measure
of reward, which is, in the moral interest of the individual, either
meaningless or corrupting. The point at which these rewards cease to be
earned is a difficult one to define; but there certainly can be no
injustice in appropriating for the community those increases in value
which are due merely to a general increase in population and business;
and this increase in value should be taken over by the community, no
matter whether it is divided among one hundred or one hundred thousand
stockholders in a corporation. The essential purpose is to secure for
the whole community those elements in value which are made by the
community. The semi-monopolistic organization of certain American
industries is little by little enabling the government to separate from
the total economic product a part at least of that fraction which is
created by social rather than individual activity; and a democracy which
failed to take advantage of the opportunity would be blind to its
fundamental interest. To be sure, the opportunity cannot be turned to
the utmost public benefit until industrial leaders, like political
leaders, are willing to do efficient work partly from disinterested
motives; but that statement is merely a translation into economic terms
of the fundamental truth that democr