SOCIAL BACTERIA AND ECONOMIC MICROBES. 317 



SOCIAL BACTERIA AND ECONOMIC MICROBES, WHOLE- 

 SOME AND NOXIOUS. A STUDY IN SMALLS. 



BY EDWARD ATKINSON, LL.D., PH.D. 



The profit of each generation, or in the present era the profit of each 

 decade, consists in the saving of what was wasted in the last one. 



1HAVE long sought a method by which the value of the annual 

 product of this country at the prices fixed at final distribution, 

 commonly called retail prices, might be ascertained with approximate 

 accuracy. 



In the study of the data of 1880 I was led to the conclusion that 

 the average per capita expenditure (and therefore the annual product 

 in its final stage) of the people of this country for the necessaries, com- 

 forts and luxuries of life could not be less than what $200 per head 

 could buy at the prices of the census year. The proportion of the 

 population occupied for gain varied but a fraction from one in three, 

 leading to the conclusion that the average product of each person occu- 

 pied for gain could not be less than $600 worth a year. Assuming this 

 estimate to be approximately correct, this sum must have been the 

 measure in money within which the cost of living, the taxes, additions 

 to capital and all personal expenditures must have been covered. But 

 on multiplying the population of the census year 1880 by $200 worth 

 per head, I was led to a very much larger estimate of the value of the 

 annual product than the estimates of any other student of social 

 facts. 



I revised this computation on the basis of the census of 1890, reach- 

 ing a conclusion that, while prices had been lessened, the value of the 

 annual product at the lessened prices had reached not less than $225 

 w r orth per head or $675 per person occupied for gain. 



Upon revising the figures of 1900 as far as given — these figures 

 being more adequate than any before compiled — I have again reached 

 the conclusion that the per capita product of the year reported in the 

 census of 1900 was not less than what $225 per capita would come to, 

 each dollar of that $225 standing on the average for a considerably 

 larger quantity of products than ever before. At the present time 

 prices have been enhanced, in consequence mainly of a short product 

 of Indian corn, of potatoes and other root crops, and of some other 

 products; but under the present aspect of ample crops and normal 

 production a return to normal conditions may be anticipated within a 

 few months or by the time when the population of this country will 



