THE GROSS AND NET GAIN OF RISING WAGES. 653 



I have already, in part, dealt with the question practically as 

 far as workingmen are concerned, by pointing out the really 

 narrow limits of monopoly rent,* and practically the final conclu- 

 sion must be reached by the statistical method, and in the way I 

 have already used. But I wish to avoid statistics for the present, 

 and to indicate merely the general conditions of the problem to 

 be solved, which appear to minimize the possible extent of the 

 alleged drawback. 



It is clear, first of all, on general grounds, that the concentra- 

 tion of men in cities is due to the fact that cities, on the whole, 

 weigh in the balance against the country. There is more and 

 better employment there than in the country, all deductions 

 made, in the opinion of those interested ; and that seems a conclu- 

 sive answer to the question as to whether, on the whole, there is 

 not a net as well as a gross improvement in wages as far as this 

 drawback is concerned. 



Next, it is plain that, as a great part of the improvement of the 

 last fifty years has consisted in the substitution of artisan and 

 other highly paid labor for merely rude labor, the additional 

 monopoly rent payable in the cities can only be, in most cases, a 

 comparatively trifling drawback. It may be the case that, if we 

 compare the former peasant of the country with the rude laborer 

 of the city, and especially of the metropolis, the latter has hardly 

 gained; but if we compare the former peasant of the country 

 with the town artisan of the present time, although the latter has 

 to pay monopoly rent or an equivalent charge for conveyance, 

 there is still an enormous gain in the latter's position. It is the 

 same with the professional classes. If the latter were stationary 

 in number, or increasing only pari passu with the increase of 

 population, then the larger gross income on the average earned 

 by the masses of professional men in cities, as compared with the 

 professional incomes earned in the country formerly, might show 

 little net improvement ; but allowance has to be made for the 

 fact that the number of such incomes has enormously increased, 

 and that the earners largely compare with the earners of wholly 

 inferior incomes in former times, whether in town or country. 

 As the increase of these classes could not have taken place with- 

 out the growth of cities, there must be a large net as well as gross 

 gain to be reckoned when the comparison is properly made. 



To bring the matter to a point, what I have to urge is, that 

 the very growth of cities implies the existence of conditions 

 under which workmen of higher grades take the place of work- 

 men of lower grades, so that, although class for class a workman 

 passing from country to town does not seem to gain so very 

 much, on account of the difference between gross and net, yet, 



* See "Essays in Finance," second series, pp. 381, 382. 



