195 

 13 



WEALTH IN CONSUMPTION. 



When the Socialist complains of the 

 unequal distribution of wealth, such is 

 the confusion arising from the various 

 applications of the term, that he is often 

 misled by references to facts which have, 

 at best, only a partial relation to the sub- 

 ject to which his attention is particularly 

 directed. 



If he bases his conclusions on the 

 " Statistician's Wealth," and especially 

 so when restricted to the Statistician's 

 Estimates — of the capital value of the 

 private wealth of the country — he is sure 

 to be misled ; for the Statistician's figures 

 do not embrace any element of wealth 

 which, during the year, is utilised or 

 devoted to the immediate consumption 

 or satisfaction of man, nor for the 

 Immediate coBsumption of man's auxiliary 



aids and instruments engaged in the work 

 of reproduction. 



They are confined strictly to those 

 articles of wealth which are fixed or set 

 apart from consumption as instruments 

 for the production, transfer, modification, 

 or protection of the current year's con- 

 sumable goods and' satisfactions for man 

 himself ; and also for the current year's 

 supply of consumable goods, required as 

 food, renewals, repairs, and shelter by 

 man's instruments, whether animate — as 

 horses, cattle, sheep— or inanimate — as 

 in the coal, oil, and other materials 

 required for the production of 

 energy in his engines and machinery, 

 engaged constantly in the production, 

 transfer, or modification of the essential 

 utilities of man's life — viz., food, trans- 

 port, shelter, warmth, clothing comforts, 

 luxuries, ease. 



Moreover, the Statistician gives the 

 capital value of these instruments; and 

 therefore no just comparison between this 

 persenally non-consumable part of a na- 

 tion's wealth can be made, until the 

 several parts of the total wealth are stated 

 in a corresponding measure of monetary 

 or exchange value. 



For if we capitaUse the value of fixed in- 

 struments, we should also for comparison 

 capitalise the annual production of wealth 

 — also annually : — 



(1) Distributed and consumed ; or (2) 

 annually converted into fresh fixed 

 auxiliary producing, transporting, 

 modifying, or protecting instru- 

 ments. 



Thus, although the capital value of fixed 

 instruments in the Australian Common- 

 wealth is estimated at 912 millions, it only 

 represents 24*60 per cent, of the corres- 

 ponding capital value of its annual pro- 

 duction of fresh wealth of consumption; 

 for although the annual value of the latter 

 only represents 185*34 millions, its 

 capital value represents a sum £'3706 

 millions, or 4-06 times the value oi the 

 Statistician's wealth of lands, houses, 

 machines, and other fixed forms of the 

 mere producing agencies. 



Even while it is admitted that the ele- 

 ment of national wealth contained in the 

 fixed producing instruments (viz., 24*60 

 per cent.) may be confined to the owner- 

 ship—not consumption— of a compara- 

 tively small number of the community, 

 this circumstance does not afford the 



