THE SOURCE OF PROSPERITY. 231 



to buy and use the same product at three to five times 

 the present cost. 



Why is it ? 



Because, eighteen and nineteen years ago the 

 masses, who are always the great consumers of all 

 products, were rich, as compared with the present 

 time. They were all employed and in receipt of good 

 wages, and from their abundant means they bought 

 and used freely and liberally. But now these same 

 masses are in poverty. They are not more than half 

 employed, and the wages received are so low that they 

 can not buy and use enough to supply the commonest 

 demands of existence. See the testimony of the work- 

 men and employers above. 



Eighteen and nineteen years ago the workman was 

 well paid, and behind every product there stood a well 

 fed, well clothed, well housed, and prosperous man or 

 woman, able and ready to buy and use freely of the 

 product of his or her own labor and the labor of 

 others. But now the workman is but little employed 

 and badly paid, and behind every cheap product 

 stands the skeleton of want, half fed, half clothed, 

 badly housed. Back of cheap products there stalk 

 misery, degradation, drunkenness, prostitution, in- 

 sanity, crime, and suicide, with men and women who 

 can but very scantily buy and use of the work of their 

 own hands or of that of others. 



Eighteen and nineteen years ago the geese that laid 

 our golden eggs were well fed and cared for. But now 

 avarice has them in its power, and, under the instruc- 

 tion of modern political economists, they are starved 

 and squeezed until there is only the skeleton left. 



