198 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. IX., No. 213 



Britain for 1883 would have amounted to 861,000,- 

 000 pounds sterling, instead of, as it appears now, 

 667,000,000 pounds sterling. 



This conclusion, however, is untrue in the case 

 of agriculture, where it is found that the quan- 

 tity of produce raised in Great Britain during the 

 last few years has materially decreased, and the 

 steady fall in prices has been felt even more 

 severely than the diminished yield of the soil; 

 and it is the section of the community interested 

 in agriculture which the commission finds par- 

 ticularly affected by the depression. The com- 

 plaints as to absence of profit, though general, are 

 not uniform. The evidence shows, however, 

 that while business is not absolutely less in quan- 

 tity, it is carried on with the smallest possible 

 margin of profit, and in some cases with no profit 

 at all. Nevertheless it is pointed out that the 

 gross amount of property and profits assessed to 

 the income-tax in the years 1885 and 1886 is much 

 larger than that of any previous year. Too much 

 stress cannot be laid upon these figures, because 

 the increase of the income-tax assessment is in 

 great degree attributable to the increased efficiency 

 of collection. It is further stated that in some 

 cases the taxis paid on profits not earned, because 

 of the unwillingness of traders to make known 

 the fact that they have sustained losses. 



But the absence or diminution of profits is not 

 the only marked feature of the prevailing depres- 

 sion, though it is the most universal one. The 

 supply of commodities is found to be in excess of 

 the demand, and the natural tendency to equi- 

 librium between them seems to have been ob- 

 structed for an unusually long period. And this 

 excess of supply is maintained in the face of un- 

 remunerative prices. The chief features of the 

 commercial situation are thus summed up : 1°, a 

 very serious falling-off in the exchangeable value 

 of the produce of the soil ; 2^, an increased pro- 

 duction of nearly all other classes of commodi- 

 ties ; 3°, a tendency in the supply of commodities 

 to outrun the demand ; 4°, a consequent diminution 

 in the profit obtainable by production ; and, 5°, a 

 similar diminution in the rate of interest on in- 

 vested capital. The diminution in the rate of 

 profit obtainable from production, whether agri- 

 cultural or manufacturing, has given rise to the 

 wide-spread feeling of depression among all the 

 producing classes. Those, on the other hand, 

 who are in receipt of fixed salaries, or who draw 

 their incomes from fixed investments, have little 

 to complain of. The same thing is true with re- 

 gard to the laboring class, so far as the purchasing 

 power of wages is concerned. Some distress is 

 created among the laboring classes by the dis- 

 placement of labor, which is always in progress 



owing to the increased use of machinery and 

 other changes of production ; and last winter 

 this distress was aggravated by the severity of 

 the weather. 



The report then takes up the causes which the 

 signers believe have assisted to produce the de- 

 pression. It goes on, " we have shown that the 

 production of the more important classes of com- 

 modities has, on the whole, continued to increase ; 

 and there can be no doubt that the cost of produc- 

 tion tends to diminish. It is difficult, therefore, 

 to understand how the net product of industry, 

 which constitutes the wealth of the country, can 

 have failed to increase also. There is, moreover, 

 sufficient evidence that capital has, on the whole, 

 continued to accumulate throughout the period 

 which is described as depressed, though there has 

 been a sensible depreciation in the value of some 

 kinds of capital. How, then, are we to account 

 for the general sense of depression which un- 

 doubtedly exists, and is becoming perhaps more 

 intense every year ? " 



The view which the signers of the majority re- 

 port adopt is that the aggregate wealth of the 

 country is being distributed differently, and that 

 a large part of the prevailing complaints and the 

 general sense of depression may be accounted for 

 by the changes which have taken place in recent 

 years in the apportionment and distribution of 

 profits. The reward of capital and management 

 has become less, and the employment of labor is, 

 for the time at least, not so full and continuous ; 

 so that even where the rate of wages has not been 

 diminished, the total amount earned by the laborer 

 has been less, owing to irregular or partial employ- 

 ment. Setting aside the classes immediately de- 

 pendent upon agriculture for their incomes, and 

 considering those only engaged directly in com- 

 mercial enterprises, it is found that the total 

 amount of profi^ts on which the income tax has 

 been paid has increased, as has also the number 

 of persons assessed. In the decade from 1875 to 

 1885 the number of incomes assessed under sched- 

 ule D of the income-tax list, amounting to £200 

 or more, increased from 184,354 to 239,367, a gain 

 of nearly thirty per cent. But the increase was 

 much more rapid at the lower end of the scale 

 than at the upper ; for it seems that the number 

 of persons with incomes of less than £2,000 a year 

 has increased at a more rapid rate than the popu- 

 lation, — which during the period in question has 

 increased about ten per cent, — while the number 

 of person with incomes above £2,000 has increased 

 at a less rapid rate, and the number of persons 

 with incomes above £5,000 has actually dimin- 

 ished. The rule is, the lower the uicome the 

 more rapid the rate of increase. The conclusion 



