Many reasons have been given for the result of the
General Election last autumn, but one is clearly proven —the anxiety of the small investor about his investments, which made him play at all costs for safety. It is too little recognized what strides have been taken in Britain- towards the property-owning democracy of Mr. Baldwin's dream. Sir Herbert Samuel last year, if I remember rightly, estimated the amount of small investments at 1,250 millions. Mr. Walter Runciman has always put it higher, and last week he gave the astonishing figure of 2,625 millions. That is mainly working-class money, for it is based only on the Post Office Savings Banks,• friendly societies, building societies, and industrial and benevolent societies, small investments in railways, banks, and commercial concerns being omitted. In spite of had times the amount seems to be steadily increasing. Here is another of our silent revolutions, Wealth is being quietly redistributed, and such redis- tribution is the greatest conceivable force on the side of what philosophers call " social persistence."
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