THE STANDARD OF LIFE.*
THE dogmatism which was once characteristic of economic speculation seems now to be a thing of the past. Every school of politics keeps its own economists, and what was once, prematurely perhaps, deemed a science is plainly become a controversy and a chaos of contending opinion. "It would be rash," says Mrs. Bosanquet in the new edition of the volume of essays which gives the title to this article, " to formulate any theory of wages as predominant at the present day, but now that we have seen how the supposed limitations of former theories have broken down, we are free to consider some of the actual influences at work in determining the Rate of Wages. Foremost amongst these is the Standard of Life" (p. 49). The most striking presentment of Mrs. Bosanquet's view of human progress and its relation to the standard of life is, to our mind, that contained in the essay on " The • (1) The Standard of Life, and other Reprinted Ramps. By Helen Bosanquet. Second Edition. London : Macmillan and CO, [8s. 6d. net.]—(2) Socialism and Politics a Study in the Rs-adjustment of the Values of Life. By C. II. Ashbee. London : Brimley Johnson and Ince. [Ss. 6d. net.]—(3) Women's Work and Wages: a Phase of Life in an Industrial City. By Edward Cadbury, M. Cecile Matheson, and George Shaun, M.A. London : T. Fisher Sonia. [63.1—(4) immigration and its Rffects upon the United States. By Prescott F. Han A.B., LL.B. London : G. Bell and Sons. Os. net.)—(5) Economic and Statistical Studies, 1840-1890. By John Towne Damson. With a brief Memoir by his Daughter. Mary Norman Hill • and an Introduction by E. C. K. Goner, M.A., Brunner Professor of Economic Science, Liverpool University. London : T. Fisher Unwin. [Ma. net.] Psychology of Social Progress." "The peculiar feature of the life of animals," she quotes from Professor Stout's volume on Psychology, " which prevents progressive development is the existence of instincts, which do for them what the human being must do for himself " (p. 91) ; but, she continues, "man, having no sufficient instincts for the purpose,, must achieve his ends by way of consciously devised means " :- "Again, why is it," she asks, "that some of us think it undesir-• able that rich people or the State should play the part of special Providence to the poor ? The lazy answer reverts to the principle- of association and says, 'you must let them feel the conSequencos of being drunken, or idle, or improvident, and then they will strive harder against it.' But this clearly applies only to some few among the poor, and even with reference to those few indicates only the beginning of the better things we hopo for. The fuller answer is, that for every man interests naturally arise which are capable of organising his life and developing his character, the interests of supplying his own wants—higher and lower—and those of his family ; and if these interests are taken out of his hands, without the introduction of others equally powerful, he is simply left to drift without the possibility of development. The only way of really helping a man is to strengthen him by education, timely assistanoe, opportunities, what you will, to meet his own difficulties and organise his own life ; and so also of any class in the community, only by their own activities can they develop progressive interests, and only by purposes and progressive interests can they organise their lives successfully." (p. 103.) The characteristic which distinguishes a progressive from a stationary or decadent career is the capacity • to aim at a remote rather than an immediate end, and, in the struggle- for its attainment, to prefer the means dictated by reason to those suggested by the mere instinct of the moment. This seems to us to be profoundly true, whether we are thinking of individuals or classes. It sums •-up for us the ultinta ratio of the standard of life. The industrial world may be regarded as a vast market in which the necessities of life have, over long periods, become cheaper, while the wages of labour have increased. The humanitarian conception of progress is comparatively modern, and this advance, such as it is, has been secured instinctively by nourishing " a blind life within the brain rather than by deliberate rational action." May we not hope that, with the definitely conceived object, and the fuller discussion of the methods by which ib is to be attained, progress may now become more rapid ? The habit of intro- spection, involved in the choice of a standard of life, is derived from faculties which are at the disposal of the •humblest. It enables each one of us to figure for himself a standard of life towards which conscious effort must be made. It is in the development of this personal responsibility that we must look for the attainment of socially competent character. In this conception, and in the expansion of it, we shall find, if any- where, the true apologia for the economic constitution of society as it might and will be :— " I am well aware," says Mrs. Bosanquet (p. 95), " that we hear a great deal about the overstrain of modern life, and wo are told sometimes that the great mass of tho people have no time to lead a higher life ; we are even threatened with an enormous increase of insanity, owing to the high pressure at which we live. My own impression is that, as I have been arguing, this high pressure is nearly all to the good, and infinitely more hopeful than any approach to stagnation."
" Intelligent competition," to borrow a phrase from Professor Walker's work on Wages, implies a reasoned determination on the part of the labourer to take advantage of the mobile and adaptable character of his particular commodity—namely, labour—and explains to him why labour is the exception to the general rule that advancing civilisation cheapens the material commodities of life. Competition, regarded from this point of view, as the great training-ground in which the animate units of our industrial system are led to seek the better, and avoid the worse, conditions of employment, is freed from the obloquy with which the Socialist seeks to cover it. The thought will to some extent reconcile us to the in- evitable.
The main object of Mrs. Bosanquet's teaching is to impress on us the fact that the principal obstacle to progress (in the humanitarian sense of the term) lies in the merely instinctive attitude towards life, the obstinately " hand-to-mouth " habit, which is characteristic of a proletariat population. Of such material no permanent social building can be made. Opinions naturally differ as to the best means of dispelling this quality of mind and replacing it by the higher intellectual armament which Mrs. Bosanquet describes. The array of books which to-day and from time to time we have to consider in these columns shows at least that the controversy is being fully debated. We have in this country the inestimable benefit of free discussion, and in the open court of public opinion the philosophic and sympathetic treatment of the problem by Mrs. Bosanquet has already happily acquired some of the authority to which it is entitled. Mrs. Bosanquet has the great advantage of knowing at close quarters the ambitions and difficulties of the poor, and this combination of philosophic insight and practical knowledge gives an exceptional value to her work.
There is a vein of Quixotism in the artist turned economist which gives a certain charm to Mr. Ashbee's reflections on Socialism and Politics : a Study in the Re-adjustment of the Values of Life. In learning to appreciate the true values of life the mere economist must sit at the feet of the saint, the scholar, and the artist. Nothing is more profoundly mortifying to the Liberal economist than to hear his authority invoked to sanction an absorbing pursuit of sordid objects. A just standard does not ignore the artistic values of life. Mr. Ashbee rightly enough feels that the objects for which men work and strive are often ignoble, but when he imputes such misappreciation specially to the competitive system we can think only of Don Quixote and the fulling mills. " There is no room," he says, "under the competitive system for the dreamer, however good his work may be. It is not that society does not want his work—society is only too glad to have it—but the present organisation does not admit of its being done " (p. 12). Is the artist always quite reasonable P He has the joy of his work, and "society is only too glad to have it." His reward is less than that of some who minister to more ignoble wants, but in dwelling so querulously on the material aspect of the question is he not descending to the level of those whom he criticises P If these complaints are deliberate, it is because the artistic view which neglects the prose of life has for him been pitched in too high a key. A true philosophy will honour those who seek to make life more spiritual, but society has its prosaic anatomy from which we cannot get away. Mr. Ashbee seems to realise that possibly the ignoble prose which he detests would cling also to our lives when readjusted by Socialism. " Determine your values first," he says (p. 22). By all means, we reply. It may then appear, as Mr. Ashbee himself seems to suspect, that the poet and the dreamer may have as high a value under our present system as they are likely to enjoy under Socialism.
Women's Work and Wages is a record of investigation and philanthropic effort, principally in the city of Birmingham. The refrain of the whole is a complaint from the humanitarian point of view against existing conditions. It is a tale of honest effort to raise the standard of life. There is much that is controversial in the treatment of the subject, but it is satis- factory to find that the authors quote with approval Mrs. Bosanquet's remark, " the way to restrict the numbers of the unskilled workers is to turn more of them into skilled workers,"—a very practical suggestion for raising the standard of life.
The volume on Immigration takes us to the other side of the Atlantic, and to the point of view of a prosperous society which thinks its standard of life may be lowered by the competition of immigrants from less favoured lands. " Foreign labor," it is asserted, " stands as a constant menace to the progress of the American laborer, and a check to his advancement. The moment foreign labor can do no harm to the native standard of living, it ceases to come ; while, the moment conditions here improve, immigration comes to share in and limit the improve- ment." This is the Trade-Unionist theory of monopoly trans- ferred to the area of the nation. The right to exclude exercised by the man in possession involves necessarily the depression of the standard of life for those excluded. The intelligent workman, it should, however, be remembered, has been recon- ciled to the introduction of machinery by the reflection that in the expansion of industry his services are more highly valued than before. We hesitate, therefore, before we accept as final this policy of exclusion. Without ignoring the diffi- culties, we venture, on behalf of those who seek to raise their standard of life, to urge the simplicity and equity of the rule of liberty, and to suggest that there may be compensations in the mutual support of new classes promoted to higher levels of industrial power and remuneration, and in the prospect of further advancement even for those whose lot is now favourable.
We wish that our space permitted a longer notice of the very interesting personality to whom the last volume on our list, Economical and Statistical Studies, 1840-1890, is a pious memorial. Some papers on statistical subjects have been recovered, and, with a most interesting memoir and introduction, serve to commemorate a useful and honourable career. Mr. Danson was a journalist, a successful promoter of insurance, and, what is rare in such a combination, a philosopher and an economist. His life and labours deserve commemoration. We specially recommend to notice his treat- ment of the subject of insurance, referred to both in the memoir and introduction. Insurance is a modern art of which the purpose is to provide for that irremovable margin of un- certainty which attaches to all human affairs. In connexion with our present subject it is an art which the civilised "standard of life" requires each of us to practise. As Pro- fessor Gonner points out, Mr. Danson was peculiarly well fitted to explain the function assumed by insurance in the development of economic society, a subject unduly neglected by most other economists.
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