WEALTH.*
" WHY should I write a preface ?" once asked a young author of an old hand. "To give the reviewer something to say," was the reply ; and the truth of the cynical remark is very often witnessed in buying a "review copy" a few days after publication, and finding that the only pages cut are the first., and, sometimes, the last. But the conscientious reviewer, as well as the other, has recourse to a preface because he knows that, if the author has anything he thinks particularly worth saying, he cannot help mentioning it in the part of the book he has written last. Turning to Professor Cannan's preface, we find him apologizing for the exclusion of special subjects like currency and taxation, and for "forgoing detail and picturesque illustration," by saying that it has allowed him to make room for some very fundamental matters which are often ignored in general treatises of moderate length, and among these he mentions the inferiority of women's earnings. Premising, then, that justice could not be done to a work which condenses a whole system of political economy into a volume of less than three hundred pages by giving a mere outline of its contents, we select what he says on this one subject.
The well-known fact is that women's earnings are consider- ably lower than those of men. This has been taken by many as proving that wages generally can be raised and main- tained above the minimum of subsistence only by corn. bination : women seldom do or can combine : therefore women's wages are an object-lesson in what would happen with men's wages if Trade Unionism were withdrawn. Pro- fessor Caiman's explanation, it will be seen, is very different. Is the inferiority of their wage, he asks, due to natural inferiority of productive powers ? We cannot say so, because, as it happens, men and women, on the whole, occupy different spheres of activity, and between these spheres nothing but the most vague comparison of their product is possible. "It is clearly no use," says Professor Canna% "to say that the woman earns less than her brother because she cannot heave as much coal ; we might just as well say that he should earn less than his sister because he cannot wash as much baby." The • Wealth a Brief Expianation of the Causes of Eamotai• W.V.,. BY 54.15 Carman, M.A., LL.D. London: P. E. King and Bon. [35.6d. net]
explanation of women's wages, then, must take account of this fact. Men and women workers occupy for the most part non- competing groups, within each of which wages are determined by quantity of product taken into consideration with the value of the unit of product ; in other words, women's wages are determined by supply and demand in women's trades. Thus, although women have and hold certain occupations in which they are naturally so much superior to men that the work done could not be done by men at all, or done only very badly, they are no more likely to have equal wages with men than would the inhabitants of two islands which bad no communi- cation with each other. If women were few, and these occupations many, wages would be high. As it is-
" The real reason why woolen's earnings are low in occupations in which the ultimate judge, the consumer, finds their output superior to men's, is to be found in the fact of the restricted area of employment offered by these occupations in comparison with the number of girls choosing them, which, of course, brings down the value of the output. The value of work being thus depressed in those occupations, not only are men driven out or kept out of them, but many girls find they can do as well for themselves by going into occupations in which men are superior, although they have to take earnings inferior to those of the men."
This, then, raises the question why the area in which women are superior is so restricted. One reason is that some quite suitable occupations are forbidden them, railway clerical work in this country being a very obvious and important example. Another is the inertia of employers, and their natural dread that the men hitherto employed would make trouble. A third is the claim made, sometimes by women themselves, sometimes by interested men competitors, for equal wages, for not only does this challenge the demand that they should prove them- selves equal at the entrance, but " the most powerful lever for increasing the opportunities of women is taken away if they are not to do the work cheaper." In any case, enlargement of the field of women's employment is probably the most important of the means by which women's earnings could be raised in comparison with men's.
But, besides this, Professor Cannan makes two valuable sug- gestions towards the same end. One is a modification of public opinion where the services rendered by the two sexes are com- paratively equal, and only tradition, or prejudice, or " style " stands in the way, such, for instance, as would give the preference to women waitresses, or insist on the exclusive employment of women servants in a household. After all, demand is the taproot of value, and demand is modifiable by all manner of social and moral motives. Self-interest, indeed, counsels shutting one's eyes and buying what is offered ; but there is every reason to think that, if people were instructed as to the effect of their demand, they would become conscientious in their expenditure. Very often, it is true, it may be impossible for the consumer to see the effect on the workers of his demand for commodities which he finds in the shop, but in the ease of direct service there seems no such difficulty. Professor Cannan's other proposal is oven more important, inasmuch as it would mean an increase in the national wealth without increasing the participants; it is increasing women's capacity. "Girls, as a rule, do not have so much spent upon them as boys. If they were better fed and trained, their output would be bigger than it now is in occupations in which they compete with men ; their average earnings in such occupations would rise more nearly to those of men ; and their improved prospects here would relieve the pressure on the special fields in which women only are em- ployed because they are superior to men."
Ex wee dime emcee. Professor Cannau packs his arguments so closely that it is difficult to condense even a single subject which he touches, and this must suffice. In the present reviewer's opinion, no such notable recasting of the principles of economies has appeared for many a day, whether as regards originality, clear-sighted common-sense, or trenchancy of statement.
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