incapacitated through any kind of vice or bad habit may occasionally destroy himself, but he usually destroys a number of others in the process. The motorman, the train dispatcher, the surgeon, the drug clerk, and a multitude of others who are in responsible positions imperil others quite as much as themselves if they ever become irresponsible and undependable through drunkenness or any other vice.

Any vice which acts so swiftly and so injuriously must seriously endanger the rest of society and must obviously call for public regulation. This applies not simply to the extremely injurious forms of consumption known as vice, but to any kind of injurious or irrational consumption, such as luxury. In a time of national crisis, when every ounce of productive energy is needed to meet the situation, he who consumes luxuriously is causing the waste of productive energy and is thus interfering with the success of the nation. In time of war, when armies and navies must be raised, ships and munitions manufactured on a vast scale, and food and clothing produced more abundantly than ever, the question is always one of economizing productive power. To use up any of this productive power needlessly in the production of luxuries is to take it out of the nation's industries and even to threaten national disaster. In such times the injury which follows from luxurious consumption is so desperate as to justify public regulation. Even though some injurious results may follow from this regulation, these can scarcely be any greater than those which follow the unregulated consumption of luxuries.

In normal times the danger from luxurious consumption is not so acute, and the need for regulation is therefore not so great. In this case we may have to consider whether luxurious consumption is more injurious than the efforts to regulate it. This consideration, however, applies to all other forms of regulation and control. There is involved here a question of balance of profit and loss. It is highly important that on all questions of regulation we balance the accounts carefully.

There is some cost in the mere extension of government control and multiplication of government offices. This diverts men from productive industry into government jobs. Unless they can save more to the country through their efforts as government officials than they could produce if they were left in productive industry, the loss is greater than the profit. Again, if through too much regulation legitimate industries are discouraged to a degree that more than offsets any saving which comes from regulation, there is always a net loss. In the case of mild luxuries which work no very serious injury to anybody, the general rule has been not to waste any energy by multiplying government offices in order to suppress them. But in times of national crisis the policy with respect even to mild luxuries may have to be changed. In normal times as well as in times of crisis the injury from certain extreme forms of luxury may be so great as to justify permanent control, regulation, or suppression.

Luxurious consumption does not increase the demand for labor. There can be no doubt, however, that luxurious consumption is in itself an injury to the public, and particularly to the laboring classes, however inexpedient it might be for the government to use its power of compulsion to prohibit . luxury. There is an ancient and nauseous fallacy to the effect that the extravagance of the rich gives employment to the poor. Nothing could be any farther from the truth. The extravagance of the rich gives much less employment to the poor than the accumulation and investment by the rich in various kinds of productive industry. The individual who buys extravagantly does of course set labor to work producing the objects of extravagance, but the individual who invests largely also sets labor to work producing the buildings, tools, etc. in which he invests. In addition to this he adds definitely to the productive power of the community. Furthermore, labor must be hired to make use of the buildings and the tools, and there is a larger social product out of which to pay their wages.

Comparatively speaking, therefore, the extravagance of the rich takes away from the employment of the poor. From that point of view extravagant consumption is a social injury.

Leisure versus luxury. If, as suggested above, there were no ulterior results from the suppression of extravagance, the state would be fully justified in suppressing it; but if the suppression of extravagance merely produced leisure and idleness, instead of extravagance, more harm than good would be done. We must conclude, therefore, that where a form of consumption has become so definitely vicious and injurious to the rest of society as to produce more harm than would probably be produced by compulsory suppression, then suppression must be justified. But where, even though it be harmful, it is not more harmful than other results which would probably follow from its suppression, then suppression is not justifiable. It must be remembered, however, that laws suppressing vice are in a sense sumptuary laws. The only difference between these and other sumptuary laws lies in the fact that the forms of consumption which they attempt to regulate or suppress meet with such general disapproval as to make their suppression popular, whereas in other cases the forms of consumption are not universally condemned and therefore their suppression is not generally approved.

Rationing the people. That school of social philosophers who hold that all forms of competition are inherently evil, and that therefore government compulsion and regimentation should be made use of to stop competition, would, if they were consistent, desire to begin with sumptuary regulations. As stated in a previous chapter, there are three main forms of economic competition, competitive production, competitive bargaining, and competitive consumption, and of these three competitive consumption is infinitely worse than either of the others. By an authoritative standardization of wearing apparel, food, and other forms of consumption we should tend to eliminate this worst form of competition. That would involve,

of course, the organization of society on a semimilitary basis, though the object need not be military conflict. It would mean the prescribing of a satisfactory uniform for all members of the community, and also of a uniform diet or ration. Houses, furniture, and other consumable goods would also have to be standardized and prescribed by government regulations.

There is no doubt whatever that if the people would accept this kind of regimentation and work cheerfully under it, we should prevent the waste of a vast amount of energy and avoid many petty jealousies and heartburnings. Academic costume, whatever may be said against it on other grounds, has the advantage of saving academicians a great deal of perplexity over the question, "Wherewithal shall we be clothed?" The costumes and vestments of certain religious orders answer the same purpose. There are also many religious sects, of which the Quakers of the old school were a good illustration, which succeeded in saving their people from that destructive form of competition which strives, first, to outshine one's neighbors in matters of dress and, second, not to be outshone by one's neighbors.

In a time of great national crisis we have many illustrations of what people may accomplish in the way of economy and effort by putting the whole nation on a fixed ration and also by prescribing the manner of dress of each class of the nation. If the people would submit cheerfully to similar regulations in time of peace, all the vast energy which in time of war is devoted to the work of destruction could then be turned to the work of production, and industrial progress could proceed at a stupendous rate. It is not impossible that at some time in the future there may be a real effort on the part of certain ambitious nations to economize their energy in this way in order that they may increase their strength rapidly in preparation for Armageddon.

CHAPTER XLII

THE BATTLE OF THE STANDARDS

Competitive and cheap standards of living. It has generally been taken for granted that the cheap standard of living would drive out a dear standard. It is asserted that people who are willing to live and multiply on a very small income will always tend to displace those who are unwilling to live and multiply except on a liberal income. If sheep and cattle are allowed to multiply and wander at will over the western ranges, it is plain that the sheep will drive out the cattle, not because they are superior in value or in fighting power, but merely because they are able to nibble closer to the ground and to live where cattle would starve. A similar law appears to operate throughout the human as well as the animal world. Those who can live on the least seem at times to be able to drive out all others by eating them out of house and home.

It must be confessed that there are some facts which seem to support this conclusion. The American laborers on the Pacific coast find it very difficult to compete, at least in the unskilled trades, with the Chinese and the Japanese. On the Atlantic seaboard employers of labor have been able to tap various reservoirs of cheap labor, first in northwestern Europe, later in southern and eastern Europe. These laborers, having been accustomed to very small incomes, are able and willing to work and multiply on incomes so small as to drive out, at once or ultimately, either the American laborers or the immigrant laborers of a previous immigration. The later immigrants drive the earlier immigrants out directly by accepting lower wages than the earlier immigrants are willing to accept ; they drive them out indirectly by multiplying rapidly and thus