“Capital never does earn anything,” responded Mr. Midith. “Labor earns all. This idea of yours that capital earns something is an illusion. We have seen that all material wealth which immediately satisfies man’s wants, consists of food, clothing, shelter and luxuries, and that all these can be actually produced only by productive labor. The physical molecules, as such, composing a plow are not wealth, but the plow is wealth no farther than it required productive labor in its production. For all we know, there is an inexhaustible amount of iron and steel waiting for us to be mined, and an inexhaustible opportunity for raising the wood necessary in the manufacture of plows. The tools with which the plow is made were also all produced by labor. In a just, economic system every laborer, whether man, woman, or child, should receive exactly all he earns, no more and no less; and, if they do that, there will be nothing left for capital, for all wealth must be produced by labor. “Let us take an example to illustrate this. We will say that our community owns a machine for boring artesian wells, a machine which is not owned by _every_ community. Now, we first do our own work with it; then some other community desires us to sink a well for them. Our community sends a gang of men with the machine to sink the well for so much per foot. We have expended so much labor in the production of the machine; it requires so many men to operate it; it wears so long, and, the average work will be so much. According to these factors, which have been ascertained by long experience, we make our charge per foot, so that every person who labored in the production of the machine, as well as those who operate it during the whole existence of the machine, just receive their day’s wages and no more. Free competition determines this price per foot. We have no profit. You see if our community is not well adapted for boring wells, it will not engage in it; and, if it should do so, it will soon be crowded out by those communities who are better adapted for it. All the communities are free competitors in all fields of industry. This free, non-monopolistic competition has slowly eliminated all _profit_. Every community has an immense amount of capital in its ‘big-houses,’ warehouses, and depots; but this capital earns nothing; no interest and no profit; it is even slowly decaying--a loss which must be repaired by the labor of the members of the community. For this reason all communities are eager to sell their negotiable commodities, so as to hold the money of other communities, instead of holding their own commodities. From what I have already said, it is scarcely necessary to say here that money is not capital, but that it is only a representative of capital. We are not working for money but for the material wealth, food, clothing, shelter, and luxuries which the money represents. In this manner, I think, you can