Of course, the wage-fund hypothesis which underlies the foregoing discussion is not realised in actual life, any more than was the "wage fund" of the classical economists. Better than any other device, however, it enables us to describe and visualise the comparative claims of different groups of labourers who have a right to unequal amounts in excess of living wages. _Wages Versus Profits_ Let us suppose that the wage fund is properly apportioned among the different classes of labourers, according to the specified canons of distribution. May not one or all of the labour groups demand an increase in wages on the ground that the employer is retaining for himself an undue share of the product? As we have seen in the last chapter, the right of the labourers to living wages is superior to the right of the employer or business man to anything in excess of that amount of profits which will insure him against risks, and afford him a decent livelihood in reasonable conformity with his accustomed plane of expenditure. It is also evident that those labourers who undergo more than average sacrifices have a claim to extra compensation which is quite as valid as the similarly based claim of the employer to more than living profits. In case the business does not provide a sufficient amount to remunerate both classes of sacrifices, the employer may prefer his own to those of his employés, on the same principle that he may prefer his own claim to a decent livelihood. The law of charity permits a man to satisfy himself rather than his neighbour, when the needs in question are of the same degree of urgency or importance. As to those labourers who turn out larger products than the average, or whose ability is unusually scarce, there is no practical difficulty; for the employer will find it profitable to give them the corresponding extra compensation. The precise question before us, then, is the claims of the labourers upon profits for remuneration above universal living wages and above the extra compensation due on account of unusual efforts, sacrifices, productivity, and scarcity. Let us call the wage that merely includes all these factors "the equitable minimum."