In the political applications of economic science we have to deal with the effect of human society upon economic law. For instance: economic law tells us that, given a certain standard of living for labour--the “worth while” of labour--and a certain minimum profit without which capital will not accumulate--the “worth while” of capital--there is, as we have seen, a lowest limit of production; a set of conditions below which production will not take place. Land which is below a certain standard of fertility will not be farmed; a vein of metal below a certain standard of yield will not be mined under such and such social conditions. But all circumstances in which production has greater advantages than this lowest limit produce a surplus value called “Rent.” That is an economic law, and it is always true. But it does not follow that the owner of the land, for instance, will get the full economic rent of the land. There may be customs in society, or laws, by which he is compelled to share with the tenant. The theoretical economic rent is there all right, but one cannot deduce from this truth that the landlord will necessarily and always get the whole of it. And so it is with every other political application. * * * * * Having said so much by way of Preface, let us turn to the particular problems, and first of all consider the idea which underlies all practical economic conclusions, the idea of =Property=. The very first governing condition of economic production and distribution in the real world is the condition of _control_. Who _controls_ the process of production in any particular Society? Who in it owns (that is, has the right and power to use or leave idle, to distribute or withhold) the means of production, the stores of food and clothing, and houses and machinery? On the answer to that question depends the economic structure of a society. This control is called _Property_, and as the first thing we have to study in practical Economics is the character of _Property_, we will make that the first division of our political applications. PROPERTY THE CONTROL OF WEALTH All the political application of Economics--that is, all the application of Economic Science to the conduct of families in the State--turns on The Control of Wealth, and of the things necessary to make wealth.