_Labor a Wealth Creator._--Labor is a wealth-creating effort, and there is no labor that is successful in attaining its purpose that does not help to bring into a serviceable condition something that can be identified as an economic good or a form of wealth. Some effort, indeed, fails in what it attempts to do and therefore produces nothing. We may build a machine that will not work, or make a product that no one wants; but labor that attains a rational purpose is always economically productive. _Protective Labor and the Attribute it imparts to Useful Matter._--Labor may be classed according to the particular result that it accomplishes. In saying that the banana grove in our illustration is wealth to the savage who resides in it, we had to insert the proviso that he is able to keep other persons out of it. Exclusive possession or ownership is necessary in order that things may continue to be effectively useful to any particular person or persons. If they are superabundant, as we have seen, no part of the supply is important; but it is also true that if they are scarce and a man is not able to keep any of them, they will not serve him. In order that an economic good may be effective, it must be appropriable, and where claimants are numerous and lawless it may take much of the owner's time and effort to keep the article in his possession. The savage must personally protect his goods, and to some extent the civilized man must do so; for however well policed a city may be, it will not do to leave purses or portable goods by the wayside. Protective labor is necessary in all stages of social advancement. In civilized life, indeed, we delegate much of it to a special class of persons,--policemen, judges, lawyers, and legislators,--and this is the most fundamental division of labor that civilization entails; but the work has to be done in any stage of social evolution. Crusoe's goods would have been worth nothing to him if he could not have kept them from the savages who, in time, appeared on his island; and they would have been worth little if he had been forced to spend most of his time in guarding them. Appropriability is, therefore, a further essential attribute of the things which can make particular men richer by reason of their presence. When such things are actually brought into ownership, their utilities become available, as they would not otherwise be. Effort expended in protecting property is wealth-creating, since it causes those service-rendering powers which otherwise would be only potential in goods to become active. In other words, it gives to things which are otherwise in a condition to be effectively useful a further quality which they require in order that they may actually promote an owner's well-being.