Thus the employment of Chinamen upon railroad embankments made places for native laborers as section bosses and engineers. The Huns and Italians that underbid the Irish miners in Pennsylvania have destroyed the “Molly McGuires” by making the same men responsible for larger enterprises. Yet the standards of living, which show a constant improvement, indicate a truer freedom of competition and a clearer recognition of individual wants and abilities. No one can watch the development of any country without realizing that its thrift, enterprise and progressive welfare depend largely upon increasing wants. Men who live best produce most and enjoy most. Chapter XVIII. Wages And Profits. _Wages distinguished from profits._—In discussing the subject of wages and profits, it is necessary to remember that both are compensation in different ways for actual exertion. If in estimating profits we sometimes include a return for the use of capital, it is from incomplete analysis of the forces in use, since the interest upon capital can easily be separated in all actual practice, and in most enterprises is counted as a distinct expense to be provided for in entering upon the undertaking. The profits really belong to the management of any undertaking, as return for the exertion in that management. In every-day use the term wages is applied only to the stipulated amount paid from time to time for services rendered to another. There is practically no difference between such payments made for service by the hour, day, week, month or year. If, however, the engagement for service is by the year, the name salary is more likely to be given than wages. Further, the term wages is most distinctly applied when the service is rendered as a task, and wage-earners when found in considerable bodies are usually called operatives, under the natural classification of labor explained and illustrated in Chapter III (page 35). The services of an overseer are much more likely to be permanently required, and his wages are therefore called a salary, estimated by the year even though payments be made monthly or even weekly. In this case, the labor is chiefly executive, taking a higher rank because of the greater powers required. In this case the overseer is supposed to have definite plans provided for his work, and to carry out those plans to the best of his ability.