4. Total income 12,077,009,284 100.00 Those persons who have incomes of $2,000 or more receive 30 cents on the dollar in the form of wages and salaries; 33 cents in the form of business profits, and 37 cents in the form of incomes from the ownership of property. The dividend payments alone--to this group of property owners, are equal to three quarters of the total returns for personal service. These figures refer, of course, to all those in receipt of $2,000 or more per year. Obviously, the smaller incomes are in the form of wages, salaries, and business profits, while the larger incomes take the form of rent, interest and dividends. This is made apparent by a study of the detailed tables published in connection with the "Income Statistics for 1916." Among those of small incomes--$5,000 to $10,000--nearly half of the income was derived from personal services. The proportion of the income resulting from personal service diminished steadily as the incomes rose until, in the highest income group--those receiving $2,000,000 or more per year, less than one-half of one per cent. was the result of personal service while more than 99 per cent. of the incomes came from property ownership. A small portion of the American people are in receipt of incomes that necessitate a report to the revenue officers. Among those persons, a small number are in receipt of incomes that might be termed large--incomes of $10,000 or over, for example. Among these persons with large incomes the majority of the income is secured in the form of rent, interest, dividends and profits. The higher the income group, the larger is the percentage of the income that comes from property holdings. The economic system that exists at the present time in the United States places a premium on property ownership. The recipients of the large incomes are the holders of the large amounts of property. Large incomes are property incomes. The rich are rich because they are property owners. Furthermore, the organization of present-day business makes the owner of property more secure--far more secure in his income, than is the worker who produces the wealth out of which the property income is paid. 5. _Plutocracy_ The owning class in the United States is established on an economic basis,--the private ownership of the earth. No more solid foundation for class integrity and class power has ever been discovered. The owners of the United States are powerfully entrenched. Operating through the corporation, its members have secured possession of the bulk of the more useful resources, the important franchises and the productive capital. Where they do not own outright, they control. The earth, in America, is the landlords and the fullness thereof. They own the productive machinery, and because they own they are able to secure a vast annual income in return for their bare ownership.