Amateur reformers who believe that the world can be made good by individual effort. Ordering the servants to dine with you. Inequality is not the fault of the rich. Poverty is not the fault of the poor. Socialism has nothing to do with almsgiving or personal generosity or kindness to the poor. Socialism abhors poverty and the poor, and has no more to do with relieving them than with relieving riches and the rich: it means to abolish both ruthlessly. Questionableness of the virtues that feed on suffering. Doles and almsgiving are necessary at present as an insurance against rebellion; but they are dangerous social evils. _Panem et circenses._ Government cannot suppress this abuse until it possesses the powers of employment now in private hands. It must become the national landlord, employer, and financier. It is not enough to know the object of Socialism and to be convinced of its possibility. Commandments are no use without laws; and Socialism is from beginning to end a matter of law and not of personal righteousness. 95 28 CAPITALISM Capitalism might more properly be called Proletarianism. Its abolition does not involve the destruction of capital. The social theory of Capitalism. The Manchester School. Property, private or real, and personal. Powers of landlords. Distinction between private property and personal possession. Private property an integral part of Capitalism. Incompatible with Socialism. Conservative and Labor parties are at bottom parties for the maintenance and abolition respectively of private property. Literary property. 100 29 YOUR SHOPPING Incidence of unequal distribution in the shop. Nothing obtainable at cost price: every price is loaded with a tribute to private property. Averaging the cost of production of the entire national supply gives the real cost price. This is the price aimed at by Socialism. Under Capitalism the cost of production of that part of the supply which is produced under the most unfavorable circumstances fixes the price of the entire supply. The coal supply. By nationalizing the coal industry the public can be supplied at the averaged cost price per ton. Examples from our numerous existing nationalizations. 105 30 YOUR TAXES Grumbling about the taxes. Government gives value at the cost price to itself; but this includes loaded prices paid by it to profiteers and landlords for materials, services, and sites. Taxation of unearned income as a method of avoiding these overcharges and even of providing the service at the cost of the landlords and capitalists. Income tax, supertax, and death duties. The National Debt. Taxation as a means of redistributing income. The War Loan. The failure of private enterprise and the success of National Factories during the war. 111 31 YOUR RATES