5. _Typical economic profits are thus a species of wages but are marked by peculiar features._ In some of the older treatises on political economy, profits are treated merely as a combination of "wages of management," and of interest on capital invested. A man hired at a fixed sum to manage a business is receiving simply contract wages. Economic profits are not _contract_ wages, not being paid by agreement, but being yielded impersonally by the industry. Profits are, however, _economic_ wages or the earnings of services. As business has developed, it has been seen that the enterpriser's work has its peculiar character and deserves special attention. The old English word "enterpriser," used of the "adventurer" who embarked in foreign trade, may fittingly apply to the organizer and director of business to-day. Foreign trade then, more often than now, was most uncertain, and there were many chances that the ship would be lost, or the venture prove a losing one. In the simplest business to-day there is this element of enterprise, or undertaking, combined with ordinary capital and labor. As industry develops, this special service stands out more clearly. In the corner-grocer and in the manager of the little news-stand, the elements of enterprise and labor are not apart. In the large wholesale house, the enterpriser is seen to be not merely an abstractly thinkable function, but a separate and concrete person. The typical enterpriser is the man who gives his time and energies to the launching and guiding of business. § II. THE TYPICAL ENTERPRISER'S SERVICES REVIEWED [Sidenote: The enterpriser's skilful use of capital]