It is true that the enactment of the principles suggested up to this point would mean the imposition of certain genuine restrictions upon the actions of those who direct industry, as for example, in connection with the living wage program. It would give all wage earners the benefits of organization. It would make for rapid and certain compensation for price movements. It would prevent wage reductions merely because of the poverty of any group. Nevertheless, if the analysis of distribution made earlier in the book is substantially correct, the answer to the question at the head of this section must be that there would be no very compelling tendency for distribution to result justly, under the enforcement of the wage principles so far proposed. The distributive result would still depend largely upon the reality and intensity of industrial competition, upon the strength, activity, and foresightedness of the wage earners' organizations, upon the will and spirit of the directors of industry, and upon the quality and liveness of public opinion. That admission can be made, even though it is believed that under the suggested principles the outcome of distribution would be nearer the desired outcome than it is at present; and that there would be a clearer perception of the public interest in the outcome of distribution than at present. 4.--If a measure could be devised which would help to bring about the desired distributive outcome, without greatly weakening in some other direction the policy as already conceived, such a measure would be a most worth-while addition to the policy. It is possible to discern clearly what the scope and form of such a measure must be. Firstly: Such a measure should not single out the profits of particular enterprises for division or transfer to the wage earners, if the profits of these particular enterprises are in excess of what is conceived to be a just profit level for industry as a whole. For, in the first place, if the principle of standardization is enforced throughout industry, the excess profits of particular enterprises may frequently be the result of superior business ability, and to take them away would be to discourage the development and use of that ability. And, in the second place, even if it is acknowledged that this is not the true explanation of the great profits of very many enterprises, but that these are accounted for rather by the possession of special privileges or the weakness of competition, nevertheless, to adopt a policy under which these profits are transferred to the wage earners would lead to wastefulness and extravagance in business operation. And lastly, there is the fact that to make wages in any enterprise contingent upon the profit returns of that enterprise is contrary to the ordinary trade union policy.