Then, too, if wages were to be adjusted with reference to the profits return in particular industries, the method that has been advocated of settling upon a criterion of just profits would not be suitable. A separate mark of fair profits would have to be set up for each industry; for different industries involve different degrees of risk and have different initial periods of little or no profits. What might correctly be considered an excessive profit for one industry might be but a fair profit for another. The task of setting up different criteria for the different industries would be extremely delicate, if it were possible at all. The same conclusion holds true in the opposite case wherein the profits in most all or all of the enterprises engaged in a particular industry are considerably below what is conceived as a fair profits return for industry as a whole. Cases will arise in which it may be to the interest of the wage earners in particular industries to accept wage reductions, because the industry is doing poorly. In such cases, however, the wage earners may be expected to agree--perhaps, only after a while--to wage reduction, in the course of wage bargaining. If, however, the wage earners will not agree that their interests are served by reduction, it will probably be sound policy to back them up. It must be admitted that this conclusion as to the inadvisability of adjusting wages by reference to the profits return of particular industries is not set down without hesitation. It is plain that if that idea is to be rejected, the policy of wage settlement as a whole must give some other guarantee of distributive justice to the wage earners. And, indeed, if after a certain period of operation and education it was found that very large profits were accruing steadily in certain industries, and if it did not seem likely that these profits would be reduced to what is conceived to be a fair level either by the forces of competition or public opinion, it might be found wiser to pursue the opposite course--that is, grant wage increases in those industries even at the risk of breaking down the scheme of wage relationship. Much will depend upon the way in which the employers respond to the purposes embodied in the policy of wage settlement. And upon the success of the wage earners and employers in reaching, by collective bargaining, agreements satisfactory to both.