What this does prove is, of course, that it was the reduction of wages, among other things, that made the reduction of prices possible. But what it was proposed to prove was the converse proposition, that the low prices made the low wages! To put it, then, in the plausible way, that the reduced prices "do not allow" of higher wages, is simply a very pretty specimen of the argument known to the vulgar as "putting the cart before the horse." What, however, we may very well learn from the wide acceptance of this view is that it is a very difficult thing to raise wages once they are down; and it may suggest that employers have some responsibility in reducing, and the public some responsibility in giving excuse for them being reduced. Thus we seem to be still without an adequate answer to the question: Why is a woman's wage less than that of a man? But the last answer, unsatisfactory as it is in itself, seems to me to have a value in something further that it suggests. It seems to draw attention to a notable fact, and to point the way to a new formulation of the whole question. The fact is this, that women are in almost exclusive possession of certain branches of trade, and that, in these branches, the commodities made are recognised by public opinion as being "cheap." The observation of most of us must confirm Mr. Webb's conclusion, that there are certain trades where men do not compete with women; indeed, that there is a well marked relegation of women-workers towards certain ill-paid trades; while, at the same time, there is as well marked a movement of men towards the better-paid trades. If this is so, the difference of wages between men and women takes a new and definite aspect. It is not a difference of wage between workers of various degrees of efficiency. It is very much a question of difference of wage between two non-competing groups, and of groups where the levels of wage are determined by a different law. The question is not: Why are men and women employed in equal work at unequal wages? but, Why are men and women employed in different groups of employment? and, comparing these two groups, Why is the wage level of skilled female labour lower even than that of unskilled male labour?