It thus appears that as far as concerns the motives to exertion in the
general body, Communism has no advantage which may not be reached
under private property, while as respects the managing heads it is at
a considerable disadvantage. It has also some disadvantages which seem
to be inherent in it, through the necessity under which it lies of
deciding in a more or less arbitrary manner questions which, on the
present system, decide themselves, often badly enough but
spontaneously.
It is a simple rule, and under certain aspects a just one, to give
equal payment to all who share in the work. But this is a very
imperfect justice unless the work also is apportioned equally. Now the
many different kinds of work required in every society are very
unequal in hardness and unpleasantness. To measure these against one
another, so as to make quality equivalent to quantity, is so difficult
that Communists generally propose that all should work by turns at
every kind of labor. But this involves an almost complete sacrifice of
the economic advantages of the division of employments, advantages
which are indeed frequently over-estimated (or rather the counter
considerations are under-estimated) by political economists, but which
are nevertheless, in the point of view of the productiveness of labor,
very considerable, for the double reason that the co-operation of
employment enables the work to distribute itself with some regard to
the special capacities and qualifications of the worker, and also that
every worker acquires greater skill and rapidity in one kind of work
by confining himself to it. The arrangement, therefore, which is
deemed indispensable to a just distribution would probably be a very
considerable disadvantage in respect of production. But further, it is
still a very imperfect standard of justice to demand the same amount
of work from every one. People have unequal capacities of work, both
mental and bodily, and what is a light task for one is an
insupportable burthen to another. It is necessary, therefore, that
there should be a dispensing power, an authority competent to grant
exemptions from the ordinary amount of work, and to proportion tasks
in some measure to capabilities. As long as there are any lazy or
selfish persons who like better to be worked for by others than to
work, there will be frequent attempts to obtain exemptions by favor or
fraud, and the frustration of these attempts will be an affair of
considerable difficulty, and will by no means be always successful.
These inconveniences would be little felt, for some time at least, in
communities composed of select persons, earnestly desirous of the
success of the experiment; but plans for the regeneration of society
must consider average human beings, and not only them but the large
residuum of persons greatly below the average in the personal and
social virtues. The squabbles and ill-blood which could not fail to be