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82 ECONOMIC INQUIRIES AND STUDIES
toil, not proportionately remunerated-for which, per-
haps, there can be no proportionate remuneration-
comes with the increase of productive capacity and
the greater call thus made on the nervous and mental
energy of the workman, what is the working man the
better off for all the civilization? Finally, as regards
the increased cost of living through a rise in the scale,
may it not be the case that such a rise in the scale of
living is to some extent what is meant by progress,
though the drawback of the slavery of the workers,
which some working men appear to feel so keenly, re-
mains? How far is the "slavery" itself avoidable, so
long as human nature is what it is, unless at the risk of
all civilization perishing? Such problems are obviously
of the deepest interest. The desire for leisure, for an
ease to a severe strain, in all these complaints, is itself
very striking, and may, perhaps, be held of itself to in-
dicate a change of working-class conditions, as com-
pared with a time when the masses simply endured,
or were content to drag on a dull existence, with little
colour in it, and without hope of change. The whole
subject, at any rate, should be well worth considering.
What are the facts, and what should be the conclusions
regarding them?

Dealing with the first head of complaint, which is
perhaps the simplest and most easily dealt with, we
must allow it to be obvious on the surface that there is
a real point for discussion. Under the essential con-
ditions of modern life, principally the concentration of
huge masses on narrow room, competition among la-
bourers undoubtedly produces monopoly rent, the pay-
ment of which is a simple deduction from the gross
money wages which workmen receive. If workmen, to
avoid paying more than they can help, live at a distance
from their work, they only escape the evil partially,
because charges for conveyance to and from their work
have to be paid. Clearly workmen under such con-
ditions, as compared with conditions under which no