Britain for the British. Robert Blatchford

wealth.

      Land is not wealth. To produce wealth you must have land and human beings.

      There can be no wealth without labour.

      And now we come to the first error of the economists. There are some economists who tell us that wealth is not produced by labour, but by "capital."

      There is neither truth nor reason in this assertion.

      What is "capital"?

      "Capital" is only another word for stores. Adam Smith calls capital "stock." Capital is any tools, machinery, or other stores used in producing wealth. Capital is any food, fuel, shelter, clothing supplied to those engaged in producing wealth.

      The hunter, before he can shoot game, needs weapons. His weapons are "capital." The farmer has to wait for his wheat and potatoes to ripen before he can use them as food. The stock of food and the tools he uses to produce the wheat or potatoes, and to live on while they ripen, are "capital."

      Robinson Crusoe's capital was the arms, food, and tools he saved from the wreck. On these he lived until he had planted corn, and tamed goats and built a hut, and made skin clothing and vessels of wood and clay.

      Capital, then, is stores. Now, where do the stores come from? Stores are wealth. Stores, whether they be food or tools, come from the land, and are made or produced by human labour.

      There is not an atom of capital in the world that has not been produced by labour.

      Every spade, every plough, every hammer, every loom, every cart, barrow, loaf, bottle, ham, haddock, pot of tea, barrel of ale, pair of boots, gold or silver coin, railway sleeper or rail, boat, road, canal, every kind of tools and stores has been produced by labour from the land.

      It is evident, then, that if there were no labour there would be no capital. Labour is before capital, for labour makes capital.

      Now, what folly it is to say that capital produces wealth. Capital is used by labour in the production of wealth, but capital itself is incapable of motion and can produce nothing.

      A spade is "capital." Is it true, then, to say that it is not the navvy but the spade that makes the trench?

      A plough is capital. Is it true to say that not the ploughman but the plough makes the furrow?

      A loom is capital. Is it true to say that the loom makes the cloth? It is the weaver who weaves the cloth. He uses the loom, and the loom was made by the miner, the smith, the joiner, and the engineer.

      There are wood and iron and brass in the loom. But you would not say that the cloth was produced by the iron-mine and the forest! It is produced by miners, engineers, sheep farmers, wool-combers, sailors, spinners, weavers, and other workers. It is produced entirely by labour, and could not be produced in any other way.

      How can capital produce wealth? Take a steam plough, a patent harrow, a sack of wheat, a bankbook, a dozen horses, enough food and clothing to last a hundred men a year; put all that capital down in a forty-acre field, and it will not produce a single ear of corn in fifty years unless you send a man to labour.

      But give a boy a forked stick, a rood of soil, and a bag of seed, and he will raise a crop for you.