GOVERNMENT FUNCTIONARIES.

77

contribution is entirely optional. Its practice would, of course, subserve the interests of wealthcreation, but there is no obligation on any one either to act upon it or to abstain from it.

CHAPTER VII.

Government Functionaries-The Professional Classes-The Unemployed Poor.

2. Those who govern, and the functionaries whom they employ.-It is this class which furnishes by far the most numerous contingent of unproductive consumers, and in which the largest reforms are both necessary and possible. Let us at once start with the following proposition, viz. :-That all those persons whose services are requisite for the due performance of those functions—legislative or executive, civil or military-through which the government of a community discharges the complex duty assigned to it of protecting the person and property of its members, are indispensable to the well-being of society, and cannot be spared from the important work to which they are appointed. It is only to those whose services are not requisite for the performance of such functions rightly understood, and who nevertheless are retained and paid by the state, that the designation of "unproductive consumers" is applicable.

Of these, some have no doubt been appointed to their useless tasks by patronage or routine, but

by far the greatest number consists of those whose barren labours are put in requisition by bad laws, mistaken policy, vicious institutions, or the passions and caprices of irresponsible rulers. It is not with the persons so employed that the blame lies. Their duty is to do the work entrusted to them, and the faithful performance of that duty generally forms a fair equivalent for what they receive from the community. It is the system that is responsible for the waste, and it is the rulers and statesmen who are responsible for the system. Let us examine the main features of the system.

In all existing civilised states the money collected by the government, as revenue from all sources, is expended in various proportions, on the following departments, viz. :

General expenses of Civil Government, collection of revenue, public works, salaries, pensions, &c. Administration of Law and Justice.

Subventions for Education, Science, and Art.
Interest on (and repayment of?) National

Debt.

Army and Navy.

Whatever portion of the expenditure under these heads is in excess of what is needful is clearly an unnecessary and injurious drain on the resources of the country, and a direct impediment to wealthcreation. The persons who would otherwise be effective agents of production are wasting their energies and their time on inutilities or worse, and have meanwhile to be supported out of the earnings of the producing classes. It is, of course, in those departments which absorb the largest share of the

CLASSIFICATION OF GOVERNMENT EXPENSES. 79

national expenditure that the waste (supposing it to exist) would be the greatest, and the retrenchment (supposing it possible) would be the most efficient. It will be very useful, therefore, to ascertain which are the departments which are most costly, and to which the tax-payer most profusely contributes.

No doubt the proportions differ in different countries, especially if the United States of America be included among them. The geographical position, the form of government, and the habits and traditions of that republic constitute it a somewhat exceptional case. But if we take European states only, the comparative amounts paid under each head by the British Government during the year 1880 may afford us some clew to the proportions respectively absorbed in other countries by the various departments in question. The total expenditure of the British Government in 1880 was £84,439,000, which was apportioned as follows :—

To the general expenses of

the Civil Government

...

To the administration of Law

and Justice

£14,637,000

To Educational purposes

To the interest, &c., of the

National Debt

...

To the Army and Navy

3,995,000

28,763,000

Here then we have in round figures, out of our annual expenditure of 84 millions, no less than 59 millions consumed in expenses connected with war,

viz., 29 millions to pay interest, &c., on the national debt contracted by our forefathers to carry on the wars of their time, and 30 millions to meet the expenses of military and naval establishments during a period of peace. The possible distention of these sums in case of a serious war may be more easily imagined than calculated.

In contrast to these gigantic amounts, we find that all the other departments of government combined, although profusely paid, cost 25 millions

-a sum which, in comparison, seems a fleabite." Roughly speaking, we may say that of England's annual expenditure more than one-third is spent in paying the penalty of former wars, more than onethird is spent in keeping up warlike establishments during peace, and less than one-third is spent on all the combined functions of government in every other department. Not that we are worse off in this respect than most other European states, for some have indeed a more grievous military burden to bear than we have. However, as we shall in a subsequent chapter devote some attention and some space to a consideration of the pernicious influence of war and international rivalries on the creation of wealth, we shall here abstain from further comments on this branch of the subject.

Reserving, therefore, war and its organs, the army and navy, for future discussion, let us take a glance at the other departments of government. The expenditure in England on these, including the administration of justice and educational purposes, amounts, within a trifle, to £25,000,000, nearly all of which is paid away in salaries to the various

functionaries who are (and in some cases who have been) employed in the performance of public duties. It has been calculated that the number of persons in the pay of the English Government, exclusive of the army and navy, is not far from 180,000. Neither does this include the numerous staff paid out of the proceeds of local taxation (county, borough, and parochial rates, &c.), which in 1878-9 amounted to about £30,000,000. Now, if out of the 180,000 functionaries, high and low, above referred to, a certain number should have been superfluous and others overpaid, that waste, be it more or be it less, is so much positive loss to the community.

In these elucidations we have taken the case of the English Government simply by way of illustration, for as our theme is wealth-creation not in one country but in all countries, so should our conclusion be a general and not a special one. We must, therefore, word it thus, that if out of the civil functionaries, high and low, in the pay of all governments, a certain number should be superfluous, and others overpaid, that waste is so much positive loss, and a subtraction to that extent from the world's wealth. There is hardly a country in the world of which it can be truly said that there is no such superfluity or overpayment of public functionaries. In some there is less, in others more, but it must be admitted that in all there is a wide field for retrenchment. We readily grant that the retrenchment may be carried too far, and that it is a great mistake in a state to underpay, or irregularly pay, its servants. But this extreme, which is compara

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