42 ECONOMIC ESSAYS IN HONOR OF JOHN BATES CLARK 
if such work is appreciated, not simply by the laborers them- 
selves but by the general public, this appreciation is a very impor- 
tant form of reward and will become a factor in the equilibrium. 
It will induce so many men of capacity to enter business as to 
reduce their pecuniary incomes and increase the pecuniary 
incomes of their employees. 
It may be discovered, in a given country, that one reason for 
the scarcity of men of high ability in business is the habit of 
retiring from business as soon as a competency is accumulated. 
Where that is the general habit, the most capable men will 
retire early in life, and the only men who will remain in business 
all their lives will be men of low capacity who can never accumu- 
late enough to enable them to retire. Except for the brief and 
brilliant careers of men of great capacity, industries in such a 
country will be mainly in the hands of second and third rate 
men, will therefore be second and third rate industries, and pay 
second and third rate wages. 
If this is discovered to be a factor in the low equilibrium wage 
levels the remedy is obvious. They who merely rail at business 
men and hold them up to the public obloquy are only making a 
bad matter worse. They make capable men more reluctant to 
enter industry, and more anxious to retire from it as soon as they 
can. Those highly intellectual men and women who do the 
railing would do infinitely more to benefit labor if they would 
show the business men, whom they think so stupid, how to do it, 
i.e., how to run an industry in such a way as to pay high wages 
and the other necessary expenses out of receipts. If, however, 
their literary aptitudes are too specialized to permit them to 
excell as payers of high wages, they could at least use their 
literary power to encourage men who have the right kind of 
capacity to go into business and to stay in business. If they can 
accomplish that result, industries will tend to be run more and 
more by first rate men, to become first rate industries, and to 
pay first rate wages. 
Again, if in a backward country it is found that the equilibrium 
wage is very low because of a lack of capital, then the obvious 
thing to do in that country is either to borrow capital from other 
countries or to start a thrift campaign in order to accelerate 
the rate of accumulation within the country. As between these 
two methods. the former is the more advantageous, for several 
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