JUSTICE OF THE SINGLE TAX 113 
it is a tax neither according to benefits nor according 
to ability, because it is a tax only in form, not a tax in 
substance. The public merely takes out of the land 
with its left hand the value which, with its right hand, 
it has put into the land. 
We ask your thoughtful criticism of the single tax 
tenet regarding wages. We believe in high wages and 
low prices, which are the equal opportunity channels 
for the equitable distribution of wealth, instead of low 
wages and high prices, which are the special privilege 
channels for the inequitable congestion of wealth. 
Contrary to popular illusion, wages are not regulated 
by dollar wheat, but the price of wheat is fixed by the 
competition of dealers, and wages are fixed by the com 
petition of labourers. The benefits of high prices go 
to the few, while the benefits of low prices go to the 
many. 
Increase in ground rent does not tend to an increase 
in prices, because usually sales increase faster propor 
tionally than rent, thus reducing the ratio of rent to 
sales. The larger the product, the lower the individual 
costs. The larger the gross sales, the lower the com 
petitive prices. 
If a man has the best corner lot in a city he has a 
monopoly, because by the private appropriation of 
ground rent (a special privilege conceded to him by the 
State, and having all the sanction of law and custom) 
he cannot help diverting, without fault of his own, into 
his own private pocket, the public expenditure in its 
transmuted form of ground rent. So we say that the 
special privilege greater than all others put together 
is the private appropriation of ground rent. We 
are entirely agreed to the private ownership of land. 
I