Skc. 2] INCOME SUMMATION 143 
DistrisuTioN LEDGER No. 2 
Net Income for 1900 
Tron IAnA cites vin ene on wikia ore $ 2:000,000,000 
“ buildings De wat elite heise 2,000,000,000 
“ yailwaysandtramways. . . . +. . + . 1,000,000,000 
lactoTIBE Caf ee et Re Te i 1,000,000,000 
HE SPOISOMB. iv vo ol miiwiine welts Sw iw siwedinsiw 13,000,000,000 
Obl Le ein ie mie eae ee 1,000,000,000 
$20,000,000,000 
§ 2 
Both these ledgers would be constructed by combining a 
number of separate net incomes, each one of which was the 
balance remaining after deducting the outgo from the gross 
income of the particular group of capital considered. In 
other words, both ledgers would be constructed — to adopt 
the phrase which was employed under capital accounts — 
by the “method of balances.” 
But there is also a second method of summing incomes, — 
the “method of couples.” Just as the same item in capital 
accounts is both asset and liability, according to the point of 
view, and is, therefore, self-canceling, so the same item in 
income accounts is both service and disservice, and is, there- 
fore, also self-canceling. The reader may, in fact, have felt 
that, in many of the examples cited, what we called dis- 
services seemed to him to be services. He may have asked 
himself, Why should we call rebuilding a house a disservice ? 
When a carpenter and his tools repair it, do we not credit 
him and them with services? Is not any production a 
service? Are not, then, repairs placed on the wrong side 
of the ledger? In answer it may be said that when a car- 
penter with his plane, hammer, and saw helps to rebuild a 
house, we have to consider two groups of capital. One 
group, the carpenter and tools, is acting on the other group, 
the house. The carpenter and tools used in the process 
certainly perform a service, but the house does not. Con- 
sidered as occasioned by the house, the repairs are dis- 
services. The house absorbs or soaks up these costs,