"But, with all its defects, the plan of settling prices by the market rate was a practical plan; and I cannot conceive what satisfactory substitute you can have devised for it.

The government being the only possible employer, there is of course no labor market or market rate.

Wages of all sorts must be arbitrarily fixed by the government.

I cannot imagine a more complex and delicate function than that must be, or one, however performed, more certain to breed universal dissatisfaction." "I beg your pardon," replied Dr.Leete, "but I think you exaggerate the difficulty.

Suppose a board of fairly sensible men were charged with settling the wages for all sorts of trades under a system which, like ours, guaranteed employment to all, while permitting the choice of avocations.