VOLUME III, SEMESTER 4, CHAPTER 44, SECTION 2

VOLUME III, SEMESTER 4, CHAPTER 44, SECTION 2

Capital and Labor: One End Puts Out Strength, One End Carries Risk

Pair the four two by two and there are six pairs in all. This section looks first at the most famous, and the fiercest-quarreling, pair: the end that stakes the money, and the end that puts out the strength. This pair faces each other daily in a shop, and fights daily in a hundred years of books.

This pair, in the hundred years and more past, has mostly been written as a pair of foes: one earns, one is earned from, one sits, one stands, one upstairs, one on the floor. This book takes neither that writing nor its reverse—the one that says one end feeds the other and the other should be grateful. This section does one thing only: set out the two ends’ positions, see what each is handling, then see how they make each other whole, and how they hold each other back, so that neither may walk to the end.

One, first see why this pair is together daily

Back to that chair shop. The shop has two things, short of either it cannot be: one is twenty-odd pairs of willing hands, one is that saw, those two assembly lines, that building that keeps off wind and rain, and that sum laid out first to buy the stock in.

These two things belong to two ends. The hands are on the workers; the stake is on that man who cannot sleep at night. To make one chair that can be sold, these two must be gathered to one place—short of either it fails, and a surplus of either is no use.

This is why the pair is together daily: not that one chose the other, nor that one took a fancy to the other; it is that the matter itself needs two things gathered before it can be done. Chapter forty set four rules measuring four matters, and the one measuring what is put in and the one measuring risk are just these two ends. So set one line straight first: they did not have their opposition first and then gather; they had to gather first before the matter could be done, and gathered, then on how to split that grid they each have their own saying, each their own grievance.

Two, without the stake, strength has nowhere to be used

Look at one end first. A man with a whole good craft, how much work can he do in a day? With only a plane in hand and a pile of wood carried home on his own back, he cannot make one decent chair in a day. With a building behind him, a saw, an assembly line, stock already brought in and dried and cut, the same pair of hands can turn out a dozen or more in a day.

See clear here: those dozen more are not that he grew a skill of a sudden; it is that his strength found a place to land. The second semester said capital is a dead drive. A dead drive does not move its own hands, yet it can let the one who does move his make one part of strength come out as ten.

That old hand of nineteen years, the craft he practiced himself, yet let that shop shut its door and his craft can only make a few stools in his own yard. The craft did not change, the man did not change; what changed is the position, and the position changed, what the same pair of hands is worth changed whole. So the strength end must own one line: the stake end handles a real matter, and a matter he himself cannot handle. When the last section pulled out the risk-carrying one, the first with no work was just the ones with real craft in hand.

Three, without the strength, the stake is dead

Now the other end. That saw set in the building will not grow a chair of itself in a night, that sum lying on the account will not turn of itself into goods, into orders, into the thing in a customer’s hand. The second semester said this layer flat: capital has no eyes, no heart, and no mind of its own. It must have someone move his hands before it comes to a thing. That man who cannot sleep at night, the reason he cannot sleep is just here—his stake must lean on another’s hands to be turned into a thing, and if those hands will not move, or move by halves, that sum of his rots on the machine day by day, and the interest is not one day less reckoned.

The last chapter spoke of five ropes on the boss, and one of them was the men. The old hand of nineteen years says a word about going home, and he cannot sleep a fortnight, for in that fortnight he knew he was not the one holding the man, he was the one begging.

So the risk end must own a line too: the strength end handles a real matter, and one he himself cannot handle. Each end has a matter the other cannot handle, each holds the half the other lacks, and this is common life—not a debt of kindness, but position. Put the two ends together and you see a very neat shape: one has strength with no place to use it, one has a place to use with no strength. Chapter forty spoke of four rules measuring four different matters, and the one measuring what is put in and the one measuring risk fall to begin with on two people, seldom on one. A man with both craft and stake there surely is, but that is the few. Most times, these two matters take two ends of people to do together. This is why the pair cannot be parted: not a bond of one who cannot do without the other, but that the matter itself needs two things to be gathered.

Four, the grid they quarrel over is the very proof they are one band

Then why do they quarrel daily? They quarrel over that grid: of the ten million of flow, how much is wage, how much is return. This quarrel is real, solid, no need to cover for anyone, no need to talk it into one peaceful mass. The wage a point higher, that grid a point thinner. That grid a point thicker, the wage a point less. This is a solid pull at two ends. But look one layer down: they quarrel over the same sum on the same account, and that sum the two ends made together, neither can earn it out alone. To quarrel over one cake the two of them baked together is a wholly different matter from quarreling over two cakes each their own.

Now see what comes of either wholly winning. If the stake end wholly wins, the wage pressed to the lowest, the first two years the account looks fine. But the fastest pair of hands walks first, the willing second and third walk after, and what is left is the ones who do as they please, the stock coming off worse year by year, and at the last the goods will not come to shape, and the orders are taken by another house. He won that grid, and lost the whole shop.

If the strength end wholly wins, the wage eats it all, not a cent left, then the machine grows old with no money to change, the new model cannot be made, one machine breaks and a line stops, and three years on the orders are taken by another house all the same, and twenty-odd people have no work together. He won that grid, and lost the whole shop too.

So the truth of this pair is: neither end can wholly win. Whoever wholly wins throws his own end in along with it. This is not a word coaxing men to be kind; this is an account that can be reckoned out with a pen.

Five, where the bound is drawn leans on three things

Since neither end can wholly win, how big should that grid be? This section gives no number, and can give none, for no number suits all shops, all trades, all years. But with three things all present, that grid will land of itself at a place both ends can hold.

The first is the account can be seen. Ten million comes in, and where it flows grid by grid, both sides know in their hearts. The second semester reckoned those seven grids once, and it was for this layer: an account unseen, and the two ends can only guess, and what they guess is mostly the least kind kind, and the cursing follows.

The second is the talk can be talked over. The two ends have a place to sit and speak, can argue, can quarrel, can settle it anew year by year. The first semester’s chapter six, that Salt and Iron debate, quarreled to the end with neither wholly winning—that was not talks broken down, that was the frame held up.

The third is the man can leave. The first semester set: the free in form is that he has the right to say no; the free in substance is that he has the stake to say no. A man who can leave carries a wholly different weight in his words from a man who cannot. This one matters most, and is most easily taken away quietly by that wall: a contract forbidding him to go elsewhere, a debt that comes down the moment he lifts his foot, pins him in place unable to move, and the first two things then come to empty words—the account seen for nothing, the talk talked over and not counting.

These three all present, and the two ends are holding each other. Short one, and one end can press the other, holding each other turns to standing alone, and the last chapter’s four ways of falling come. These three things will be met again and again in the chapters to come. The account can be seen sets the matter in the open so no one need guess, the talk can be talked over leaves a place for different positions to speak, the man can leave lets every person keep in his hand one no he can say aloud. These three together are the proof of whether the bound between this pair can stand. Chapter forty-seven on the check and balance, chapter forty-nine on each keeping its position, use these same three.

Six, what this section sets

What this section sets is a line: one end puts out strength, one end carries risk, and short either end the matter cannot be done. They did not have their opposition first and then gather; they had to gather first before the matter could be done. The one who puts out strength leans on the stake to make one part of strength come out as ten; the one who carries risk leans on those hands to turn dead money into a thing. They quarrel over that grid, and it is real, but they quarrel over one cake baked together, and whoever wholly wins throws the whole shop in.

The bound between the two ends leans on three things: the account can be seen, the talk can be talked over, the man can leave. These three are this pair’s holding each other and growing. The next section looks at another pair, labor and need. That pair looks more opposite in reason, yet the thread by which they feed one another is nearer still than this pair’s.

Credit to the ancestors; the mistakes are mine: Tiger Lyon.

Three, Labor and Need: One Measures What Is Put In, One Measures What Is Needed