ge of forty, so that it may be truly said in these
halcyon days everybody works but father. But the work of life does not
begin till education ends at the age of twenty-one. After that all the
young men and women pass for three years into the general "Industrial
Army," much as the young men used to pass into the ranks of
conscription. Afterwards each person may select any trade that he likes.
But the hours are made longer or shorter according to whether too many
or too few young people apply to come in. A gardener works for more
hours than a scavenger. Yet all occupations are equally honorable. The
wages of all the people are equal; or rather there are no wages at all,
as the workers merely receive cards, which entitle them to goods of such
and such a quantity at any of the emporiums. The cards are punched out
as the goods are used. The goods are all valued according to the amount
of time used in their making and each citizen draws out the same total
amount. But he may take it out in installments just as he likes, drawing
many things one month and few the next. He may even get goods in advance
if he has any special need. He may, within a certain time limit, save up
his cards, but it must be remembered that the one thing which no card
can buy and which no citizens can own is the "means of production."
These belong collectively to all. Land, mines, machinery, factories and
the whole mechanism of transport, these things are public property
managed by the State. Its workers in their use of them are all directed
by public authority as to what they shall make and when they shall make
it, and how much shall be made. On these terms all share alike; the
cripple receives as much as the giant; the worker of exceptional
dexterity and energy the same as his slower and less gifted fellow.

All the management, the control--and let this be noted, for there is no
escape from it either by Mr. Bellamy or by anybody else--is exercised by
boards of officials elected by the people. All the complex organization
by which production goes on by which the workers are supervised and
shifted from trade to trade, by which their requests for a change of
work or an extension of credit are heard and judged--all of this is done
by the elected "bosses." One lays stress on this not because it is Mr.
Bellamy's plan, but because it is, and it _has to be_, the plan of
anybody who constructs a socialist commonwealth.

Mr. Bellamy has many ingenious arrangemen