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Laborers, landlords, and lending capitalists are all alike in that the amount of remuneration received by them for the aid which they render to production is commonly fixed in advance by agreement, and is not immediately affected by the profitableness or unprofitableness of the undertaking. It remains to examine the economic fortunes of those men whose money incomes are made up by the sums left over in any business after all the stipulated expenses have been met.
 A very important part of the solution of the problem of profits has already been contributed by the preceding studies of wages, rent, and interest. The evidence has been found to support the conclusion that in almost all cases the sums of money wages, rent, and interest received by laborers, landlords, and capitalists increased much less rapidly than did the general price level. If the wording of this conclusion be reversed -- the prices of products rose more rapidly than wages, rent, or interest -- we come at once to the proposition that as a rule profits must have increased more rapidly than prices. For, if the sums paid to all the other co-operating parties were increased in just the same ratio as the prices of the articles sold, it would follow that, other things remaining the same, money profits also would increase in the same ratio. But if, while prices doubled, the payments to labourers, landlords, and capitalists increased in any ratio less than 100 per cent., the sums of money left for the residual claimants must have more than doubled. In other words, the effect of the depreciation of the paper currency upon the distribution of wealth may be summed up in the proposition: The shares of wage-earners, landowners, and lenders in the national dividend were diminished and the share of residual claimants was increased.
Two other general propositions respecting profits are suggested. First, other things being equal, profits varied inversely as the average wage per day paid to employees. This conclusion follows directly from the fact that the money wages of men earning $1-$1.49 per day before the perturbation of prices increased in higher ratio than those of men earning $1.50-$1.99; that the wages of the latter class increased more than the wages of men in the next higher wage class, etc. Second, other things being equal, profits varied directly as the complexity of the business organization. By this proposition is meant, for example, that a farmer who paid money rent, used borrowed capital, and employed hired labourers, made a higher percentage of profits than a farmer of whom any one of these suppositions did not hold true. If, as has been argued, the increase of profits was made at the expense of laborers, landlords, and capitalists, it follows that that entrepreneur fared best whose contracts enabled him to exploit the largest number of these other persons.
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