Functional socialism

TAXATION Fils

may be no surplus to tax. Function will not know its business if it does not reduce existing share prices to their true value. The Stock Exchange will find life depressing, but not dull. If this be so, then a considerable section of overhead charges will either be wiped out or their equivalent absorbed into a higher and more general standard of life.

Our next task is to picture the new methods of State maintenance in a functional society.

II THE STATE IS THE FIRST CHARGE

The upkeep and general maintenance of a State that has had the wisdom and prudence to separate its economic functions from its political life must inevitably lead to greatly increased expenditure, not balanced by the decrease in armaments. Our cultural activities must expand beyond all knowledge. If our existing Budget is, say, £750,000,000, we must prepare for at least £1,000,000,000 in the new dispensation. I make allowance for the stupendous burden of debt interest and sinking fund and even then have no fear of vast expenditure on education, science, art, housing, replanning, transport, and a thousand other things. Still, 1 may be wrong. Our Budget, 1913-1914, was only £163,000,000, compared with £784,000,000 in 1918-1919, the last year of the War. Never mind! Whatever the amount greater or smaller, we can manage it—ten times over, if needs be.