Three plans for a fairer distribution of wealth have been proposed.  According to one, the profits from industry would be divided among the population on a basis of their needs.  This is, however, clearly impracticable; every one, would discover unlimited needs, and no one would be fit to make the apportionment.  The second scheme is that all men should be paid alike for equal hours of work, or, rather, in proportion to the disagreeableness of the work, the amount of sacrifice made.  This scheme is that usually advocated by Socialists.  The objection to it is that equal pay for every man would take away the chief stimulus to initiative, skill, energy, efficiency; it would take the zest and excitement out of the game of life, make living too monotonous; there must be rewards for the ambitious youth, prizes to be won.  The third plan proportions reward to efficiency.  And on the whole, as men are constituted, it seems desirable to reward men financially according to their efficiency, so far as that can be measured.[Footnote:  F. W. Taussig, Principles of Economics, chap. 64, sec. 3.] This does not mean to leave things as they are.  For at present the shrewd, if also fortunate, are rewarded out of all proportion to their efficiency; and many who are not efficient at all, who even do no work at all that is socially useful, are among the wealthiest.  Moreover, efficiency itself is only partly due to the individual’s will and effort; it is due to the physique and gifts and fortune he has inherited, the education and environment that have molded him, the social situation in which he finds himself, the willingness of others to cooperate with him, and his good luck in early ventures.  It seems unfair that to him that hath so much, so much more should be given.  Or at least it seems fair that he that hath less should be given more favorable opportunity.  It is not enough, as Professor Giddings says, to reward every man according to his performance; we must find a way to enable every man to achieve his potential performance.  The plan of proportioning rewards to efficiency must be modified by mercy for the weak-minded and weak-bodied.  It must be supplemented by earnest efforts to provide health, education, and favorable environment for all, and, by the limitation of the right of inheritance, that all may have, so far as possible, approximately equal opportunity.  It must beware of judging efficiency by immediate and obvious results, must encourage inventions that ripen slowly, genius that stumbles and blunders before succeeding, work that contributes to others’ results and makes no showing for itself.  It must involve a restriction of the right to unearned incomes.  To put these necessary corollaries to the efficiency-\ reward plan into concrete form: 

(1) The handicap of ignorance must be removed by providing free education for all, to the point of enabling every one to develop efficiency in some vocation.  Scholarships for the needy, the prohibition of child labor, and a high enough wage scale for adults to permit the youth of all classes to complete their education, are indispensable.