Such is the case at present, and socialism would do nothing to modify it.

If our author thinks that a man, under these conditions, is his own employer, our author must be easily satisfied, and we will not quarrel with his opinion.

It will be enough to point out that the moment he descends to details his promise that socialism would equalise economic opportunity for all reduces itself to the contention that the ordinary labourer or worker would, if the state employed him, have a better chance of promotion and increased wages than he has to-day, when employed by a private firm, and (we may add, though our author does not here say so) that some sort of useful work would be devised by the state for everybody.
Now, although every item of this contention, and especially the last, is disputable, let us suppose, for argument's sake, that it is, on the whole, well founded.

Even so, we have not touched the real crux of the question.

We have dealt only with the case of the ordinary worker, who fulfils the ordinary functions which must always be those of nine men out of every ten, let society be constituted in what way we will.