Jeniffer electronic book

The French democracy is confronted by an economic, as well as a
political, problem of peculiar difficulty. The effects of the Revolution
were no less important upon the distribution of wealth in France than
upon the distribution of political power. The people came into the
ownership of the land; and in the course of time the area of this
distribution has been increased rather than diminished. Furthermore, the
laws under which property in France is inherited have promoted a
similarly wide distribution of personal estate. France is a rich
country; and its riches are much more evenly divided than is the case in
Great Britain, Germany, or the United States. There are fewer large
fortunes, and fewer cases of poverty. The average Frenchman is a small,
but extremely thrifty proprietor, who abhors speculation and is always
managing to add something to his accumulations; and the French economic
system is adapted to this peculiar distribution of wealth. The scarcity
in France of iron and coal has checked the tendency to industrial
organization on a huge scale.


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