Capital And Interest

The portion of total "profit" obtained by the private employer or undertaker, as such, is here eliminated; or, rather, it is made definite and measurable in being divided among the managing director, the ordinary directors, and the secretary, who are paid a fixed fee, salary, or, accurately and simply, a wage.

A careful consideration of the balance sheet of any such company will guard us against a common misunderstanding. Such a balance sheet will generally show two funds - a Depreciation Fund and an Insurance Fund. The former, sometimes called Sinking, Wear and Tear, Repairs, or Replacement of Capital Fund, secures that fixed capital, or its value, is replaced in the proportion in which it is worn out, and thus provides a guarantee that the value of the parent capital is not encroached upon, or inadvertently paid away in dividend. The latter, sometimes called Equalisation of Dividend Fund, is a provision for averaging the losses that are sure to occur over a series of years, and are really a portion of the current expenses. It is only after these funds are provided for that the dividend is paid over to the shareholders, and this accentuates two important facts: (1) that interest properly so called is something distinct from any portion of parent capital, and (2) that it is not accounted for by insurance against risks.

The question now is, Is such a dividend pure interest? Here we have to reckon with the familiar fact that limited companies, under similar conditions, pay the most various rates of dividend. If then we accept "dividend" as the equivalent of "interest" we shall have to conclude that varying rates of interest are obtainable on equal amounts of capital. On looking closer, however, we find the dividing line again reasserting itself. If a sound industrial company is known to be paying a dividend higher than a certain definite percentage on its capital, the value of the stock, or parent capital, will rise to the point where dividend corresponds to an interest no greater than this definite percentage - e.g. the £100 stock of a great railway paying 5 per cent will rise to something like £125, at which price the 5 per cent dividend on the original capital shows a return of 4 per cent on the new value of the capital.