sterling on racing and fox-hunting. The number of bondholders in Great Britain has risen to about 1,000,000. The percentage of producers amongst the total population is becoming smaller.
| Years. |
Population in millions. |
No. of workers in the big industries. |
Percentage of producers in the total. | |
| 1851 | ... | 17.9 | 4.1 | 23 per cent. |
| 1901 | ... | 32.5 | 4.9 | 15 per cent. |
And, in speaking of the British working class, the bourgeois student of British Imperialism in the 20th Century, is obliged to distinguish systematically between the "upper layers" and the "lower layers, or proletarians properly so called." The upper layers furnish the main body of co-operators, of trade unionists, of members of sporting bodies, and of numerous religious sects. Universal suffrage, which is still "sufficiently restricted" in Britain "to exclude the lower layers of proletarians properly so called" is adapted to their needs. In order to present the condition of the British working class under its best possible aspect, only this upper layer—which constitutes only a minority of the proletariat—is generally spoken of. For instance: "The question of unemployment is mainly a question of London and the lower proletarian elements, about whom the politicians care little." It would be better to say: with whom the bourgeois politicians and the "Socialist" opportunists reckon little.
Amongst the special features of imperialism, connected with the facts that we are describing, there is the decreased rate of emigration from imperialist countries, and the increased rate of emigration from the backward countries, where
