In any society, there will be real output (real income) that is not produced solely by humans. Some real income is due to the contribution of nature – land, natural resources, beneficial weather patterns, animals and so on. Some real income is produced by machines, robots and other means of production that were created by prior applications of labor in combination with nature. In any given accounting period, this real income is ‘unearned’ in the sense that it is not due to human effort exerted within the period. Much of it currently flows to industrial capitalists and rentiers on the basis of property ownership rather than productive contribution. Over time, the real productive contribution of means of production can be expected to rise, due to technical progress. In this post, a framework is tentatively suggested for thinking about the distribution of unearned income, both at a point in time and as it grows over time.

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