The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, The Echo and The sun. MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1940. WAGES AND THE FAMILY

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 220, 16 September 1940, Page 6

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, The Echo and The sun.

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1940. WAGES AND THE FAMILY

For the cause that lacks assistance, For the wrong that needs resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that we can do.

Workers organised in unions under the jurisdiction of the Arbitration Court, Mr. Nash has said, number only about 50 per cent of all wage and salary earners. This section, following the Budget, which introduced the national security tax of 5 per cent, received a 5 per cent increase in wages. The others, and also those men and women whose incomes are not derived from wages or salaries, have been paying the tax, but have received no increase of income. This statement must be qualified in respect of social security beneficiaries, who pay no direct taxation. The Government has now decided to remove the anomaly in so far as it affects the lower-paid State employees. These are to receive the 5 per cent increase, retrospective to August 12, and subject to tax. As to the remaining , groups of the community, comprising , those who neither belong to unions nor are employed by the Government —the cost of living has been rising for them, too, but neither from the Court nor the Government are they likely to gain relief. Indeed, their position will become progressively worse, for, as the judge of the Arbitration Court remarked when the 5 per cent wage increase was granted, "It would, of course, be unreasonable to suggest that no increase in the cost of living will take place during the next six months."

Though it may be granted that when the Court granted the wage increase to half the wage-earners the Government could not fairly refuse to "do something for the civil servants," it must be emphasised that the removal of anomalies is t"he least of the Government's problems. The Prime Minister, at the opening of the. Economic Conference, defined the main problem as that of spreading the reduction in consumption over the community. Wage increases do not reduce consumption, and when the increase in purchasing power is limited to a section, consumption is not "spread over the community"; on the contrary, some have the money to pay for what they want, while others have less and less. That is the process that has begun in New Zealand, and, pending the outcome of the Economic Conference, it is impossible to feel confidence that progress has been or will be made to check it. Meanwhile, once again, the effect of our present system of wage fixing is demonstrated. The single man or woman is to receive an increase of 5/ a week. In the majority of cases he or she does not need it; both are over-paid now. The man with a family is to receive the same increase, provided his wage does not exceed about £6 9/ a week. The same 5/ is supposed to pay for the increased cost of meeting the needs of one man, and the needs of a man, wife*"and children. As a cost-of-living increase it fails where it should succeed first—that is, in I helping the- family.