Social and Economic Systems
Sir, —conditionally that one does not think on the matter, the present social and economic system is perfect. So perfect in fact that to assert otherwise is to earn the reputation of an insufferable crank, all other complacent folk being the only useful members of society, which is divisible into these nations which have been exalted by righteousness! If Christian people are searching for a blemish in the present social disorder, why don’t they take their cue from a well-known passage of St. Matthew’s Gospel? They might then realise what is meant when monetary reformers point to the fallacy of saving. Two thousand years ago the world was advised not to “lay up treasures on earth.” How much more so must that advice hold good to-day? Man is supposed to be superior to the animals. Is he? One way in which he sets out to prove it is to store up for himself a sum of money known as capital. By doing so he is driving workers out of the field ' (by taking money out of circulation) and accumulating for his own selfish ends a huge pile of food and clothing, etc., which is minute compared with Nature’s bounteous provision, which outside his gate like the British museum is to he gazed on but not taken away. A little thought will indicate the accuracy of this view. When a man saves money what else is he doing but fostering a claim to a lifelong supply of goods, those common amenities to animal existence? It has yet to be proved that the' savers are “better off” than the spenders; I know who are the happier. Close-fisted folk and spendthrifts to-day are in the same boat. Is it not strange? It is not lack qf thrift that has brought us to the present predicament of being poverty stricken in an assured supply of plenty, but our credence in a system which sprang up when scarcity governed man’s actions and has flourished ever since on the enigma of debt. With all due regard to Dr. Gluck, mentioned by “W.F.K.,” it is fairly obvious that our common life has already been brought into line with the principle of the Golden Rule. The whole trouble is that the rule has the habit of expanding and contracting according to the whim of certain very astute gentlemen, who style themselves the keepers of the public purse.—l am, etc., C. H. MLLER. Pahiatua, December 26.
Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/DOM19350102.2.100.6
Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka
Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 83, 2 January 1935, Page 11
Word count
Tapeke kupu
411Social and Economic Systems Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 83, 2 January 1935, Page 11
Using this item
Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi
Stuff Ltd is the copyright owner for the Dominion. You can reproduce in-copyright material from this newspaper for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). This newspaper is not available for commercial use without the consent of Stuff Ltd. For advice on reproduction of out-of-copyright material from this newspaper, please refer to the Copyright guide.