TAKING ANOTHER CHANCE

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 15, 19 January 1933, Page 8

TAKING ANOTHER CHANCE

"The way out of our troubles does not consist of further political expedients, but of giving industry and commerce a chance to develop as far as possible without further political interference." This sentence from the business men's statement on exchange goes to the heart of the controversy. High exchange-is a ppli-

deal expedient, a means of evading an unpleasant issue and postponing a difficult task. One of the high rate supporters at the farmers' meeting said something similar but with a different conclusion when he declared: "All of us have, been simply gambling on a rise in prices for primary products. We have been at it for three years now and we have no right to gamble any longer." But this high exchange is another throw of the dice. As the business men point out, it cannot be of permanent value. • Any temporary" relief will be speedily absorbed in rising costs, and then there will be a demand (as there has been in Australia) for higher exchange. Moreover, we doubt whether even any section of producers would • contend \ that primary production should be permanently subsidised by the rest of the people, that the "backbone" should be always supported with splints and plaster. That being so, the high rate is a gamble on the chance of prices rising so that an adjustment of capital and other costs will be less urgent. It puts off the evil, day, but it does not strike the evil day put of > the calendar. When the day of-reckoning does come there will be double accounts to* settle and with Interest.