THE REFLEXES OF PROSPERITY.

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 77, 23 December 1937, Page 4

THE REFLEXES OF PROSPERITY.

Tiie year now so close to running out its course looks very mueli like making its exit under most favourable conditions ® so far as concerns the material prosperity of our little country, and fcrtunateJy much the same may be said with respect to most, if not all, member countries of the Empire to whieh it is our good lucBT to belong. Figures published on another page to-day show that the value of our exports for the already expired eleven months of the calendar year is well up to the mark, giving promise that for tlie full year it will surpass that of 1936, -which itself constituted a "record" for the Dominion. That there is fair confidence in the continued receptivity of oversea markets for our primary produets — the United Kingdom, which takes most of them, in particular — is instanced by the fact that our imports for the eleven months liave gone up by close on £12-million ahove the amount for the corresponding months of last year. This, however, is perhaps not to he regarded as an altogether healthy symptom, for, in the first place it savonrs a good deal of a disposition to make something of a boom-time of our prosperity — to "eat, drink and be merry." Then, also, in some respects the rise in imports is undoubtedly dne to the heavily increased costs of production having made it impossible for our home manufacturers to compete suceessfully with rivals overseas, where it has been found possible to -keep such costs at a fairly steady level, while still doing a great deal towards improving conditions for those engaged in exp6rt industries and at the same time maintaining the cost of living at a fairly constant and reasonable level. Only a few days ago the authorities drew attention to the fact that the volume of Reserve Bank notes on issue had gone up very materially in order to meet tho trading banks' demand for till-money wherewith to provide the people with holidaytime pocket-money. From both tlie Old Country and the Commonwealth we have had cahled word of like movements, in each case a record cash circulation heing indicated. In all instances this is rightly claimed as giving proof of the augmented spending capacity of the people in the rnass. Unhappily, however, in our own country, owing to the rapid rise in the prices of most commodities, purchasing power has not kept anything like an even relative pace with spending power, as in otlier . countries where it has been found possible to keep production costs on a fairly stable basis. Still, it is quite competent to congratulate all classes on deriving some share of benefit from tlie prosperity that during the last year or two has come to us mainly as the result of enhanced returns from. our exportable produce. It is espacially reassuring to liave responsihle reports from tlie Old Country intimating confidence that, though rearmament expenditure mnst of course be taken into account, economic recovery lias by careful nursing now been plaeed upon a footing of permanence that will survive the finish of any such artificial spending, which, in any event, will continue for some few years. It may sound something like heresy to say so, but it is none the less the truth that the lasting maintenance of the spending and purchasing power of the many millions of wage-earners in the Old Country is at least of as great importance to the wage-earners of this little land as is the increase in the cash return for their own services. Industrial prosperity in the Motherland will always find its reflection away out here so long as our farmers can keep up the volume of food supplies to send across the ocean and can there secure a ready market and some adequate retnrn for them, though even in this connection increased production costs must have a very considerable bearing, when we keep in mind the keen competition with which they, too, have to contend.