A FOOL'S PARADISE.

Hokitika Guardian, 4 January 1922, Page 3

A FOOL'S PARADISE.

(By Ernest J. P. Renn, in English Magazine.) I was talking the other day to a young mechanic, a toolmaker of the best type a young man of about thirty live, and a serious student of affairs. He was spending the week-end at a modest country hotel, and I game across him at the table where wo' wftfe both enjoying a i'our-and-six-peimy dinffer. We fell to discussing the 121 per cent:, and he explained to me what a serious matter it was from his point of view. He was a married man, without any family, and lie found great difficulty in existing on liis present pay. He saw no prospect of economising t]o the extent of 121 per cent., and if this bonus were withdrawn he was piepared to go on strike. When I left liim I fell wondering how far he was typical of the rest of us. Here Was a man of fair education and high ideals, keefl to live the full life of a citizen, tasting alid thoroughly enjoying some of the good things of life, and living on a scale which measured by bis etliigal attainments seemed on the face of it to be just reasonable and proper. 1 W'afe quite tillable to argue with him, hut, aS so' bfteii happens, when I had left him I seemed to gather strength to put the other side of tiie case'. This man is enjoying as iiiaiiy of the social ameniiidS as were a few Real's ago within the grasp of the average iniddlo-alass employer. There are indeed, very few of our fathers, whether in business or professional circles, who were able to afford many of the comforts which are very properly and naturally regards as his due.

FI CTITIO U S WAH-TX MB PROSPERITY.

II; is a matter for sincere delight and congratulation that a mechanic-a toolmaker, can afford to keep a crease iii his trousers and have a clean serviette for every meal at a week end resort. It is very hard to suggest to the man who lias enjoyed these things,- ftp* predated them and lived up to them, that lie must now dispense with them. Ti seems to me that this young mechanic is very largely typical, of the rest of us, and sums up within 'himself many of the difficultties which we find it so hard to etiooinpass; Many of us are suffering from the taste of a fictitious war-time prosperity, and ale equally reluctant to face the necessities of postwar poverty. This young man, like tfie majority of u«, is in u little hit too much of ft hurry id and enjoy those things which are within his reach if only he will do the right thing to secure them and recognise that it is"a long and troublesome process. He differs in no wav from the retailer, who, having for a brief spell enjoyed d-mlde the percentage of profit which was previously his due, is reluctant to

give it up. VALUE FOR VALUE. ’lhe simple question before us at the moment is to know how flinch of the bankruptcy conn, twill be necessary to cause the individual to make the effort which sooner or later will be forced upon him .Exactly the same is true of the trade unionist especially the un skilled trade unionist. Artificial scar- j city has for years given an artificial j value to the lowest grades of labour, , and girls and hoys who at their best were never quite worth their keep Oil a strict exchange basis, have foulu j themselves the possessors of silk stock- ; iu-rs and cigarettes and other amenities j exceeding by far in value anything! which they themselves contributed to | the common stock. These young l*o,lc have never been up against the simple equation "value for value” and the question is, how long it will take, and how much unemployment and suffering will be necJsfiafiy before they will see the wisdom of facing that elementary problem fairly courageously. Wc have two or three million public servants in the same boat. For the period of the war the community was willing to support these people in order that they might perform all sorts of little services which together made up the business of saving us fi nil the Hun. They gave ‘value for value when we were engaged in winning the war, hut since those days they haw continued to draw from the common stuck of commodifies without putting into it anything which th t rest of ns can recognise at value. THE RIGHT WAY.

A very simple illustration of the same difficulties is seen in the domestic servant (/question. Thousands of young women who before the war exchanged the cooking of pudding and the penning of steps for a modest living, were suddenly lifted into a fictitious position and enabled to enjoy social amenities far exceeding in value anything which they could normally produce in return. It is very hard to suggest that they must return they will return all right in time the pity is, that being mere human being*, instead of yielding to argument, they will probably prefer to learn a lesson in the school of hitter experience.

All this sounds like had reaction, but it is really nothing of the kind. None of these people are* enjoying more than tliev could secure if they would go the right way to get it, none of the advantages which are now s<* common are outside our grasp if only we will go the right way to get them. My friend the mechanic could enjoy all that lie now possesses if only he would recognise the formula, “value for' money,” hut in obedience to thoroughly uneconomic and fictitious rules and regulations he is, as a good trade unionist, deliberately contributing to the wealth of the world only a proportion !of the total that lie might give. SciI ence and capital will bring everything | to his feet in time, hilt restriction and i revolution will only rob him of all.

The common problem, yours, mine

everyone’s Is not to faiiev what were fair m life Provided it could be but, finding first What may be, then, find how to malt* it fair [Jp to our means- a very different thing 1 • ... No abstract intellectual plan of life Quite irrespective of life’s plainest laws. But one a man, who is man and nothing more May load within a wirld which (by your leave) Is Rome, or London—not Fool’s Paradise.