The Guardian (And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times.) THUSDAY, OCTOBER 15th., 1923. CAUSE AND EFFECT OF UN EMPLOYMENT.

Hokitika Guardian, 18 October 1923, Page 2

The Guardian (And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times.) THUSDAY, OCTOBER 15th., 1923. CAUSE AND EFFECT OF UN EMPLOYMENT.

In' tho course of an illuminating review of the British position regarding employment, a Member of I’arliameut lately discussed the subject very cogently, and in the course of his remarks went on to say : Unemployment! To those who are willing and anxious to earn their bread by the sweat of their brows there is tragedy in the term. There are others whose lines are pitched always in pleasant places and wilder normal conditions, who accept the problem ns inevitable on tho pu:eIv economic grounds of tile law of supply and demand. And there are still others (mostly politicians) who, in spite of all past- experiences make no attempt to grapple in an intelligent manner with the problem until it presents itself iu. an intensely gruesome and Ugly form and becomes a serious danger to social order. They then vainly try to grapple with it bv panic legislation (akin to a sticking plaster on a cancer), barely touching the fringe of the National Calamity at present unduly prevalent. All of them, in my opinion, ate fundamentally wrong. In a well-ordered State the man physically and mentally capable of producing the wealth of a nation ought at all times to be a national asset. Under our existing system he is a victim of that much vaunted economic fallacy “the law of supply and demand.” and becomes a liability instead. In accordance with still another economic fallacy, “cost of living” on the basis of the purchasing power, the wage paid to the wealth-producer leaves him very little, if Any, margin with which to meet ft slump in trade. |lc- finds the w«re.

houses ltdl to cverllov.ing with the goods his labour has helped to produce, and himself uiiemj loved and without the wherewithal to purchase the necessary commodities of life he has himself helped to produce. And to this condition of tilings, as a sop to the Cerberus of our consciences, we give the fancy name of “over-production.” And so, between the devil of unemployment ami the deep sea of false economies, the man whose labour has helped to produce the wealth is denied his share, and reduced to starvation point. For to him it is inconceivable, or at least grossly unjust, how it can be made to (it the existing state of things that there should lie a falling oft' in demand for the necessary commodities of life, while lie and others who helped to stork the warehouses are in need of the commodities which iil! them. Sorely puzsded in his mind as to the reason it is that keeps the two elements, sll Pi ; l.v on the one hand, which is there, and the natural demand, from operating, he rushes to the equally fallacious decision that it is a case of over-ptoduo--1 ion which can only he remedied by reduction of the hours of labour and general limitation of output.. We then have confusion worse confounded. The most uni'oitunate. part of the ease is I hat all this confusion is fed by tilt; demand for increased cheap production—a remedy which has not only failed in its prophecy, hut. in spite of the lad that (a.s in .the ease of the miner) the production is now in excess of piewar level, wages have gone down to 10', above pre-war, with the cost ci Jiving over -SON, above it.