MOTOR CAR A LUXURY.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 5203, 14 November 1927, Page 1

MOTOR CAR A LUXURY.

INCOME NEEDED BY OWNER. VIEWS OF BRITISH JUDGE? A well-known British judge, Mr Justice Crawford, has stated that too many people with small incomes own motor cars, snd there has arisen a keen controversy on the point raised. “ Like most judicial dicta,” asserts the London “Daily Ne/ws/’ Judge Crawford’s declaration that, no person with an income of less than £1,500 a year is justified in owning a motorcar, is rather out-of-date. It, is no doubt true to say that many persons who own motor-cars cannot really afford to do so; it is equally true to say that many persons who own ; houses and pianolas and prize dogs and • other things that they cannot afford to possess. “ But to prtend that the possession of a private motor-can is still the prerogative only of the well-to-do, is to be blind to a very remarkable phenomenon of civilised life. One may continue to describe the motorcar as a luxury. In the sense that a crystal wireless set, is ,a luxury, a motor-car is a luxury of the majority of owners though not for all. “ The time is fast approaching when it will cease to be regarded as | any more of a luxury than a thirdclass seat in a railway train, or a decent house to live in. In the United States of America one person among every five inhabitants owns a motorcar, and though last year the proportion in the United Kingdom was only one car to 43 persons, these figures are being modified daily. “The whole tendency of modern life is tc make it both easier and more necessary to develop the motor-car habit. Not only are communities of houses being built in places where it is inconvenient for the housholder to go to work unless he has a small car, but the buildetrs are sacrificing a room in the house to find space for the essential garage. “At present it is the £4OO a year, or the £5OO a year man who, generally speaking, represents in this country, the< lowest economic grade in the great world of motor-car owners. It is likely that he finds the ‘luxury’ something of a tax on his resources ; its runnipg cost may vary frpm £3O or £4O to £BO or £lOO a year . He saves less than lie would otherwise savq, perhaps; he goes less to the theatre, or the picture house; the family practises certain economies for the sake of the; car. The family does this because it thinks the sacrifice is worth making. It propably is well worth making.

“What Judge Crawford really ought to have said that it would he; improper for a £5OOO a year man to buy a £l5OO a year man’s motor car, which is a very different thing.”