The Times. Published on Tuesday and Friday Afternoons. Motto: Public service. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1920. THE ECONOMIC OUTLOOK.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 9, Issue 569, 24 September 1920, Page 2

The Times. Published on Tuesday and Friday Afternoons. Motto: Public service. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1920. THE ECONOMIC OUTLOOK.

The seeds of revolution are contained in the policies adopted by both Labour and Capitalistic profiteers. Wage workers who are organised into powerful unions have for some years been demanding higher wages, shorter hours, and conditions of work which become more and more harassing to the owners and directors of factories and business concerns of all kinds. Passing through what, for the sake of convenience, may be termed the middle class, we come to the magnates of commerce, whom we find have a ,set policy of creating artificial shortages of oils, benzine, cement and other commodities in general use. These periodical shortages are maintained until the community in genera! has reached such dire straits that it is agreeable to a sub- \ stantial increase in retail prices. When this concession is secured a shipload or the particular commodity that has been held back»artili-'' cially finds its way into port, and is sold at extortionate figures. The process is repeated again .and again until the* users can only with great difficulty make a living. And so the community is ground between the upper millstone-of grossly profiteering capitalists and the nether one of insatiable labour unions. The inevitable result is that the middle classes in the cities and the country, including the small farmers, are. becoming dissatislied almost to the point of

exasperation. Thinking men who have long since visualised the picture we draw have attempted to stave off the evil day of open strife by advocating co-part-nership in all industries, but for very obvious reasons the leaders of Labour, who have made a profession of fomenting industrial disputes, are stoutly opposed to anything which falls short of syndicalism, or the ownership and control of all industries by those who are now wage workers. The wholesale merchant is not greatly troubled, because every rise in wages <;ives him the excuse for increasing his selling prices out of all proportion to the increased cost of production; Co-operative concerns, some of them possessing millions of capita!, have endeavoured to soive the problem of dear living, but vested interests wage waisagainst them, tooth and nail. It would be vastly interesting, for instance, to know all the moves played against the Commonwealth Shipping Line by powerful shipping companies who fear that a reduction in freights may reduce their fat dividends. This is a Stale versus private ownership case, but the analogy holds good in respect to co-operative concerns also. No doubt we shall be told tliit the dairy farmers are attempting to launch a piece of profiteering by demanding the open market price for butter, but the people who take this

line of argument either cannot, or will not soo that, there is a world of dill'ercnce between asking for price* that are fixed by the lawn of supply and demand, and the policy of artificially restricting imports by i-ner chants, or artificially raising wages and reducing output by wage workers. The. farmers take their chancein ihe wide, widt world, and are not bolstered up by any such iniquity and travesty of democracy as "preference Co unionists." If worker:- were freely offered, say. 2s 6d per hour, there would be a boisterous howl if some other section of the community sl.ep-

|K.'d ill mill insisted that Is fid onry should bo paid. The laws of the land ensure that workers under an award shall not be paid below i certain

minimum, but there is no maximum fixed. The wage worker or salaried man can take as high a price for the commodity he has to sell (his labour, skill, mental abilities) as anyone likes to offer him, but be denies this right to the primary producer, even though the laltei has to pay his share of every increase in the cost of articles he has to purchase for his and his family's personal needs and the running of his farm. If the market falls heavily he is beggared. There is

' no logic or justice in this attitude. For remedies the people naturally turn to those whom they have electud to practise Statecraft on behalf of the nations. So far our legislatures have been "ither unable or unwilling to mete out even-handed jus! ice, but if governments do not roon display sullicieiil backbone to resist inordinate demands by Organised Labour, and also refuse to allow capitalistic profiteers to impose extortionate prices, then we shall assuredly sec, within the next decade, an overturning of our social system. It may pertinently be asked, "And what good would that do'.' Has Russia benefited by her cataclysmic social and economic upheavals?" The answer is that once the people have reached the stage when they are intensely discontented they do not stop to reason. History teaches us that when the white-hot fires of resentment are flaming, the oppressed'ones usually start breaking things, in the vague hope that something better will arise out of the ruins. It sometimes happens, as in Russia, that worse" evils come into being but then it is ton | late! I

A judicious and progressive immigration policy, coupled wilh the possession of a line of State-owned steamers and* State importing departments offer partial jsolution6 for the vexed problems referred to,