“VERY DANGEROUS”

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 969, 12 May 1930, Page 1

“VERY DANGEROUS”

PROPOSAL TO ABOLISH STANDARD WAGE MANUFACTURER’S VIEW Special to THE SUN WELLINGTON, Today. “It seems to me that it would be very dangerous indeed,” said Mr. Prank Campbell, a prominent manufacturer and public man today, when discussing a Christchurch proposal that the solution of unemployment was to abolish the standard wage set by the Arbitration Court and let the men go into the open market for what they could get. “I presume that what is meant is that a minimum wage should be abolished. ‘Apart from the effect which such an action would have upon the workers, it must be remembered that it would be a boomerang which would rebound upon the traders with great force. An immense body of our workers is under the Arbitration Court, and to reduce their wages is naturally to reduce their purchasing power. That will mean that the circle will be complete. In addition, to reduce wages would be to convey to the worker the fact that with less wages this week he might have none at all next week, and that would cause him to save as much as he could, thus further reducing purchases. Prices would have to fall. “ ‘Not a penny off wages, not a minute on hours/ was how Sir E. Benn set out his doctrine. That doctrine seems sound.” “Undoubtedly some classes of labour are receiving too much, but it by no means follows that all classes are overpaid," said Mr. C. J. B. Norwood, vice-president of the Wellington Chamber of Commerce, and past Mayor of the city. “There are many aspects to the unemployment problem and any generalisation is apt to need many qualifications. It seems to me that this is a sweeping statement, though some good would be brought about by reductions of wages in certain directions.”