IF GOLD WERE DROSS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVI, Issue 83, 3 September 1914, Page 6

IF GOLD WERE DROSS

WHAT WOULD RESULT FROM OVERPRODUCTION T

Once move some people are alarmedly asking what would happen "if gold were dross"—that is, if it were produced in such quantities as to bring it down in value to the level of the base metals. There is supposed to be plenty of the precious metal in sea water. There must be so much of it in various parts of the earth that, could man only get at it, we should have a great deal more of it than we need. And there is the possibility of manufacturing it. Yes, making gold. Nothing being provab • impossible, it might with plausibility be asserted here that old can be chemically produced. Edison is said to be convinced that its manufacture is imminent, and various patents have been taken out with that intent.

The sea-water proposition is put aside as too expensive, as wholesale increase of production must be for the same reason. Broadly, it is a fact that the cost of producing gold exceeds its value when obtained. Of course, there are big "punches" made and fat fortunes got quickly by individuals and group of individuals . Think, for instance, of the g.orious runs of rocks of gold in South Afhica and West Australia and tho Klondike in recent years. But think also of the millions on millions that have irretrievably sunk in,

■.THOUSANDS AND THOUSANDS OV DUFFERS,

But the cost in one scale and the gold in the other and see the gold hit the beam.

At first sight overproduction of gold '.ooks the glorious good thing which, in fact, it is not. Suppose gold could be made or won in coal's quantities, couldn't we all cut it dash with it! Everybody wearing gold watches, gold buttons, and gold eyelets for bootlaces; inpecunious poets writing perishable verse with gold nibs in gold handles, baby playing with gold toys, eight-bob-a-day men eating off gold plates and carrying their dinner in gold baskets fitted with gold billies and mugs. And mother! Gold rings, gold brooches, gold sequins on her dress, and gold hatpins stuck through the humblest hat that tever came from Paris. I!ut there's the rub. Scarcely in any quantity would gold buy a real Paris hat or a "creation" of any kind, and with silver it would be about as impossible. .Because, at present, in all countries governed with any wisdom, the value of silver in a coin is about half the value which .commercially attaches to it owing to the gold guarantee. The silver in twenty shiiirigs would be worth about ten or twelve shillings if melted down, but . twenty shillings can be exchanged for a golden sovereign, and thus the ''splendid shilling'' audaciously maintains a value as ficticious (only for its backing) as any majority that ever upheld a rocky Ministry. Deprived of

ITS FELLOW-METAL FINANCIER silver might drop still further; or it might appreciate in value owing to the destruction of gold for monetary purposes. Either way the beautiful hat would be harder to come by, and so would the baby food and suits of clothes and tram rides and bread and butter. Moreover, gold would 'become an object of scorn. Madame of the elite presently wouldn't be seen wearing it, and in the customary course of events the "girl" in the house and the young lady behind the counter would put it off; while yourself would give up having any of such common stuff on your person. The whole scheme of business and of money and of the daily routine ot .work and pay and service and supply .would be absolutely and hopelessly bung. Because ill effect there would be no money, and what for v-ould Uie farmer grow wheat and the ki'iiiiv publican disperse malt and spirituous liquors? Happily, there is 110 need to apprehend a calamitous overflow of gold. Mr Conant. who knows the inside and outside of these questions, and certain other canny know-alls before him, have indicated where disaster could be corked up and put aside until it "lapsed into innocuous desuetude." First of all, Governments that permit free coinage of gold would at once withdraw that permission. saying to the gold-makers,

"You can do what you like with your stulT; pave your paths with it, and build skyscrapers with it, but making coins with it, means ten years' haril labor per coin." Or the Government would

.MONOPOLISE TU.K MAKING OF (I OLD.

so that the output would be balanced against requirement. As a fact, we could do with a great 'deal more gold than we can get now, or are likely to get. The, people of India are ready to bury train loads of it. even in bulk, probably. And it wouldn't- hurt- anyone if it 'became so plentiful as to bring down its price for commercial purposes. Gold stnlling for teeth comes high at present, so <lo gold jewellery and ornaments. But cheaper gold and too much gold are different things. And in case of the trouble it might cause us, let us put up our prayers, against the curse of gold becoming too plentiful.