HARD TIMES IN BRITAIN.

Taranaki Daily News, 2 April 1921, Page 7

HARD TIMES IN BRITAIN.

INDUSTRIAL PROBLEMS. Writing early in February, a London correspondent vividly depicts the industrial and commercial conditions obtaining in the Mother Country. In the workshops of Britain, he says, the men arc eagerly discussing wages—how to stop a fall. In offices and clubs manufacturers are talking about production—how to decrease its cost. In their homes the women are asking whether prices of food and clothing are really being reduced at last. Everywhere it i& recognised that the Old Country has, at last, to face the essential post-war problem—what js the real value of work done? During the war this problem was shirked. Now unemployment, short time, excessive taxation, and the slump in overseas trade have shown that, unpleasant as the question is, it must be faced. It must be decided without delay how work done in post-war Britain can be expressed in the £ s d of wages. In recent years there was a wild scramble for more, and yet more wages. In the course of this scramble certain trades trebled and quadrupled their wages, while less favored folk have been forced to struggle against the ever-rising price of goods as best they could.