Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1910. THE COST OF LIVING.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10152, 23 December 1910, Page 4

Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1910. THE COST OF LIVING.

The Ta'ranaki Herald has been making special enquiries into the increased cost of living—a suhjeet which intimately concerns every resident in this country, especially the wage earners and all in receipt of fixed incomes. Our contemporary finds that, at least, so far as Taranaki is concerned, the statement of the President of the Canterbury Chamber of Commerce, to the effect that there lias not been an increase in the cost, is incorrect. Comparing the statistics of 1890 with those lately issued for the last year, the Herald finds that in Taranaki the price of bread has i.ici eased from 6d to 8d the 41b loaf, flour from ss'6tl to 7s and 7s 9d the 501b bag, beef from 2sd to 5d per lb, mutton from 2£d to from 3d to 6d per lb, pork from 5d to 6d, bacon from 6d to 9d and lOd, potatoes from 4s per cwt to Gs Gd, and firewood from* 18s petcord to 35s and 365. Here are a. number of the first necessities showing an added cost of from 25 to 100 per cent,, and they are the articles upon which most has to >u spent.

On the other hand, sugar, which used to cost 3d per lb, is now 2|d; rice shows a similar reduction; salt has dropped from 2}-d to Id, candles from lOd to 7d, tea from 2s to Is 6d, coals are about the same price —£2 5s per ton. Butter, however, was put down at 8d twenty years ago, and now it is Is or lid, - and cheese, which then cost 6d, is now 8d per lb. Milk was then 3d per quart, and now varies from 3d to 4d. Eggs were then 8d per dozen, and now range from Is to Is 2d, and the Herald points out that if the working man keeps fowls to supply his house with eggs he has to pay fully 50 per cent, more for the feed than he did twenty years ago. Tea, rice, salt, candles, and sugar, the only items showing a. deduction, do not cost very much in the aggregate; but meat, bread, potatoes, and other articles which make the biggest hole in the weekly wages are nearly all much dearer. In addition, rents are higher now than they were twenty years ago. The statistics do not help much to ascertain the relative cost of clothing, but our contemporary finds that in 1890 the boots and shoes imported from the United Kingdom were valued for Customs purposes at an average of about 4s 3d per pair, while those imported last year were valued at an average of 5s Bd, : or just a third more, and the actual cost in the shops to-day is about that much more than it was twenty years ago. A suit of clothes tliait would cost, say, £4 10s twenty years ago is now charged at about £5 10s. Prices vary in different parts of New Zealand, and the comparison may not be the same in Christchurch, but the Herald is certain that in New Plymouth, to live in the sajne way now as twenty years ago costs fully 25 per cent, more. When to " this increase is added the addition brought about by the highest standard of comfort and living, the Herald ventures to say that 30s goes little further than a pound did twenty years ago.