LOTTERY LOANS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 29 April 1943, Page 3

LOTTERY LOANS

SUGGESTED IN AUSTRALIA BIG PRIZES IN PLACE OF INTEREST. OBJECTIONS ON MORAL GROUNDS. (Special Australian Correspondent.) SYDNEY, April 28. “Australians will be called on to subscribe to many more loans before this war ends.” This forthright declaration by the Prime Minister, Mr Curtin, has roused wide discussion on the methods to be adopted in filling future Liberty Loans necessary to finance Australia’s war effort. Though oversubscribed by an unprecedented last minute rush, the recent third Liberty Loan of £100,000,000 lagged badly till its closing stages. For some weeks it was feared the loan would not be filled.

Compulsory loans are commonly suggested as the solution of a problem which will grow as each successive subscription is sought. The political correspondent of the Melbourne “Herald” says: “There will be little chance of filling future loans of £100,000,000 or more unless the compulsory system of post-war credits in operation in Britain and Canada is introduced in Australia. Future wai’ loans cannot be smaller unless the Government intends to rely more on the issue of bank credit. which is expected to reach at least £200,000,000 in the present financial year.

“Further large contributions in taxation, plus compulsory loans from incomes below £5OO, must be made. It has been a disappointing feature of the war loans that only a very small proportion of the lower income groups has made any appreciable contribution to the war costs.”

The Sydney “Sun” also emphasises editorially that future war loans must be subscribed by the small incomeearner. The paper suggests education in the value of investment rather than high-toned appeals to patriotism as the most satisfactory method of inducing subscriptions to the loans. It also advocates the adoption of the Canadian system by which subscribers to war loans are given badges proclaiming their good citizenship. A more novel suggestion, which has aroused enthusiasm and opposition, is war loan lotteries, with prizes ranging from £5OOO to £50,000. Broadly, the proposal is that a war loan lottery should appeal to people to invest £lO which would be lent interest free to the Government. But the Government would make available in prize money what it would otherwise have paid in interest. Thus, a £10,000,000 lottery of 1,000,000 subscribers would offer about £300,000 in prizes. Advocates of the scheme, which has some political support, urge that many people would prefer the opportunity of winning huge prizes to the small amount of interest they would receive on £lO. Subscribers to the lottery would not risk their principal. When the loan expired, they would get their money back. Those who had a moral objection to such lotteries could subscribe to war loans in the usual way.

It is held that such a war loan lottery would interest many of the 3,000,000 people who earn 80 per cent of the wages in Australia, but who have subscribed less than 5 per cent of the war loan totals. The main objection to the lottery is on moral grounds, but the view of many Australians is reflected in the statement of the veteran politician, Mr W. M. Hughes: “However much we may deplore the tendency of the Australian people to worship at the shrine of chance, it seems inherent in the community. And never was the god of chance invoked for a better purpose. This money is not wanted for any immoral or undesirable purpose, but for the safety of the country.”