THRESHING STRAW.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume VII, Issue 2111, 3 October 1885, Page 2

THRESHING STRAW.

In the year 1884 there were 846 bankruptcies inNewZealand, whoseasdfe were stated at £804,148 and liabilities jK63Q, leaving only the trifling decfilbucy of £67,482. Both assets and liabilities, howevor, were enormously overstated, though unfortunately, not by any means equally "so. The assets not £804,148, but £112,638 ; and the debtS proved were not £878,630, but £481,220. This leaves a deficiency, not of £67,482, but of £368,682, But the worst is yet to come. Out of assets estimated at £801,148, and actually realised to the amount of £112,638,. the creditors only received after a11£44,116in dividends! There'was thus an absolute loss, as between debts proved and dividends paid, of £437,100. The dividend obtained was about one ,Wiling and ninepence in the pound. ItTHay well be asked, when the trouble and delay and other annoyances to creditors are taken into account, whether the game is worth the candle, — whether, for the sake of collecting and distributing one and ninepence in the ;pound, it is worth while for the country to maintain the cumbrous and complicated Bankruptcy system. Would it not be better to say at once to creditors," "If you choose to give credit, you must run the risk of not being paid," and .to debtors, 11 If you choose to get into debt, you must get out of it the best way you can." We cannot help thii»ttg the effect of that would speediiy business of all sorts on a much Sunder footing than it has been on in New Zealand for many years past,—Evening: Press, •