THE AGRARIAN DEPRESSION.

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 210, 6 September 1927, Page 6

THE AGRARIAN DEPRESSION.

Thanks arc due to Professor Bokhaw end Dr. Xcale for their interesting opinion* on this question. It if pleasing to note tntnaj economist* are brooming public I should like thews gentlemen to deal v jth rrt another a>peoi in detail, vit, how far haa locking of capital in unproductive works «oi» to cause dislocation industrially and commercial ]y and thereby increased cort of production? I think a table will show: (I) That public and local body borrowing actually hat gow , altogether in the direction of locking capital. (2) That private investor* have followed rait, as witness the large building* recently erected in every town in Xew Zealand. I believe lh»x we have borrowed ten yean beyond the taxabk capacity of tie country to carry the burden, and that our circulating capital i« quite inadequate to meet national requirements. The. economic result is elementary, that if tlii be the case, productive cost rises enormously tM consumption falls in the same ratio. Two things are necessary in our present situatkni: (1) Git down borrowing eighty per cent and prevent every £1 we can for the next three to five years being invested in locked capital; (2) cut down Government administrative cost* at least £7,000,000. Sir Joseph Ward ran tin country up to ibe end of 1919 on £1».©9M»0. His successor raised it the very next Tear to £32.500,000, and then Post and Telefimnk and Railways were losing wholesale. Tlk present Government is equally as spendthrift and absolutely rwkle«s in "borrowings, and the adtninUtratitc expenses are simply I staggering, fe A- HALL SKELTOK.