"IN LAP OF THE GODS."

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 16, 20 January 1933, Page 8

"IN LAP OF THE GODS."

FORMER BANKER'S OPINION. NOT ANALOGOUS WITH AUSTRALIA "The future is in the lap of the gods," stated an Aucklander with long experience in the banking business the city. "Apparently the Government has taken this drastic, step because of its inability to find any other solution of the country's economic problems and has done so against the combined weight of advice of business men and the banking experts.

"Producers will get immediate benefit," he added, "but it is difficult to se« that it will be more than ephemeral, and that in a short time it will not be nullified by the increase in the cost of living, and that of imports, on which they are dependent."

In commenting upon the fact that New Zealand had followed Australia in pegging the exchange, he stressed the fact that the conditions prevailing in New Zealand to-day were not analogous with Australian conditions when the exchange was inflated there. "The Government's action in the Dominion," he said, "is purely to provide a bounty for the primary producers, but in Australia the exchange was raised to check imports and to balance them with export. This it has successfully done. But in New Zealand' imports have already been reduced to a minimum, and the balance of trade is now heavily in favour of exports."