THE AMERICAN PLAN.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 194, 18 August 1933, Page 6

THE AMERICAN PLAN.

According to our American news to-day, President Roosevelt is not finding his path to national recovery smooth. No one who knows much about American conditions should be surprised at this; opposition is inevitable in a huge • country so long given over to individualism as America has been. The Industrial Recovery Act is not only the most important, but the only, thing of its kind ever attempted in the United States. It proposes, through co-operation of industry with the Government,, to secure widespread re-eniploy-ment, shorten working hours, guarantee a living wage, prevent unfair competition and eliminate over-production. These ends are to be reached without detriment to either worker or consumer. Even agriculture, always the most individualistic of all industries, is to be brought under planned control.. These measures jettison the old methods under which industry in America has been built up. Americans hitherto have always thought in terms of individualism, have feared Government intervention, and have extolled the virtues of an unregulated and uncontrolled exploitative system. The immense resources of the American Continent made that country an experimental laboratory for individual enterprise. It was generally believed that people left to their own resources would build better than any Government could build for them. There arose great combinations of capital and industry, and these corporations became persons in the eyes of the law. Trade unionism has been unable to win the position it occupies in England. Proposals for the regulation of charges or of hours and conditions of Labour were defeated. President Roosevelt will find it is one thing to plan, and another to alter at a stroke the fixed habits of generations.