ABUNDANCE AND POVERTY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 22, 26 January 1935, Page 8

ABUNDANCE AND POVERTY.

ECONOMIC READJUSTMENT.

(To the Editor.)

After reading your leader on "Trade and Migration" I was more than ever impressed by the • fact that our politicians seem quite incapable of solving the economic problems arising in our trade relations within the Empire, If this deadlock between the representatives of the colonies and Britain does nothing more, it should demonstrate clearly to the rank and file that the task of readjusting our economic system to meet the demands of a new age must be taken out of the hands of incompetent politicians, while the claims of men who have made a scientific study of these problems must be given serious consideration. It is our duty to examine every avenue to a possible solution of these problems if we are to avert a complete breakdown of the whole economic system. I am amazed at the colossal ignorance prevalent among all classes and sections of our people and the persistent unwillingness to face facts which should he obvious to the most simple-minded. Here in New Zealand we are living in a land of plenty, a land capable of producing a super-abundance' and yet we are grubbing along as if we were' living in an age of scarcity. The most deplorable feature of this state of affairs, to mv mind, is that the greatest number of people in this fair land are learning to do without material necessities and are being forced to conserve at a time when it is increasingly urgent for them to consume the goods "an abundance of which has been made possible through the inventive genius of man himself! We do not appear to realise that, for the first time in history, man has the opportunity to free himself from an existence of abject slavery and rise to undreamt of spiritual heights, his vision unclouded by thoughts of how to provide for liis mere physical existence. This is csurely what is meant by the "Kingdom of Heaven on Earth." Will man renounce his glorious heritage now? Does he lack the courage to step on to this higher plane and live a free and full life? ROBERT J. PETER.