WAY TO WEALTH.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 198, 22 August 1935, Page 6

WAY TO WEALTH.

HARTLEY WITHERS , BOOK.

IMPATIENCE IN AMERICA.

(By E.C.F.)

A whole shelf of books bears witness to tlie literary powers of Mr. Hartley Withers and to his mastery of a wide and varied field of economic thought. Now he has added another,* and it is as delightful reading as the rest. Here lie is not trying to help everyone to make a fortune; he is thinking more of the wealth of nations than of individuals, but, of course, if nations are better off individuals, too, will find themselves with more money in their pockets. "All our recent distress," he writes, "has been caused by human angers and stupidities and can be cured only by man's intelligence and good will." That is the theme of the book. Mr. Withers finds all the schemes for cutting down production so much childish folly. He raises good-humoured laughs at the expense of America, and generously gives many Americans the credit for seeing the humorous side of paying a man for not raising hogs or wheat or cotton or some other commodity of which the world stands in need but cannot buy because trade is hobbled and struggling on its knees. He thinks the mistake the Americans have made has been in attempting to do too many things in a hurry; they are so impatient to get ahead that they have been falling over one another and getting badly elbowed in the general rush. Weakness of Dictatorships. Capitalism lias had its failures and reverses, as Mr. Withers readily admits, but he is not impressed by the advantages claimed for Communism, Socialism, Fascism and for the varying degrees of dictatorship which have found their place in the world. Russia's experience ha.s shown that all men cannot be placed on a dead level and kept there; there must be the reward to fit the effort, that is, pay in accordance with what the work is worth. Under test, Communism in Russia lias come down to earth and is likely to remain there; and as for those in Western countries who talk airily about it, Mr. Withers tells us that they are mostly harmless, gentle-minded folk who rail against a system which often gives the plums to stupid young people through birth and ancestry. Government in Business. A mild form of Socialism, however, has made progress, and Mr. Withers points to the deeper interest now taken by Governments in business. The tendency of business men to create combinations and monopolies, he says, will have to be vigilantly watched, and Governments must be ready to interfere when consumers are being "shorn too close." . As for dictatorships, he makes this observation: "Wherever such control has been tried in the past few years it has been to remedy a state of things more or less miserable." A Mussolini, he remarks, may give his people a new spirit and make them "feel good" for a time, but inventive pioneers and those eager souls who prefer to strike out for themselves are more than likely to be choked if put into leading strings under a dictator, however inspiring. In his opinion, Fascism would be a miserable failure if transplanted to an AngloSaxon country; "the theatrical side of it would simply make us laugh." Besides, it is very questionable whether a disciplined and regimented nation could duplicate the progress made by Britain in the past century. Mr. Withers quotes a report that between 1818 and 1932 the real income of the people increased by four times. "That is not a bad record, but we ought to boat it handsomely during the century ahead, if only the world will pull itself together." The Task Ahead. First of all in the task ahead America must stop floundering; an international money standard must be restored; trade must be freed from excessive tariffs, quotas and other obstacles; and, most important of all, the political atmosphere of the world must be restored to calm. Business cannot prosper under a threat of war, and if business draws into its shell it is vain for Governments to hope that prosperity can be restored through -more circulation of money, whether by credit expansion, largo expenditure on public works, or a return to gold. Mr. Withers takes America to task for her handling of the finaii:ial leadership of the world in the decade after the war. New York was too inexperienced, he says, to make a job of it, and the frenzied finance of those years made the crash nil the worse when it came. Of course, the inevitable happened, and London again had to take the lead. Under the guidance of the London bankers more or less stable conditions iiave been restored in a large part of the financial world, and Mr. Withers suggests that the time is now ripe for a further step forward in the complete lifting of the embargo on lending which the British Government imposed over three years ago. With sterling divorced from gold, there is no danger of any kind of run on the Bank of England, and if'deserving borrowers are allowed and encouraged to raise loans in London, British trade will soon feel the benefit.

It is a most informative book, and, as usual with anything Mr. Withers writes, a most quotable one. His exposure of the Donglas Credit "rainbow" Ls a pern of its kind. For the Labour party he has a friendly feeling and. gives it some useful advice. ♦ "The Way to Wealth," by Hartley Withers. (Thornton, Butterworth, Ltd. London.) G/.