COST OF STATE INTERFERENCE IN INDUSTRY

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22274, 13 December 1937, Page 6

COST OF STATE INTERFERENCE IN INDUSTRY

TO* TUB EDITOR OF THE PRESS. Sir _We hear on all sides to-day the cry for protection or assistance of one kind or another, for those who produce the country’s wealth. There is protection by means of quotas or guaranteed prices for the dairy farmer, the wheatgrower, and the orchardist; and now the manufacturer, ■who already has a high tariff wall to keep competitors at bay, finds his protection insufficient. And I think he can make out a very good case for assistance. Thanks to arbitrary interference by the Government with his internal costs, to heavy taxation and increased external charges of every kind, the manufacturer finds himself unable to compete with imported goods. The fault is not his. In nearly every case he owes his very existence to the Government’s encouragement and protection; the Government is responsible for increasing his costs, while his prices are regulated by overseas competition. Therefore he looks to the Government to protect him further from that competition, and with every justification. But what is the effect upon the community? Somebody must pay for his protection, and the only possible person is tbe consumer, who in the ultimate analysis is the wageearner. who cannot pass on his increased costs. Thus it is that every increase in wages beyond that which an industry can pay without increasing the prices of its products defeats itself, and inevitably results in an actual reduction in the purchasing power of those very wages which it is sought by arbitrary means to raise. This result is apparent in New Zealand to-day in the high cost of every article we buy. Protection, taxation, regulation, and restriction of enterprise are already resulting in the industrial stagnation of the country and in the inflation of the currency. If each article sold were marked with its New Zealand price and with the price in England of an article of similar description and quality, it would be immediately apparent that the New Zealand pound is only worth 10s, or at most 12s. in English money. That is the result of Socialistic interference with private enterprise in New Zealand. Is it worth it?— Yours, etc.. SPECTATOR. December 11, 1937.