EMPLOYMENT AND POPULATION.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 496, 1 May 1909, Page 14

EMPLOYMENT AND POPULATION.

Sir,—ln . arranging details of ..its vast letrenchmont scheme, tho Government would do well to aeo that before married or single men are put off, tho' fomalo clerks in tno scrvico are dispensed with. ■ Tlus country undoubtedly - wants population, and with that end hi view;. expensive. spendthrifts are being engaged for. our .London office to paint tho pictures of gold-paved : streets, so as to induce moro, immigrants of the mong type to come here and compete in the labour market irith those who, helped to defray tho passago money ;of tho _ said immigrants. Our birth-rate :is not. high, enough to give us the population wo require, and Ac reason Ts, plain/ A clerk, for instance, cannot have eiuklfSß.—ho cannot even marry, because a girl for 305., will do the work he does for £3. The result is that he does not get £3i He'either gets 40s. to 605., or else the sack, and .tho girl naturb intended him to marry gets' his, job,, and the fcoimtsy gets no children. i. This is a serious position, and it.must be faced very soon. Fancy, Tom pays Bill's fnoUo New. Zealand,.'so' that; Bill, may get Tom's job at lower >vages. Mary comes along and' gets' the job ' from BO] at lower wages still. Tho three live, exist, or starve, and finally die, but', they do not. reproduce; their race, so wo pay to land a few other strangers to repeat tho performance. • : Therefore,, if two New Zealandcrs, with the assistance of one importation, can' produce nothing in ten years, how long win it be before' New Zealand's " population is 6127? —I am, oto;, '. MARISEDTJN. April 27.