"THE HUNGRY SLEEPING PARTNER"

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 127, 1 June 1938, Page 10

"THE HUNGRY SLEEPING PARTNER"

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —The two letters in your issue e: of May 30 on the above topic are evi- ii dential of two unpleasant characteris- v tics which seem to be particularly noticeable in the community today, tl One is the spirit of envy which hates h to see anyone else making an out- t standing success of his business, the t other is the looseness of thought t whereby it is assumed that by reason fi of the State taking a large share of t the rewards of successful business, the c buying public, the satisfaction of whose i requirements was the means of producing those rewards, share in the re* I wards they helped to create. t With regard to the making of large 1 profits, surely so long as they are made c after paying fair wages and in the face of usual business competition the big- > ger the profit the better. Such profits 1 enable the establishment of reserves < in the best possible terms for the pur- < pose of expansion of business when < the opportunity occurs and for the J maintenance of dividends and wages 1 during periods of depression, whilst 1 the efficient management which brings about such a happy state of affairs forms an example to the whole community which one may be sure will not be lost. Yet there are people who like to see the Government putting an increasingly large shovel into these profits, merely because they are profits. They say that this is most just and better fpr the community as a whole than that these profits should be applied to reserves or distributed in the form of dividends. If the expenditure of hundreds of thousands of pounds upon unnecessary roading, the expansion of an economically unsound railway system, the entry of the State into such a speculative adventure as the establishment on a large scale of an iron and steel industry, is better than allowing the people generally to spend the money according to their individual needs, I stand to be corrected. In my opinion unsound arguments are almost worse than unsound decisions, and I thought in that, respect the Forbes-Coates Government with its compulsory voluntary conversion ' loan and its raising of the exchange rate (to be pegged only until there * was a substantial alteration in the l prices of our primary products) took 1 the palm. But I fear that the weaknesses of the Forbes-Coates Government in that direction pale beside the machinations of the Labour Party mind which thinks that the Labour Party has a monopoly of humanitarian ideas, that any criticism must be from interested motives, and that by the lavish expenditure of other people's money it is possible to establish and maintain prosperity. No wonder not a penny has been taken off taxation in one of the most prosperous years ever experienced by the Dominion, and that pre-election remarks about taxation being overdone have been ignored or forgotten. The • drift from accurate thinking 1 which has been so noticeable during! > past few years must be a cause " of grave anxiety to those who have the " Dominion's welfare at heart, and for that reason I welcome the return to 3 clear thought and expression which 1 seemed to me to be the main feature * of Mr. Hamilton's broadcast address. * "Sweet are the uses of adversity" and if the debacle of the National Party in 1935 has proved to be the means of its setting its house in order and of establishing a new political standard based on sound principles and not on sugar-coated generalities, then the discomfort some of us have felt in listening to and reading the fulminations of certain Labour Ministers (well-mean-s ing, no doubt) and seeing the country r slipping to goodness knows where, n through the medium of an eat, drink, n and be merry philosophy, will not have - been in vain.—l am, etc., B.