AUSTRALIA'S WARTIME ECONOMY

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 108, 3 November 1942, Page 4

AUSTRALIA'S WARTIME ECONOMY

CANBERRA, November 2. Australia is approaching the third, last, and most sacrificial stage of her war economy in which civilians will be living at considerably lower standards than those to which they have been accustomed, declares tha Australian Prices Commissioner, Professor D. B. Copland. "I suggest," he says, "that this will be a period of much greater tranquillity than the present period. We shall then have reorganised our lives, "industries, consumption, and general standards of conduct and enjoyment."

Professor Copland visualises the following standards for Australia's

third war stage: Private enterprise will be working on certain terms for the Government. The resources of the community will be allocated according to a general plan arrived at after a review of the community's whole needs.

Civil consumption will be controlk:l by rationing much move than today. There will be more Government direction of productive methods with increased rationalisation. Investment will be confined almost entirely to war needs.

Incomes and prices will be stabilised. Taxation will be at a maximum consistent with retention of incentive, and surplus spending will be immobilised.