IMMIGRATION

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 15, 19 January 1944, Page 3

IMMIGRATION

FUTURE PROSPECTS

POPULATION PROBLEM Recent bulletins prepared by the Canterbury Chamber of Commerce, after consultation with the Department of Economics of Canterbury University College, have dcwlt with immigration and population problems. After dealing at some length with trends in the population'figures of various countries and the tendency for net reproduction rates to decrease, especially jn European countries, the chamber stresses the seriousness of the position from the point of view of a country like New Zealand, which has relied on immigration for part of its population. The point is made that most of our immigrants in the past • have come from Great Britain and some from Western Europe. Oyer most of this area the population is now stationary or declining, and there is no longer the surplus available for continued emigration to toe newer countries. Some revival of migration is possible after the war, it is stated, but Europe has her own population problem and will need her own people for reconstruction. Other factors against free migration include lack of stable monetary standards, free investment, and relatively free trade. For these reasons conditions in New Zealand will need to be considerably more attractive than elsewhere if immigrants are to be secured. _ In these conditions New Zealand, like other countries, must rely mainly on the reproduction of her own people for any growth of population in the near future. But here, as elsewhere, birth-rates and reproduction rates are low and population tending to become stationary or decline. After discussing various causes of this tendency—the practice of birth control, the greater emphasis by parents on the quality rather than the quantity of their offsprings, the desire to maintain and improve living and social standards, and the lack of real security—the chamber concludes: — . . "The causes of low and, declining birth-rates are therefore far from simple. They are many-sided and complex and many causes may be mixed to produce the present effects. "For remedies most reformers look to the Government to change the economic and social conditions, forgetting apparently that the Governments social influence is slight, and that economically it cannot give to the people as a whole more than it takes from them. MATTER OF COST. "In New Zealand, for instance, Government housing is advocated to relieve the housing position. But housing is a matter of cost, and rent restriction over a long period, reduced hours of labour, better wages and conditions of work over a wide range of occupations, combined with high taxation, both direct and indirect, all imposed to help the working majority of the people, have increased the cost o. housing to a point where the rent, 11 it is to meet costs,, is beyond the capacity of tenants. Family allowances, maternity benefits, free medical services, etc., all desirable in themselves, raise much the same dilemma. % Their cost has to be met, and much ot it has to be paid by taxation collected from the very classes of people it is expected to benefit. The encouragement given by assisting actual parents may be offset by the cost in taxes,, etc., to potential parents, and the birth-rate may fail to respond to the best intentioned social reforms. This result has been widely experienced. "Hence there appears to be no simple solution of the population problem. From the national point of view, an increase in population is desirable. Such' an increase would make the country safer from aggression, and would enhance both the productive capacity and the market for production. It would thus make for progress, and increase both the opportunities for economic advancement and the amenities for social life. "But the final decision in matters such as this lies, and must continue to lie, within the privacy of individual families, and the individual family attitude, in New Zealand and in many other countries, is in direct conflict with the national interest."