PROTECTION.

Evening Star, Issue 12473, 7 April 1905, Page 8

PROTECTION.

TO THE BDITOK. Sir.—With your permission I will endeavor to .answer Mr Neil's questions. 1. We cannot compete with there countries on a 10 or 15" per cent, tariff. In these protected countries the manufacturer makes his profits through the want of competition! •with other countries •. after bis profit is made thusly he can afford to export, and again make a jgrofit, even if the import duties were made 20 or 30p.r cent., but to do so would interfere with the revenue. The Protective wall cannot be raked too high, unless we prohibit importation altogether. 2. Part of the money goes to revenue and part to the local manufacturer; to +.he latter because he raises the price to the local consumer. The local worker derives no benefit in the shape of an increase in the purchasing power of his wages. _ 3. Yes, we certainly want, more population. We should then produce more and consume more, and prosperity; would rapidly progress in such a magnificent country es New Zealand. 4. No, not so comprehensively as the question seems to assume. Those who remember the Asia's and Caroline's have seen the evils of indiscriminate immigration. • 5. No,, certainly not. We sell our wool in the best market, labor benefits by the exportation of the raw product, and labor again by its manufacture and reimportation. There is an a'.l-Tound benefit to the merchant, banker, shipowner, manufacturer, and the men and women whose only capital is their labor. 6. It is impossible to say how much profit is made by sending, say. £IOO worth of wool and brmging-it back "at £3OO made into cloth. In the main the question is one of supply and demand. Certain lcinds of wool are nsed for certain fabrics. This wool is mixed with shoddy in its manufacture, and re-exported. "The Argentine is breeding a class of wool eminently suited for th> idas? of goods, and the freight from South' America to Europe is much'r less than from New Zealand, hence the New Zealand

importer's profit is greater on the Argentine manufactured wool than on the New Zealand. .From a Protectionist's point of view the questions are admirably put. Whether we are Protectionists or Freetraders, all buy in the cheapest and sell in the dearest markets.—l am, etc F v April 6.