THE NEXT SLUMP.

Evening Star, Issue 22684, 25 June 1937, Page 14

THE NEXT SLUMP.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir,—lf there is anything more pitiful than the patient suffering of millions of people who suffer from a lack of money in the midst of mountains of goods it is the nows which comes to hand in this evening’s ‘ Star.’ We learn that a move is on foot, by presumably sane men, to prepare for the next slump. It becomes increasingly hard to understand the mentality of those who, faced with the fact of overwhelming abundance, are yet content to accept—and prepare for —the next occasion when the people will be asked to starve in the midst of plenty. This is one thing of major importance which future generations will find all but incredible. That in a world filled to overflowing with every necessity, or luxury, we submit to an artificiallycreated “ poverty ” will bo as difficult then to believe as we find it to credit that leading lawyers a little over a hundred years ago believed solemnly in the existence of witches. What is it that keeps so many from seeing that when there is what we call a depression it represents only a shortage of a labour-saving device called money? In a world which is at once favoured and afflicted with labour-saving machinery we suffer because tho_ greatest labour-saving of all —money—is denied us when it is most needed. Surely it is permeating tho brain of man that while the things which wo eat, wear, or otherwise produce comprise the real wealth of the world it is more than absurd to allow a device called money to rule the situation, and not only decide whether we will produce more of the things we need but whether we may consume that which we have already produced. There are extant numerous statements and text books which show what money actually is, but without here subscribing to these it is certain that money is no more or less than a convenient device invented by man to facilitate the exchange of the things which man produces and needs. How then does a position arise, and arise more or less regularly, whereby the real things which man produces are withheld from him, simply because the device which was invented to purchase or distribute them is in short supply? This is a case of the tail wagging the dog with a vengeance. That which is intended to servo mankind ends by ruling him. What hypnotism is it that keeps man from realising the position and remedying it as only ho can? What is it that causes men to agitate for measures to be taken against the apparently accepted inevitability of another money shortage? Truly will more enlightened ages marvel at such, mass suicide and blindness. —I am, etc., June 23. A.