The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is in corporated the West Coast Times

Hokitika Guardian, 2 May 1931, Page 4

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is in corporated the West Coast Times

SA l (..*t< BAY, MAY 2, R,31. TRADE ISSUES. Tunisk is very sound counsel in the reminder that the quickest and surest way ot securing prosperity is to work for it, comments a New York financial journal when remarking that the trade crisis in Britain and the United States, calls for resourcefulness to’deal adequately with tin* general situation. 1 ho fortunes of England and America, individually and nationally, were built up - from a foundation of hard work. Those who did the building knew that success was not to be bad without effort, and they made the eft M't. Everybody knows, nays the American paper, that America am, Great Britain are facing Lite greatestindustrial crisis since Lite Great War. Although British trade, before the war, had us ups and downs, ninety-six per emit, ot the registered working population were kept in fairly regular employment, and 11 1 ! IS happy condition ot a Tail's seems to have strangely obsmied the significance of those nfw (actors in the industrial world slowly spreading their shadows over the area of the world markets. Under the best of conditions, during the pre-war period, there remained a “persistent mass” of unemployment in both Aniereau arc! British labor markets amounting to about, a million out of work in each country, even when other countries were virtually free from any serious unemployment. Changes in ITgli, ions, r.ew inventions, the impost of tariffs increased pressure of competition within the British markets, although the genuine implication of these dislienting changes was not fully grasped. For England, it was the Great War which brought about a violent upset of old-fashioned relations and, after its close, rendered the problem of readjustment in the industrial world | of paramount importance. The war, indeed, diverted industry from iiccusturned to unaccustomed channels and for a time it put u check upon the normal process of continuous adjustment, with the result that not until about the year 1927 did British mamifa' hirers become fully aware of the enormous political and economic transformation produced by the upheaval. But manufacturing industries in foreign countries had received a tremendous fillip during the war. so that industries competitive to British activities were forced into existence. Mean, while, for the first time in history, Amei iea’s export trade in 1927 increased to the tune of more than eight hundred million dollars and showed a larger sum-total of manufacturing output and sale than the official figures representing the commerce of Germany or Great Britain. As regard Brinish trade, it has declined from fourteen, per cent, of the world’s total before the war to cloven per cent, at the present time. In view of the present unemployment situation and the do-line in trade, if Great Britain is to recover her position in the world markets, there must be a wholesale readjustment of her basic industries, new methods, new ideas in merchandising. modern machinery, along with the adoption of a new wage scale that will enable British industry to meet the challenge of the now conditions of imperative mandate. The British peco p| <; are trudging along a rough road under a staggering burden of financial handicaps, unprecedented in the history of the nation, and such as lints a severe strain upon every muscle and fibre of the body politic. It is generally admitted that production costs must be brought into some closer relation to the; new level of commodity prices. Labor is an importent item in these costs, and labor, as yet, lias shown no disposition to assume its share of the task which has to be performed. To find a right path through the thorny wilderness of problems which now beset Britain will tax tlu« resourcefulness, courage and capacity of her people and politicians to the utmost.