MACHINES BLAMED

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXVI, Issue 3450, 26 November 1932, Page 6

MACHINES BLAMED

Mechanisation of industry resulting in the displacement of human labour is the principal cause of the present economic troubles of the world, according to Mr. A. Anderson, a prominent Hutt Valley resident, who recently returned from a tour of England and Canada extending to five months. To a Wellington Post reporter Mr. Anderson said that he could see no improvement in the business world in either England or Canada. The first thing he had noticed in England was the enormous amount of shipping lying idle in the Thames, and to his mind this and unemployment had been caused in some measure by the high tariffs of other countries and by the high exchange rates. He quoted the Daily Times of Victoria, British Columbia, as his authority for the statement that Canada's unemployed were four times the number they were two years ago and that conditions would grow worse unless the Government changed its high tariff policy which had resulted in economic war with Australia and New Zealand, among others. Unemployment in England was "pretty bad," said Mr. Anderson. Tariffs and exchange rates played their part in producing it, but the greatest evil of all was*the displacement of human labour by machinery. This was progressing so rapidly that the creation of new industries could not check the steady decline of employment. Mr. Anderson instanced a factory nearing completion in New Jersey for the production of rayon yarns. The factory would be entirely mechanical, and production could be carried on for twenty-four hours a day with about three people in control, taking the place of approximately 100 workers. In Mr. Anderson's opinion, if mechanisation as the cause of unemployment and trade depression did not receive the attention it merited it might well cause more distress than all the other economic problems added together. At the present rate of progress we would soon reach a stage at which mechanised mass-production would be so perfected that vast factories would be run by a few dozen people in place of thousands. The seriousness of this warranted even the stopping of inventions for a period of years.

To Mr. Anderson's mind conditions in Canada were, if anything, worse than in England. In a back-country town he had visited there, salmon were bringing only 3 cents each, and the river was full of lumber waiting to be sawn, while the mills were idle because of huge stocks in hand. Timber was as cheap as the fish. Doubledressed "four-by-two" cost 2 dollars 50 cents a thousand feet, and shingles 1 dollar 50 cents a thousand. "My general impression was that New Zealand is really better off than other countries, though things are bad here," concluded Mr. Anderson.