King Country Chronicle. Friday, May 13, 1938. UNEMPLOYMENT AND THE FUTURE.

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXXII, Issue 4639, 13 May 1938, Page 4

King Country Chronicle. Friday, May 13, 1938. UNEMPLOYMENT AND THE FUTURE.

Though the actual unemployment position in New Zealand is unknown owing to the prevarications of the Government and the partisan criticisms of the Opposition, one thing seems to be very clear —that if the unemployment taxation is to be increased again to Is in the pound, but to be used for the social security scheme, the Government may at some future date have the greatest difficulty in finding money to meet any large scale decrease in employment. When the full unemployment figures were last issued, at the end of 1937, it was disclosed that 2229 were registered but not receiving relief, 4714 were employed on scheme No. 5, 18,110 were on sustenance and not performing any work, and 11,397 were in full-time subsidised employment. The total included in the classes mentioned was 36,450. There seems to be no reason to assume that the figure has dropped to any great extent since this full survey of the position was quoted. On top of that New Zealand has over 20,000 public works employees, who, as are the unemployed, are dependent upon taxation returns for their wages. History has shown these that taxation returns are by no means constant, and few will deny the assertion that the national income, from which taxation is drawn, is unlikely to go much higher than the present level. What, however, if that income should drop? Apparently only a small proportion of the Is in the pound tax would be available for the relief of unemployment, and to increase that tax over Is would be a virtual impossibility. Other tax yields would be also reduced. Besides the many who would be pushed out of private employment, and the present unemployed, the Government would still be faced with the problem of finding employment for the 20,000 men on public works. Could it do this at the standard rates ruling at present, and could it provide reasonable conditions for an everincreasing army of workless, when the revenue from the emergency tax for unemployment is diverted to other purposes, however laudable? The Government has virtually confessed through its reticence that it has found it impossible to solve the problem of finding work for everybody even during a period, of peak prosperity; what of the less prosperous times? The position of the United States has shown us it is impossible to find prosperity through Government spending, and the people will want to know, failing satisfaction as to the plans for the guarding of the Dominion from economic blizzards, how these blizzards are to be weathered when they arrive.