THE COST OF LIVING.

Manawatu Times, Volume XLIII, Issue 1661, 14 October 1920, Page 4

THE COST OF LIVING.

We were encouraged a few months ago by a temporary reduction of the Government Statistician's index figure, occurring in June, to hope that the rising tide of prices was at last beginning to recede. Accepting the Statistician's assurance that the movement of food prices presents a fairly accurate index to the movement of the prices of all commodities making up the household budget, the trend of the cost of living since July, 1914, may be briefly summarised as follows: The total increase over the period from August, 1914, down to August, 1920, has been 71.4 per cent, so that the average monthly increase has been a small fraction under one per cent. The steepest increases were near the beginning and at the very end of the six years. The three quarters in which the greatest increases have taken place have been Novem-ber-January, 1914-15, 7.57 per cent; November-January, 1916-17, 6.54 per cent; June-August, 1920, 8.22 petcent. All other quarters have been somewhere near an average of 3 per cent. The June-August quarter of the present year* has shown an exceptionally large increase, since it commenced with a decrease of 6.3 8 per cent between May and June. The increase in July was 4.58 per cent, and in August 4.02 per cent, making a rise of 8.6 per cent in two months. This represents a very marked acceleration in the rate at which prices are rising. So far as the month of August was concerned, the increase was principally due to the increased price of sugar, and a fairly substantial rise in the price of meat. The dairy produce group showed a slight fall. It may be expected that the dairy produce group will show a substantial increase during the present month on account of the 60 per cent increase in the price of butter. It would appear that the cost of living, which started to advance at a canter and subsided into a trot, has now commenced to gallop, providing a very curious commentary on the utility of methods in vogue to control prices.