PEOPLE’S COLUMN

Northern Advocate, 18 January 1936, Page 3

PEOPLE’S COLUMN

[Our columns are open to the public for the discussion of matters of public concern. We invite correspondence but do not identify ourselves with the views expressed by our correspondents. Letters must be written in ink and on one side of the paper only. The real name and address of the writer must be attached to a letter, not necessarily for publication, but ns a mark of good faith.—Rd, j FARMING COSTS

Sir.—Your correspondent, Mr. J. Crompton’s latest letter regarding costs fairly reeks with inaccuracies and irregularities. In the first place he contended that if cost of production was reduced in this country it would be the salvation of the industry. I tried to point out to him that lowering costs would only leave a greater trail of misery and hardship than it already had done in the past, and that there were greater problems to face than this. I endeavoured to point out to him that our greatest problem was not to base the consuming power of our producers, which of course ultimately means the great majority of our people, upon oversea payments. , I pointed out that no matter how productive our land, or how industrious our people, our standard of living in this country was based upon the prices which the portion of our goods sent overseas fetches. In other words, the amount of our own food we produce in our own country we can eat is based on whatever we can sell our surpls for. Surely ,a ridiculous position. Your correspondent, however, apparently still thinks this is as it should be, and Advocates reducing costs and our standard of living further to compete on an overcrowded market. He says we can reduce costs by making industries fight their own way to prosperity (I would say to bankruptcy, under the present economics). Now, why did the late deceased Government abolish the Arbitration Court? To accomplish this very thing. And did it suc-

ceed? It succeeded in lowering the purchasing power of the people and brought misery and hardship upon the workers, including the farmers themselves, ultimately. His statement that if purchasing power was doubled our people would not eat much more of the good things we produce is utter cot. Surely he must have read the statements of the Rev. Martin, of Wellington, who lived among the unemployed for three weeks and saw men going to work with dry bread —and this in a land where we could pile butter mountains high. Does he remember the case in Otago, about six months ago, where a woman died of starvation in an endeavour to feed her four children. The doctor at the inquest said there was no edible thing in the house when he called —and this in a land rich in everything the heart 3f man desires (but poor in the easiest created thing of all, i.e., money). Reducing costs, upon which your correspondent pins so much faith, helped to do these very things, and the farmer suffers ultimately. The statement that wages were not based on oversea prices is too absurd for words, and hardly needs contradiction. This was the very reason advanced for the abolition of the Arbitration Court. He would reduce taxation and Government costs to help reduce farmers’ costs, and at the same time abolish tariffs —yes. and at one stroke put 66,000 of our people engaged in secondary industries on the dole, and allow our country to be swamped with Asiatic goods at the same time. A peculiar way of reducing taxation! Where would the saving go? Your correspondent states that -farmers’ prices are down 40 per cent, and wages are on the 1929 level. I strongly doubt the latter statement, but, assuming his figures are cbrrect, and remembering that after the abolition of the Arbitration Court employers forced wages down as low as possible in an endeavour to reduce costs, I think he has condemned his own argument regarding the possibility of further reducing costs, and must look for a remedy elsewhere. Regarding the statement that if purchasing power was increased we might buy Asiatic goods, your correspondent must know that the reason we buy Japanese goods is because our people are in such desperate straits that they must buy the cheapest goods. Incidentally, he must also know the reason the Japs can sell so cheap is because their internal price level is not based upon export prices. Does not this suggest a cure of our troubles to Mr Crompton? To summarise the position, Mr Crompton would endeavour to lower costs in some vague way, thereby reducing the purchasing power of the people, and encourage repudiation of contracts, etc., and at the same time, stir up class hatred in an. endeavour to make the export of our produce a paying proposition. I maintain that a nation’s first consideration is to feed its own people by the adjustment of internal purchasing power and internal prices, and if its people are industrious, and their country productive, their surplus production could be sent away in exchange for the goods I they cannot economically produce. A I country with a high volume of export j per head of population does not necesj sarily denote a rich country (examples; New Zealand and Ireland) and a country with a low average export, means a rich country (example: America). So why bother reducing costs (at such a cost) to accomplish an objective which will have the above effects. Finally, your correspondent’s statement comparing the good marketing facilities of Ireland and New Zealand, when New Zealand is on th£ other Side of the world and Ireland

right at her customers’ back door, is beyond comment. —I am; etc.,

“REFORM.” Mangapai,