LABOUR AND CURRENCY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21515, 12 June 1933, Page 13

LABOUR AND CURRENCY

Sir, —In seeking for the solution of present-day problems we must recognise that there has been, more especially since the armistice, a useful departure from the normal relationship of labour and currency. If the rules of the game are observed this relationship easily adjusts itself, but any serious infiaction of these rules upsets the delicate balance that creates a fair distribution of commodities and currency and gives place to the lamentable condition that now dismays the human family everywhere. Let us consider how this disaster has taken shape. Earned currency will always adjust itself to the needs of the workers. But unearned currency will upset the applecart for this reason. Paper currency is false currency, without tho backing of real value (such as gold, which, of course, is gathered by labour, and is itself earned currency). To thrust into what was a currency of real value and stability that which is false causes a .disturbance in tho labour market. For instance, false paper money can create an abundance, but if (through fear) this paper money is withdrawn and destroyed, we are left without any purchasing power for the abundance. Inflation, it is needless to say, is closely related to false currency and is a contributing factor to our downfall. The only solution then to our present-day perplexities is for tho nations to cast out these false values and discourage all such things as have been thus created, for what has been created by false currency requires similar currency for its maintenance. For instance, innumerable motor-cars and the rapid and uncontrolled strides of science have largely excited an expenditure of currency that is largely false, and robbed the labour market of tho right to a livelihood. Turn to the Scriptures and read Genesis iii., 19. False currency has deprived many millions of men of the right to a living wage, and has thus brought about a wilful disobedience to Divino law, which demands for real value the right to sustenance, and such disobedience inevitably brings confusion. It would seem then, if we expect to enjoy life, that tho nations must scrap all forms of self-indulgence and earn their daily bread by the sweat of the face, as it was in the beginning. J. A. Burnett.