FARM LABOUR

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21868, 2 August 1934, Page 13

FARM LABOUR

Sir, —In tho publication of my last letter a context which would have explained my position as to thinking in goods was ruled out. If a universal minimum wage of 16s per day would purchase exactly the amount of necessities—other things besides food and clothing, of course —each at a stipulated price, that the purchaser is entitled to, then a quarter of that amount, viz., 4s per day, should purchase the same goods at a quarter the price. Goods or services. It's only a sum in simple proportion. Everything, from a penny tram rido to the interest on overseas debts, reduced abruptly to a quarter. Theoretically, it sounds all right; just how would it work out in practice? Wages are to be attacked first, ruthlessly and by force, because wages can only be paid out of production or services, to skill or efficiency. The cost of living, the price the hapless wage-earner has to pay for his own production or services can be safely trusted to the tender mercies of the vendors, who can control the prices. The only reason some people do not invent an excuse for raising these prices here and now is because they know they could not transact business if they raised them another penny. According to the impressions Mr. Vaile conveys, the most well-to-do in the land are the wageearners, sheltered under arbitration. Logically, then, they are the owners of the "multitudes of motor-cars, the flash bungalows, and of all the evidences of wealth and prosperity we see around us. I know that chaff should bo cheaper in Ashburton, where it is produced in large quantities, than in Auckland, where it is not produced at all;, that is, given the demand in Auckland is as great, which it is not. A person resident in Auckland does .his shopping in Auckland, and not in Ashburton or Oamaru. There is no need for a worker to be acquainted with market quotations to know whether he can afford to pay the price asked, or whether he cannot. His own common sense tells him that one thing is cheap or that another is dear. J. Orr.