SHORTER WORKING HOURS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22346, 18 February 1936, Page 15

SHORTER WORKING HOURS

Sir, —I hare to thank your three correspondents, Civis, J. Thomas and J. Johnstone, for their lett-ers in reply to mine on the above subject. What I qsked was that those who oppose the proposal for shorter hours would show how they would provide work for all who are employable, without a reduction in hours, or how, in the event of all labour and modern equipment being employed at present hours, they would provide for the profitable consumption of the resultant product. Unfortunately, none of the three attempted a reply to that. They brought forward arguments against reduced hours —but, as I have been an advocate for reduced hours for the past 20 yenrs or more, I think I nave become acquainted with all the arguments against the proposal. What the opponents do not seem to realise is that •while they argue against a reduction that reduction has already taken place, but the reduction is unfairly distributed. About a year ago there wero in the industrial and agricultural world about 30,000,000 employable workers without employment, there were 70,000 in this country whose hours of work at their ordinary employment had been reduced by 100 per cent. Some of these have been employed on various jobs called relief works, and there has been almost constant criticism of that system —and rightly so. But when some of us suggest that the necessary work might be spread a tittle more evenly among those able to do it, by means of a general reduction of hours, we are told that industry cannot stand the strain, or they work longer hours in Japan, or the farmers will be ruined. 1 say it is quite fair and logical for those who oppose shorter hours to be asked to show how we can all be employed at present hours. I have asked that repeatedly, but have not yet got an answer. Mr. Johnstone asks for the name of the authority who discovered that there was an increase of 90 per cent in the output per head in the United States in a recent period of 30 years. The authority is Professor Mills, of the National Bureau of Economic Research —and he added: "At the pre-war rate 63 years would have been required for a doubling of the individuals' share in the annual output of the country, while at the rate of increase prevailing between 1922 and 1929 such doubling would have required only 29 years." (Quoted in January circular Natural City Bank of New York.) I agree with Mr. Johnstone that our output does not exceed our wants, as he says practically all of us want better houses and furniture, better food and clothing, more education and professional services, better roads and utilities. But Mr. Johnstone knows as well as I do that these things are not produced merely because people want them; they are produced if the market can absorb them —that is, if the people can buy them. It is not enough for a man to say he wants a suit of clothes; he must also be able to pay for the clothes, otherwise he is no help to the producer of clothes. What I want to know is, how will Mr. Johnstone and the others arrange that all who are able to work 44 hours per week for, say, 50 weeks each year shall be enabled and entitled to do so. If they are really so sure that the country cannot afford for people to work less than that, they ought to be able to show clearly how the 44 hours per week for each and all of us able to do it will be arranged or provided. j Tom Bloodwobth. 1