WOMEN ON FARMS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22580, 19 November 1936, Page 15

WOMEN ON FARMS

Sir. —"Chopping Block's" letter in Tuesday's Herald should compel all responsible people to realise that we in New Zealand are living in a fool's paradise. The high wages now being paid to town workers are made possible only through the virtual enslavement of land workers, men and women, more especially the latter. It is a discrace to the community and to the Government which represents it that those who produce by far the greater portion of the national wealth should do so under such unfair conditions. As to the guaranteed price paid to them it would be necessary, in order to put the dairy farm worker on an equality with the town one, for the price of butter-fat to be at least 2s 6d per lb. This being impracticable in view of our almost total dependence on a world-market price, the only sane and sound alternative is to bring the wage standard into line with the amount available from the national income—in other words, to "cut our coat according to our cloth." In these times of inflated wages, inflated prices and inflated ideas, such a warning will probably be scorned, but facts are stubborn things and have a habit of proving themselves in spite of all fancy theories based on unsound reasoning. W.M.