READY MONEY AVAILABLE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25853, 25 May 1945, Page 4

READY MONEY AVAILABLE

GREAT WAR-TIME INCREASE (P.A.) WELLINGTON, May 24. “ Ready money—the notes and coin in circulation, credit balances- -in - the trading banks and ’deposits in' the savings banks—has increased by £90,000,000 during the war period. Current incomes have expanded remarkably, though the spending outlet has been restricted, tt is not surprising, therefore, that the people of New Zealand have been able to pay war taxation, subscribe to loans of record amounts and still enjoy the comforting security of good balances in the bank,” states the National War Loan Council.

“The national income continues to expand. The wage revisions now in progress are estimated on a conservative basis to be putting into the pockets of the workers at least £10,000,000 more, and the price adjustments at the beginning of the year in connection with the British purchases of our food products will, it is stated by a competent authority, add another £3,000,000 a year to the incomes of the dairy farmers and meat producers. They have worked hard for it, because the labour on the land has not been adequate. All this income cannot be spent and therefore the district war loan committees hope to get very generous loan subscriptions from the men on the land.

The National War Loan Council has communicated with all the dairy companies of the Dominion, asking for their backing in the personal approach which is to be made to their suppliers by the district war loan committees. “The ‘ready money’ test is not the only indication of our solid prosperity and ability to finance the country's war effort. Mortgage indebtedness has been declining, at a rote never before demonstrated. In the official figures of mortgages registered and discharged up till 1944, the tendenev every year was to' borrow more money than the total repaid. The tide flowed the other way in 1942, when £500.000 more in cash was paid to redeem mortgages than was advanced as a debt against property. This movement gained impetus in the following year, when the mortgages discharged exceeded the total of those registered by over £4,500,000. There is money to spare in New Zealand for the £25,000,000 Victory Loan.”