SUBSIDIES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27345, 22 March 1950, Page 6

SUBSIDIES

Sir,—lt is comforting to find that my letter on subsidies has to some extent opened “ Matilda’s ” eyes to the real nature of the private profit system which he supports so valiantly. A step or two further along would put him in a position to see other important things. He would, no doubt, realise that the flair he imputes to me for contradicting myself is really in the system itself, which is full of contradictions. He might also learn that the twin evils of inflation and depreciation of the - currency, which he harks so much upon, are caused by the major contradictions of world-wide overspending on destruction and under-spend-ing on construction, and he. might then begin to feel that he had been rather rash in blaming them so scathingjy on to a small political party at the far end of the globe. Continuing this interesting line of inquiry, he might find that surplus production is contradicted by underconsumption, unemployment and want; that shortage of man-power is contradicted by wage. stabilisation and price control, which, in turn, are contradicted by the need for excess profit taxation, and that the prevalence of excess profit in business is contradicted by the need of subsidies on consumer purchases of necessities. x In short, it is, perhaps, not too much to hope that “ Matilda,” by an honest approach to this matter, will finaUy reach the only possible conclusion, that the endless series of contradictions that abound in the private profit system have a common source in the apotheosis of greed.—l am, etc., , ' Rattar.

[As the correspondence has strayed from the point, no further letters will be printed.—Ed., ODT.] ,