Unemployment

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19334, 26 May 1937, Page 7

Unemployment

Sir,—Everyone agrees upon the necessity for baekblock's roads, ami gives Ihe (iovernment credit for deciding to undertake this necessary work. There is. however, much room for objection to the policy of making public works the chief method of relieving unemployment. At the present lime a great deal ol unnecessary main mad work is being done, and";! staggeringly large number ill' men employed. In fact, public works r iiils fair to become New Zealand's staple industry, a stale of affairs thai will cripple' Ihe Dominion for \ynrs. To lake out of work men and put I hem on in such jobs is not solving the tinetii plovmenl problems; it. is but intensifying it. and hatching chickens which will come home to roost as very vigorous hens in the near future. As a matter of fact, the present Government has not relieved the unemployment position t'o any great extent. It has merely increased taxation in order to obtain money to employ men on public works, many of which are unnecessary and uneconomic, increased the army of State servants, and is paying huge sums of money out to sustenance men for doing nothing. At the same time. fanners are calling out for men. and other jobs are offering which sustenance men will not fake because they say it would not pay them. Public works cannot last for ever and ill addition to that there is a limit to the ability ol any country to find money for such things. Tim's in a very short period, the unemployment position will be worse than ever it was. The only true solution of unemployment, is to get men back into industry ;m(1 llnt .il that is done the (lovernment cannot, claim to have even touched the fringe of the problem.—Yours, etc. s "COMMON SENSE.