MISERY IN GERMANY.

Colonist, Volume LVI, Issue 13598, 7 October 1914, Page 2

MISERY IN GERMANY.

All the German newspapers indicate that economic disturbances in the Fatherland are already having disastrous effect. The pinch of food scarcity is being felt in Berlin and other large towns. The "Cologne Gazette" gives a terrible picture of industrial workers' conditions in Berlin. A conference has been held at the Ministry of^, the Interior to discuss the great unemployment problem in Berlin among women. The stores have dismissed most "of their - employees, and were expected to dismiss more. Most women clerks, typists, and assistants have been discharged because their employers ore at war or "are ruined. The costume trade is at a standstill, and home workers are starving. The textile industry is suffering fearfully, and dismissing its mill workers, mostly women, by hundreds. Other factories must shut-up because the mobilisation has .taken away their male, workmen. Women who run boardinghouses or let rooms are riuned. At the conference it was complained that "ruthlessness of the rich? was reducing the employment of women unnecessarily. One town has bought £32,000 worth of foodstuffs to be sold at shops. .'lt is estimated that • there are 17,000 families," each' with three children, who.need help, which will cost the town about £10,000 a month. Each family receives 27s a month from the Imperial Treasury, and the same amount from the municipal treasury. In Berlin the labour bureaus are unable to find employment for the crowds of women who besiege them. Crowds of girls are now offering their services for board and lodging.