PRICES SOARING.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 16448, 31 May 1919, Page 10

PRICES SOARING.

. NO PROSPECT OF FALL. WHAT SYDNEY FIRMS SAY. The .good old pre-war times of cheap prices are gone, nevertto return Isays tlie Sydney Daily Tdlegraph). We may bid them a long farewell. - Nothing will ever be as cheap as it was. There exists a vague hope in the heart of the housewife that if she only waits a little while the price of dress materials and the hundreds of other things in which she is keenly interested will fall to approximately the level of Jier purse. She had better not wait. Take the case of some of the chief staples used in clothing. Wool, Judged by the reports: of the latest London sales, is .steadily, increasing in price. An increase of 5 or 10 per cent, is shown. Cotton is in Just as bad a v ay. The war kept cotton down; for four years there have been short crops in America. The Southern cotton fa i raers in the United States have made up their collective minds to hold their present crop until they can sell for at? least 30 cents a x>ound, and also to reduce their 1919 cotton acreage by one-tl-ird. Cotton, they say,-cannot be produced at present market quotations and allow the farmers the right sort of livelihood. They are thoroughly organised. It sounds kike a threat of another Southern rebellion. If you do not buy cotton goods now you will not be to got them af anything like the present price hereafter. At :uy rate, that is what the people who grow cotton in America say. FLAX FIBRE SHORTAGE. AVhat about linen? Flax fibre is normally obtained from Ireland, Belgium, Gernany, and Russia. The main supply has for many years been raised in -Russia near- the German border. Russia can confidently be ruled out as a main source of supply. The Boh shevik cotton farmer has more absorbing inlci-ofst. Belgium and - Germany are in a similar situation. There remain Ireland and parti, of Scotland. But the Irish 'supply is quite insufficient for a world supply, and every item of producing costs has increased. • There is little hope of a bettor sup® ply of any of these staples in the near future; though Australian wool, if manufactured in Australia, should, one would think, decrease in price. But that time is not jet. “Now that peace Js signed?” says the housewife hopefully. But" peace, as has been seen, will make no immediate difference an prices. WORLD OVERSTOCKED. Sydney firms are riot hopeful. There ere generally admitted to'be vast soteks of goods in the warehouses and in tho shops bought at pre-war or war prices. The business men were practically forced ,to purchase those stocks. And tho .same over-stocking prevails nqt only throughout Australia, but alt ever the world. • And not only have they these highly-priced stocks, hut more are on order; and they are compelled to take delivery at war prices. With all these stocks waiting to bo unloaded, extreme car© must be taken by both wholesale and retail houses" that no financial crisis occurs, which would react upon all sections of the public. This over-stocking is causing vast capital suras to lie idle, with loss of interest .and prpfit charges.

CHEAPER THAN IN LONDON. One large retail lions© says that, despite the cry about high prices, the public in Sydney to-day can buy goods more cheaply than they are being bought in London. The local prices for imported cotton and wool goods are lower than the present London quotations. On imported goods customs duty has to be paid, not on the prices pain for them on purchase, but on , the prices i tiling at the time they reach here—probably many months after purchase. An article bought at 16s duty has on occasion to be paid on 48s. < Naturally the shops blame the customs for adding .its burden' to prices. The rise in wages and the increased working expanses duo to industrial legislation are also' blamed. Yet it is a fact that certain firms have made big profits diping the war. The reason is explained Try one house as being due to better management. Thotign the gross profit is at ’a lower I ate than before’, by turning over of the stock more often during the year there has resulted a greater aggregate profit. Whatever the specific flooal and general causes, there , underlies all these the general rise in the price of living, with which the rise in wages is intimately connected. That in itself is sufficient to sound the doom of the days'of cheap buying and cheap selling.