LUXURY SPENDING

Timaru Herald, Volume CLV, Issue 22791, 15 January 1944, Page 3

LUXURY SPENDING

Boom In New York

Milling Crowds On Broadway

Broadway, New 7 York's famous “great white way,” is enjoying a prosperity unequalled even in the hectic days of the 1929 boom. It is congested with milling crowds whose only thought seems to be to get rid of dollars. Sober observers wonder where the money is coming from, says a New York correspondent of the “Melbourne Herald.”

White-collar workers, who are fighting a losing battle with the high cost of living, cannot afford night life. Servicemen, with their wives or sweethearts, constitute perhaps 40 per cent, of Broadway’s crowds, but their pockets are not limitless.

Night Life The fact remains that 53 licensed night clubs and cabarets within a mile of Times Square are catering for 226,000 persons each week. Crowds stand patiently in line for hours to get a table or seats. New York’s dozen mammoth cinemas and theatres are booked to capacity months ahead. Two hundred restaurants in the Tunes Square area are turning thousands away each night. People are no longer content to return home after supper, but go from one cabaret or bar to another until dawn. Jewellers also are profiting. Nine of the largest cities in the United States revealed that their jewellery sales had advanced 20 to 100 per cent, within the year, and yet shops report that the middle and upper classes are buying less. The busmess is coming from war workers, commission men, servicemen, all of whom are buying expensive items like watches priced at 150 to 200 dollars, and gold-plated costume jewellery at 10 to 50 dollars. Furriers report a similar demand for fur coats, which nowadays are worn by every second woman or girl. The story is not merely one of selfish extravagance heedless of the possibility of inflation, but of declining morals. America is confronted with a youth problem similar to that preoccupying social workers in Britain as uniformcrazy girls and boys, attracted by the ease with which unqualified people earn 20 to 40 dollars a week, leave home.

Gambling and Bootlegging These children in their teens present a growing problem to the authorities. Gambling and bootlegging are also spreading, although New York’s liquor supplies are estimated to be high. Record hoarding by individuals, fearing future shortages, and dealers holding out for higher prices have resulted in an artificial scarcity of whisky. As a result, bootlegging, hi-jacking and stock robberies are increasing. ■ The "Christian Science Monitor,” describing the war as “easy money war for the United States,” says: “Th» American people might be shocked to find how many pocket-books peace would hit. The majority have profited financially from the war. Many have had higher living costs without increased incomes, but for America as a whole the war has been a boom time.”