THE WORKING OF THE M'KINLEY TARIFF.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 1889, 27 April 1892, Page 6

THE WORKING OF THE M'KINLEY TARIFF.

The American people have had a year's experience of the M'Kinley tariff, and the recent State elections show that they are no more reconciled to it than they were in the first month after its enactment. The two chief bulwarks of American protection have been the conviction among the artisans that it raises wages and the difficulty that farmers have had in understanding that it raises prices. On these two points, however, experience is proving to be a most effective school. The rise of prices which followed the passing of the Act was palpable, and could not be ignored nor explained away. Nearly everything became dearer, and the advance is equivalent to about two-thirds of the increased duty. A list carefully prepared in Boston of the prices of 112 articles in common use showed that things on which the duty was increased 30 per cent, are 20 per cent, dearer than they were a year ago. It is the same all over the Union ; and all purchasers have thus an object lesson in Freetrade. They cannot help seeing that it is they who pay the duty, and not the foreigner. The farmers, who are taxed on everything they buy, and have to sell in a freetrade market nearly all that they produce, naturally feel this increase of the burden more than others. They have in these twelve months made the discovery that they are the worst sufferers from tariffs, and they will not unlearn the lesson. But others are feeling it, Boston and New York people pay more for tbeir clothes, tbeir furniture, their bedding, their cutlery and all the manufactured articles they use. They might be content to pay this increased price if it was universally felt that the industrial classes were better off. But wages have not increased ; in some industries they have diminished. The new tariff has, in fact, entirely failed to revive industry.