COST OF LIVING.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XXXVII, Issue 8362, 28 July 1920, Page 3

COST OF LIVING.

NATIONAL THRIFT THE REMEDY. It would be futile (stated tbe Prime Minister in his Budget Speech in the House last evening) to attempt to review the whole of the causes of the increased cost of living, which constitutes a world-wide problem which aii Governments are at present actively engaged in attempting to solve. Where the supply of goods falls short of the demand high prices aije inevitable; and reduced production, from whatever cause it may arise, in tensities the difficulty. The extent t which the Government can successfully arrest rises in prices in such circumstances constitutes a complex question, but active measures for the limitation of profits have been adopted, and these will be continued and strengthened. A wave of extravagance has undoubtedly followed in the wake of the war, and people must realise that if they spend over-freely they raise prices against themselves. By practising thrift one of the im-

portant causes of the rise in prices may be checked. It can still be claimed by this Donffnion that, we are better off than any other part of the world not only in respect of food prices, but in the general level of prices. The Board of Trade has controlled the prices of such. essential commodities as wheat, flour, bread, butter, sugar, meat, milk, groceries, benzine, timber, and cement, as regards meat, the price has practically remained constant - during the last three years, and no complaints have been received as th excessive prices. By means of this control consumers have been saved many thousands of pounds. The conserving of food and clothing supplies grown and manufactured in the Dominion, lias been effective in checking the export of commodities needed in the Dominion. This prohibition included such articles as jam, sugar, bacon, hams, pork, leather, footwear, and manufactured woollen goods. The chief cause of complaint centres round the enormous increase in the prices of imported goods, over which no control can lie exercised beyond ensuring that profits made in New Zealand are not unreasonable.