The Wanganui Chronicle FRIDAY, MAY 7, 1948. SAVINGS BANK DEPOSITS

Wanganui Chronicle, 7 May 1948, Page 4

The Wanganui Chronicle FRIDAY, MAY 7, 1948. SAVINGS BANK DEPOSITS

“CAVINGS Bank in the Post Office, trustee savings banks, and National Savings Accounts had increased from £60.709,000 at March, 1935, to £220,414,000 at March, 1948. The latter figure adjusted (to a 50 per cent, increase in prices) to the 1935 money value would become £147,000,0000, representing an increase in the real spending power of depositors of £86,000,000, an increase of 141 per cent.” Mr. Fraser, addressing the Labour Party Conference in Dunedin, adduced the foregoing facts, inter alia, as evidence of the great increase in the prosperity of the people The foregoing facts do not state the whole of the picture. In the first instance it must be remembered that between 1935 and 1948 there has been a very big increase in the population of New Zealand. In March, 1935, it stood at 1,554,297, and by 1946 it had increased to 1,758,004 an increase of 204,107, so the probable increase in population to date is somewhere in the region of 364,000 since 1935. The population increase can, therefore, Le set down at 20 per eent. This would account for a considerable addition to the savings accounts for they have shown a tendency to rise throughout the history of rhe Post Office Savings Bank and similar institutions. As education has increased so people have become more sensible and save their money instead of wasting it in riotous living. That is to the good but the tendency has gone on irrespective of what government was in office. To this must be added the abnormal savings made by men. young men. and women, engaged in active service during the war years. Realising that they were coming back to an uncertain world they wisely saved part of their pay to a degree beyond normal savings. The overall consideration, however, lay in the fact that imported goods did not arrive in New Zealand in sufficient quantities to permit of savings being spent in the normal way. There is consequently a plentitudc of money and savings in banks but a shortage of goods. People do not live by hoarding money; their wealth is to be discovered by what they are using and consuming. If they cannot get goods for their well-being, if they cannot get electricity in their homes, if they cannot get a, roof to cover them and must perforce hive up in rooms to the detriment of homelife and to the harm of growing children, then they are poorer than they were, notwithstanding their credit Balance in the savings bank which is losing its value day-by-day as prices rise higher and yet higher. The standard of measurement set by Mr. Fraser in respect to savings would be valid if the people's homes were stocked with the normal supply of goods; but too many people arc living under depressing conditions and going about with patched shirts and shoddy clothes for the increase in savings to be accepted as evidence of an improved condition of the workers. If men and women were actually better off today than they were in 1935 why is it that industrial disputes have resulted in an all-time high in working days lost in strikes. People do not strike because they are better off; but that is Mr. Fraser’s ease.