N.Z. Cost Of Living Is Below That Of Countries He Has Visited Overseas

Wanganui Chronicle, 31 October 1950, Page 6

N.Z. Cost Of Living Is Below That Of Countries He Has Visited Overseas

PARLIAMENT BLDGS, Last Night (PA). —“I return to New Zealand happily convinced that there are many blessings we can sount, and not the least of these is the fact that the cost of living this country is infinitely less than in any of the countries I have risited during the past weeks,” said the Minister of External Af-

fairs (Mr. Doidge) tonight. He arrived in Wellington this afternoon from Auckland and reported to Cabinet tonight the results of his overseas mission. Mr Doidge visited Britain, France, the United States and Canada, and in each of those countries said he found a common domestic problem almost transcending in interest, if not i m " portance, the question of peace or war—the cost of living. The problem had developed with frightening rapidity. Governments everywhere admitted their concern and none, it seemed, was on its way to finding a complete answer to it.

equivalent to £72 in New Zealand money. There was an actual labour shortage in the United States, said Mr Doidge. Four million people had been added to the working force since the beginning of the year, and factory wages were at record heights. Employees were earning five dollars a week more than they did a year ago. “Canada’s story is one of booming prosperity,’’ said the Minister. He was told that Canada’s population had increased by 3,000,000 in the past ten years, and that in the same period her gross national production had climbed from 51 billion dollars to 17 billion dollars.

“Britain has made immense strides toward economic recovery,” continued Mr Doidge. “There is no unemployment, the ravages of war are fast being repaired, and the spirit of the people is high. There is, not unnaturally, an ever-present concern over the international situation, but the real fear in the mind of the average man and woman relates to the steady increase in the cost of living.” The Minister said that meals cost at least twice as much in London as in Wellington, and drinks and tobacco often three times as much. A quitesimple meal in Paris averaged £2 a head, and even more disturbing and spectacular was the manner in which the cost of living had rocketed in the United States.

Despite the evidence of prosperity, Governments were at their wits' end to avoid inflation and stem the rise in living costs, said Mr Doidge. “In the United States it is considered that there is a desperate need to bring about a contraction in the inflated volume of purchasing power, and with this end in view the Federal Reserve Board has been tightening the conI sumer credit restriction screw. Pay- ! ments on goods, including motor-cars, 'have to be completed in 15 months.” In Britain there was equal anxiety over the inflationary trend, and its effect on the cost of living. The trouble was regarded as due to two causes—the delayed effects of deflation and world-wide advances in commodity prices intensified by the new defence programme. “The Canadians think they have the answer to the problem,” said Mr Doidge. “They are ploughing back more than 20 per cent of their earnings into production expansion and new developments.”

Mr Doidge said that in New York a breakfast cost 12s 6d and a steak nearly £2 in New Zealand currency. A raincoat cost about £l6, and a United Nations delegate had told him that a tailor-made suit cost almost the