Why Living Costs More.

Begin with food, It may be said to consist of variously—beef, milk, Hour, potatoes, sugar, mutton, bread, oatmeal, eggs, pork, butter, rice, tea. The Registrar-General found that, taking all these necessaries, there was a rise in 12 years of 18.6 per cent. What has caused this rise? There have been as there always are with respect to the price of necessaries several causes. Wheat, oats, milk, potates, meat—remember how seasons good and bad—drought—shortages due to market flotations and other causes affect these commodities—remember also that the wages of farm labour have not and do not vary greatly from decade to decade, and one must surely admit that to unhesitatingly conclude that the increased price of these commodities is due to wages having been raised in a number of industries by the Arbitration Court is somewhat unreasonable. But there is a further consideration and that is the prices our export of food stuffs have been obtaining in Britain and foreign markets. These prices are plainly not effected by our cost of production—by the wages we are paying here, but by the competition and by supply and demand in the world's markets.