2 WESTERN CANADIAN LUMBER WORKER 2nd Issue, July, 1961 Prices Never Come Down Free Enterprise Killing Itself By Profiteering Editor's note: While we do not always agree with Mr. Philpott's political yiews we most cer- tainly agree with him on the importance of proper legislation to take care of the needs of the Canadian people. When I was a boy Canadians used to say, “What goes up must come down. We know better nowadays. We have seen with our own eyes that some things go up, but never come down. The price of bread, for instance. Or the price of coffee, tea, sugar, gaso- line, shoes, shirts, or what-have-you. Ve are supposed to live under a free enterprise economy. But about the only thing that is still free is the freedom for the owners of the system to soak their own customers, both coming and going. Take a good long look at what happened when our Tory government recently deliberately depreciated the Canadian dollar. Before you could say Jack Robinson the government- appointed wheat board jacked up the price of wheat and wheat flour to Canadian consumers. Please note it is not the Americans, Russians, Poles, Czechs or Red Chin- ese who will now have to pay more for Canada’s wheat. No, the custo- mers who are to get it in the neck are the always-uncomplaining Ca- nadians. One highly-priced spokesman for the big bakery chains declared, within hours after Mr. Fleming’s budget speech that, because of the rise in the price of flour, the price of bread would also have to be boosted by one cent per loaf. True, there was a hitch in the price- hoist. Mr. Fleming plaintively told Parliament that the increase in the price of flour would only account for an extra cost of one-eighth of a cent per loaf. But it later turned out that the spokesman knew his bread-price: trends better than did Mr. Fleming. Ox-Like Public What intrigues me is the cynical contempt for the public shown by the government, by the government-ap- pointed boards, and by the big busi- ness corporations. But why not? The ox-like Canadian public swallows without a word o organized protest the insulting expla- nation that the price of Canadian wheat-flour must be jacked up be- cause our government has deliber- ately debased the value of our dollar. If that is true, how was it that the wheat board never cut the domestic price of wheat flour in the long years when our dollar commanded a pre- mium over the American? Or if you want another example take a look at what happened when the American government tangled with Castro in Cuba, and cut off the huge U.S. purchases of sugar from that island. A simple Canadian, reared in the years when the so-called law of sup- ply and demand was supposed to govern Prices, might have expected that sugar prices would immediately come down in Canada. Actually, prices increased in eastern Canada. Oh, I know that. in the past few weeks Castro’s agents have begun to sell directly on the Canadian mar- ket, and the eastern refineries are hollering bloody murder. e see the strange paradox of Cas- tro’s alleged Communists actually be- ing the last practitioners of classic free enterprise. But even so, those sugar prices are as slow as molasses in coming down in Canada. The famous Canadian-born Har- vard economist, Professor Galbraith, explains in his book, The Affluent Society, how the big corporations ap- ply new slick tricks in jacking up prices to the public. The most fre- quent device is to stage a prolonged gvunt-and-groan wrestling match with From Page 1 “Meany” reluctance because of his respect for the medical profession. Extreme Position The fact remains, he said, that the AMA’s advertising “has taken a.really extreme position” in describing the Anderson-King bill as one-to “inject the government into every consulta- tion room, deprive Americans of free choice. of doctors, to dictate the pat- tern of health care.” Meany said the judgment of Con- gress on -the Anderson-King bill should be based on three factors— whether a problem exésts in regard to medical costs to older people, whether effective remedies are avail- able outside the social security sys- tem, and whether the proposed plan of the bill is sound and workable. Health Study A study published by the Brookings Institution, he continued, recently pointed out that the medical costs of the aged appeared to average about one-third of their income, whereas existing insurance plans provided no more than one-sixth of the coverage for those who carried policies and met “only about one-fourteenth of the total medical costs for the aged as a whole.” The Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans have built-in obstacles, Meany said, and even union-sponsored health plans have found themselves unable to meet the cost of providing hospi- talization of their own retired mem- bers. DUNCAN BUSINESS GUIDE Duncan Lake Cowichen LOUTET AGENCIES LTD. INSURANCE AND REAL ESTATE J.- Lindsay Loutet Gordon R. Loutet 131 Jubilee St. S. Shore Road HANEY BUSINESS GUIDE ESQUIRE MEN’S WEAR (Graham Mowatt) Complete Stock of Work and Dress Clothing “THE STORE WITH THE POPULAR BRANDS” HANEY BRITISH COLUMBIA PORT ALBERNI Phone 2600 WOODWARD STORES (PORT ALBERNI) LTD. “YOUR FAMILY SHOPPING CENTRE” Closed Monday All Day BUSINESS GUIDE MacGREGOR’S MEN’S WEAR For Everything A Man Wears * WORK, SPORT or DRESS * We Can Afford To Sell The... BEST For LESS! Hours: 9 - 5:30 By Elmer Philpott the unions representing the employ- ees. Price Boosted Galbraith does not say, but cer- tainly hints, that some of these dis- putes are as scandalously faked as are wrestling matches. Be that as it may, the disputes are finally settled. Then almost before the ink is dry on the new wage contract, the price of the product is boosted. But, as Galbraith clearly shows, the corporations rarely boost the price merely to the extent justified by the actual wage increase. The wage in- crease is just a convenient cover-up for price hold-ups which make the activities of old fashioned highway- men look amateur. Our Western civilization is not really beaten by the Communists, in either cold or hot wars, big or little. It is really committing suicide, be- cause those who talk about free en- terprise do not themselves believe in it. They rig markets, prices, and in dozens of new ways flagrantly violate their own boasted principles. School Kids Won In my whole lifetime in Canada I have only seen one example where Canadian consumers did something about the price hold-ups. It was just after the Hitler war. The price controls which had worked so well in the war were taken off. The price of the candy bar promptly went up from five to seven cents. Then the school-kids of Canada put their own fathers and mothers, uncles, aunts and cousins to shame. They spontaneously went on a buyers’ strike right across Canada. So effective was the boycott that within a matter of weeks the price of the candy bar came back down again to the nickel. True, those kids had no chance in the long run. The manufacturers beat them in the end by cutting down on the size of the candy inside the wrap- per. But think it over, chum; over. think it —Vancouver Sun Farm Cash Sales Up Cash income from the sale of farm products totalled a record $651 million in the first quarter of 1961, the bureau of statistics reported. The January-March figure com- pared with income of $598.2 million a year earlier and the former quarter record of $635.1 million. The bureau attributed the increase over 1960 income to larger returns for wheat, flaxseed, tobacco, hogs and eggs. It said these more than offset lower revenues from potatoes, and cattle and calves. BS SW ; SM ep one = weeee So ae a! Time You're Ready, John! Hoesil Oe “AS WE BEGIN TO TURN THE CORNER, CANADA WILL BE IN A BETTER POSITION . . ronto Star Archer Claims Government U..C. Probe “Way To Get Off Hook” The setting up of a four-man Royal Commission to probe the Unemployment Insurance Act is the first move by the govern- ment to get off the hook it got itself on, according to David Archer, president of the Ontario Federation of Labour. The Commifesion is made up of two insurance company executives and two economists. The failure Ss the federal government to name trade unionist to the Commie ae been duly noted by the Canadian Labour Congress and trade union leaders across Canada. U.I. Fund Neglect The OFL president pointed out that the government was under strong attack in the House of Com- mons during the spring session for neglect and mismanagement of the U.I. fund which held over $900 mil- lion in 1956 and is below the $150 million mark today. The rapid depletion of the fund was predicted by the Unemployment Insurance Commission, on which labour is represented, which called for more substantial contributions from the federal treasury to cover the ab- normal unemployment rate and the addition of categories, such as fisher- men, which have also made heavy inroads into the fund. Insult to Labour The failure to name a union rep- resentative has been described by the Toronto Star as an insult to Can- ada’s labour movement. “Nobody is more interested in the unemployment insurance system than labour,” said a Star editorial. “Nobody has a bigger stake in its proper func- tioning.” The Star suggested that the Die- fenbaker government had reneged on its 1957 election promise to give labour adequate representation on all boards and commissions dealing with labour’s interests. The trade union movement, the paper noted, was represented on the Unemployment Insurance Commis- sion and its advisory committee, but was ignored when it came to a thor- oughgoing examination of the sys- em’s weaknesses Included on the Royal Commission are Ernest Gill, president of Canada Life, Etienne Crevier, president of Provident Assurance, and economists J. Deutsch, vice-principal of. . Queen’s University and J. R. Petrie of Montreal. Labour Found Most Honest The AFL-CIO secretary-treasurer Surety Association, which sets rate standards for the nation’s bonding companies, is offering the trade union movement “the lowest honesty fidelity bonding rate in America”. The association, he said, found that the trade union movement has the best bonding experience in America, including “all of. business, all banks, all fraternal organizations announced that the American AFL-CIO News CoPpyYricur free home delivery This advertisement is not published or displayed by the Liquor Control Board or by the Government of British Columbia. | y *