US Presidency
1943

It has been the objective of this Government to reduce that hardship, to obtain for miners and for all who do the nation's work a better standard of living. I know only too well that the cost of living is troubling the miners ' families, and troubling the families of millions of other workers throughout the country as well. A year ago it became evident to all of us that something had to be done about living costs. Your Government determined not to let the cost of living continue to go up as it did in the first World War. Your Government has been determined to maintain stability of both prices and wages so that a dollar would buy, so far as possible, the same amount of the necessities of life. And by necessities I mean just that not the luxuries, not the ( and ) fancy goods that we have learned to do without in wartime.