The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1910-08-12
CAUSES OF HIGH
COST OF LIVING

The increased supply of gold toget-
her with a great expansion of banking
and credits; the waste ON military
establishments that eat up billions
AMI must be paid for by all of us
public and private extravaganza; ma
tional carelessness, and methods of
distribution of commodities that are
primitive and very costly, are the
ca Uses that the Massachusetts Com
mission gives on the cost of living
nowadays.
The report sets forth plainly that
we in the United States are at the
turning point of new epoch. We
have filled up our surplus lands with
the people we invited to citizenship.
Land now costs and must pay upon
cal ital invested. There are no long
er vast, uncounted stores of re-
sources free or very cheap, to count
on. We must become economical
and make everything count, without
waste. Shortly we will cease to ex-
port food and begin to import. Our
profits are no longer so large that
we ignore costs. Therefore, we must,
as a nation, begin to think of useless
expenditures we make, and cut them
off, for they come home to and have
to be paid for by all of us.
Particularly the report makes clear
how every man, woman and child,
and particularly the wage-earners,
those who rent ana those VINO Uuy
from hand to mouth, pay for things
that they think others pay for; how
the taxes, direct and indirect are
passed along by those who get the
bills, figuring in added costs on all
kinds that, the person who eats the
food, OF wears the cloth, or rides on
the car, finally pays in added price
How even losses by fire and the pro-
fits of useless trade customs, and
even of advertising, come from the
consumer.
Incidentally, after some figures
showing what things cost today, as
compared with a dozen years ago, the
commission gives some homely adj
Give about household expenses cut
down by buying the groceries more
carefully. These are the solemn eco
nomic facts side by side, with the
points on buying rolled oats.
OF the tariff the commission says
with regard to the tariff, the facts
that prices have fallen and risen dur
ing long periods without relation to
changes in duties. that prices have
,;o{ IN, Dr34
free trade, and that large increases
have taken place in the prices of COM
modities not appreciably affected by
the tariff, show conclusively that the
tariff is not a factor in the recent
upward movement of prices in this
country. On the other hand, how
ever, it is clear that in a period OF
rising prices like the present the
tariff cuts off possible relief to con
sumers by closing access to the
cheapest sources of supply in the
worlds markets. In the past the
duties on the necessities of common
consumption, foodstuffs, have beer
largely imperative, because the coun
try produced not only it's own fooC
supply, but a large surplus Tor eX
portation.
"The United States appears how
ever, to be approaching rapidly the
turning point, when it will become
instead of a food exporting, fooC
importing country. Under these con
ditions, as the duties on foodsUuff'
become actually operative, their eff
feet must be to increase the cost o
living to wage earners and the ex
pense of production to manufacturers
thus hampering the development o
industry and defeating the very pur
pose of the protection policy. Thu
commission is therefore OF the opin
ion that when the tariff shall furthe
be revised the expediency of remoy
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