PRODUCTIVITY AS A GUIDE TO WAGES
Through defective presentation the Government has allowed the wages pause to be interpreted as involving a substantial sacrifice by all concerned, and especially by those least able to afford it. The very reverse is true. In fact, substantial benefits would accrue to everybody by maintaining existing wages levels, because if this were done for a reasonable time, real earnings, or purchasing power, would improve. And if thereafter reasonable restraint were exercised in asking for, or giving, wages increases, there would be a real hope of recapturing the habit of price reduction and so of still further improving purchasing power.