odor ee Wi; ROGER: WORTH. For the. “LS. million . unemployed Canadians, and a great many others, Six and Five is. something of a bad joke... Six and Five, of course, is the slogan created -.by-.the promotion and _ advertising . people in the nation's capital to exemplify Ottawa's efforts nore iS ger ‘stnitements during oe on scaactly how ‘the “enterprises, "for example “would be over-joyed- if they S achieved a six percent. in-» “crease in earnings, or were: “able: to: pay. their employees. that | : the needed. $60 jmillion ack are ® Aayotis or — y wns ape - ene ‘be for. teachers to. rent 17% hike as a basis for “but work, this year, for a ‘THE. SOLUTION to. the current: depression — ~ - to: unemployment, business ‘bankruptcies, lagging, productivity, _ZeTO ‘growth, | “horrendous ..govern- — ment deficits;-the lot — is as closeas your personal ‘: capital: “Canada for: more’ lucrative “fields: and the . dollar. wilt osedive once | more. : fos Display Advertising © 980-0511 north shore ‘Classified Advertising 986-6222: rn ews ‘Newsroom 985-2131 Circulation ~ 986-1337 1139 Lonsdale Ave., North Vancouver, B.C. V7M 2H4 Publisher Peter Speck Associate Publisher Editor-in-Chief Advertising Director Robert Graham Noel Wright Tim Francis General Manager, Administration & Personnel Mrs. Berni Hilliard Circulation Director Brian A. Ellis North Shore News, founded in 1969 as an independent community newspaper and qualified under Schedute fli, Part Ill, Paragraph il) of the Excise Tax Act, is published each Wednesday and Sunday by North Shore Free Presa Utd. and distributed to evary door on the North Shore, Second Class Mail Registration Number 3685. Entire contents “-¢ 1982 North Shore Free Press Lid. All rights reserved. Subscriptions, North and West Vancouver, $25. per year Malling rates available on request. No responsibility accepted tor unsolicited material including manuscripts and pictures which should be accompanied by a stamped, addressed onvolope VERIFIED CIRCULATION 54,643 Wednesday; 54,003 Sunday i Rie SnN% oF conned THIS PAPER IS RECYCLABLE “ thousands reasons why the little sign of letting up. That's the message in a ‘Financial. Post article last. '; week by former North Vancouver MLA. and retired | B.C. Liberal leader Gordon . At you're. keeping. a. few.. i hundreds “Or. “quietly,” stashed away for a’ ‘rainy day, you're one of the | ‘present: ‘downpour of bad news shows | Gibson. In 900 words he woes than most of the other billions of words written and... spoken on the subject to: date. Mr. Gibson’s main thesis . is what this column also has. been arguing consistently: : the only ‘way out of the mess és to bring down interest rates, Six-and-five restraint, he says, is O.K. for starters in’ the battle against inflation. But six-and-five alone isn’t going to get anything ac- - tually moving -- and until business and. industry do begin to move again, no lasting relief is in sight.’ Which ‘brings us back to. your and: my little’ savings account, “AWASHIN SAVINGS” Mr. Gibson notes the hoary official argument that, df interest. rates are not kept | points | talks more horse sense about. a cure for our economic. . gs account at your friendly” neighborhood. < | -bank or credit union. : high, governments will not find capital forthcoming to fund their deficits and keep vital services (among them, unemployment — insurance, welfare, health and education) operating. No . longer true, he says. * Personal savings today are running at an incredible 10.4 per cent of personal income --, nearly two percentage higher than. the average of the past cight years. That increase alone, he calculates, is cnough.to ~. cover Ottawa’s entire $20 billion. annual. deficit three. times over. ‘In:short, the nation hasn’ t. any true deficit at all. Ax Mr, Gibson puts it, we're literally “awash in savings and liquidity”. The trouble is that high interest rates prevent those savings from doing any useful work.,. Interest rates are bankrupting the people compelled to borrow at today's 16 per cent or higher (mortgage slaves and businesses desperate for immediate tash flow), They are discouraging other - businesses from borrowing at all — and, therefore, from expanding and creating new jobs... Nothing, of course, stops | governments from reduced = rates, x e bortowing because it's ine | taxpayers who meet the usurious interest rates. Yet, here again, every one per cent drop in those rates is worth about a $1 billion ‘reduction in Ottawa's . deficit. And by the same token, cach one per cent decline adds about: five per cent to the pre-tax profits of industry. 70% CAPACITY Ah, says Bank of Canada governor Gerald Bouey, but by casing credit, will fuel inflation and send interest levels boundin upward again. Moreover, if rates fall below those in the ~ No - Gibson: , “ proposition. Noel Wright. | to “othe first With industrial capacity presently lagging at | under, 70.\per cent, there's plenty of slack to be taken up without any early risk of further inflation. = + As to fleeing capital and a weakening dollar, the simple ‘answer is’ a period-. of _ modified exchange ‘controls, such. as ‘numerous. ‘other ‘countries have imposed at F ' various times without: their economies. suffering serious long term damage. . The only people who are_ going to be jolted for the’ moment -- on paper -- are we savings account types. If - lending rates dropped to. 10 per cent, we'd wind up ~ earning only six or seven per _ cent instead of the current 13-14 per, ‘cent credited nomthly ‘to’ our little blue and green books, How could we afford that loss? | . We could afford it ‘fine. We'd also be paying four to five por cent less on mor- tgages and credit cards. Prices would stabilize | because businesses would be paying four or five per cent less to operate. Government deficits would © shrink. Unemployment and welfare costs would drop as new jobs opened up, Anyone got a better idea about how to make those billions in personal | savings part of the solution instead of part of the probl¢m?