Category Archives: History

Word War II and Post War Reconstruction

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As part of a project into the history and development of Australian currency I have written a little more of the events that took place over WWII that led to Australia’s post war reconstruction. The events start at the end of the thirties and go through to just before the Commonwealth Bank was created and a Central Bank in 1945.

The Commonwealth Bank Act 1945 repealed the previous Commonwealth Bank Act 1911-1943 and recreated it as a central bank. A well known public servant H.C Coombs was largely responsible for the rationing system over the war and the creation of Australia’s post war reconstruction. He trained as a secondary teacher but over the 1930’s received his PhD in economics and went on to work in various capacities for the Commonwealth Government.

If you can obtain a copy of his book Trial Balance (now out of print) he details these extraordinary events and the shift in thinking not only of a defunct economic paradigm that was used over the 1930’s but also in society more broadly.

The finished paper will be a more coherent narrative some of which feature in the following posts and more!

Currency Issuing Governments Finance Themselves
A History of Australian Coinage and Note Issuance- Part 1
History of Australian Currency – More Detail
Let’s have a rational debate on government spending.
The Mainstream are Trying to Stay Relevant

Preparations for WWII and War Rationing

Various financial statements and budget speeches in 1939 and 1940 were stating that with a given workforce and existing pattern of technology and industrial organisation there was a maximum real Gross National Product (GNP) which would for practical purposes be reached when available labour was fully employed. 

(Insert EXAMPLES OF THESE SPEECHES)

The National Security Act 1939 had given powers to The Governor General to make regulations for securing the public safety and the defence of the Commonwealth and the Territories of the Commonwealth, and in particular— (h) for preventing money or goods being sent out of the Commonwealth except under conditions approved by any Minister of State; as well as other mechanisms to make provision for the Safety and Defence of the Commonwealth and its Territories during the present state of War. 

This act in conjunction with the changes to the Commonwealth Bank amendments 1929, in effect abandoning a gold standard allowed for the Commonwealth to implement a system of rationing.  There was contention within the Fadden Government. 

By 1941 preparations were being made for a wartime economy. Chairman of the Financial and Economic Committee Lyndhurst Giblin had been in contact with Keynes regarding propositions that if the war effort was to be accomplished an additional transfer of resources amounting to 10 per cent of the total available would from civil to war purposes had to be achieved. 

In a response to Giblin, Keynes had replied

…to deprive the economic system of the freedom represented by uncontrolled prices through rigorous price control supplemented necessary by rationing and by strong propaganda in favour of increased saving out of the margins of income preserved in favour of individuals by price fixing policy.  (Coombs, 1981 p.11)

In a statement submitted to cabinet Fadden regarding his budget proposal submitted

There is a physical limit to our resources of manpower, equipment and materials and…the new programme will impose a severe strain on those resources. Last year (40/41) 15% of National Income was devoted to the war effort; this year (41/42) it would be 23%. The transfer of resources to achieve this must mean a substantial fall in civil production. The financial measures chosen must be designed to effect the necessary transfer. (Coombs, 1981 p.12)

In terms of an economic strategy the Finance and Economic Committee was preparing for a system of rationing as per the correspondence between Giblin and Keynes.  There was awareness that rationing as a result of trade restrictions and production would need to occur. As a result of this Keynes had pointed out to Giblin ‘fairness of distribution social security would necessitate rationing’ In February of 1941 the Committee advised ‘Direct rationing or restriction of supplies of specific goods or services, chosen because the resources they use are most adaptable to war purposes.’ (Coombs, 1981 p.12) 

‘There was a view within the Committee that direct rationing to consumers appeared inevitable and that plans to introduce and organise it should be prepared in secret by the Department of Customs’ (Combs, 1981 p.13)

The ABS 1301.0 Year Book Australia No. 35 1942-43 Commonwealth Food Control (1939-49 WAR) notes; 

‘Australia began in 1938 to prepare for food control in the event of war, not only to safeguard her economy, in which exports have always occupied an important place, and to protect primary producers against market collapse, but also to ensure that essential supplies moved quickly to the United Kingdom. Plans were laid then for mass marketing to replace individual enterprise, and understandings were reached that as far as shipping was available, the United Kingdom would take the export surpluses of most of our principal foods.’

The Year Book Australia 1944-45 notes the reasoning for rationing. 

‘War conditions necessitated civilian rationing of clothing and certain foodstuffs in Australia. The main reasons for clothing rationing were the serious falling off in imports, increased Service demands, and reduced labour for local production of textiles and making up of garments. The supply to the United Kingdom and the Australian and Allied Services of maximum quantities of foodstuffs necessitated the rationing of sugar. butter and meat, while reduction in imports, consequent upon enemy occupation of Java, necessitated the rationing of tea. In addition to the controls exercised by the Rationing Commission, rationing of certain other commodities is directed by other departments, e.g., petrol, tobacco, liquor, etc.’ (ABS 1301.0 Year Book Australia,Clothing and Food Rationing, 1944-45)

As the concern built within the Committee around the Fadden Government’s failure to implement rationing measures onto the civilian population and the political constraints within the Parliament, the Fadden Government’s 1941/42 budget failed to pass the House of Representatives. Two independent members of the House, Alexander Wilson and Arthur Coles crossed the floor.  Fadden resigned from office and the support of the two independent members of the house gave support to John Curtin and Ben Chifley delivering  the ALP under Curtin and Chifley Government. 

By 8 May 1942 Prime Minister Curtin had announced Australia would enter a system of rationing and by 17 May 1942 a Rationing Committee was formed. It was decided that a coupon system be introduced with interim arrangements being proposed before clothing supplies were depleted. (Coombs, 1981 p.20-21) 

A coupon system was devised in respect of Clothing, Food and Petrol. 

‘Coupon Rationing. After examination of the systems of rationing operating in other countries, it was considered that coupon rationing was preferable to a system of consumer registration, since it allows consumers to purchase from any retailer and also provides a comparatively simple control of traders’ replenishment of stocks by means of the passage of coupons to their suppliers. Food coupons are provided in the general Food Ration Book issued each year.’  (ABS 1301.0  Year Book Australia,Clothing and Food Rationing, 1944-45)

This coupon system would last throughout the war and was the means by which Australian citizens would obtain essential goods and services. The Food Ration Book provided each year per household negated the need to spend currency that was earned. 

Australia’s Post-War Reconstruction

Following the end of the war the Government was seeking a means to continue it’s control over the economy with similar wartime powers.  A failed 1944 referendum sought an insertion of a Chapter 1A in the constitution 

“CHAPTER IA.—TEMPORARY PROVISIONS.
POWER TO MAKE LAWS, FOB A LIMITED PERIOD, WITH RESPECT TO CERTAIN MATTERS.
6oA.—(i.) The Parliament shall, subject to this Constitution, have power to make laws for the peace, order and good government of the Commonwealth with respect to—
(i) the reinstatement and advancement of those who have been members of the fighting services of the Commonwealth during any war, and the advancement of the dependants of those members who have died or been disabled as a consequence of any war ;
(ii) employment and unemployment;
(iii) organized marketing of commodities ; etc…  (ABS 1301.0 Year Book Australia No.35 1942-43 p.65-66)

The failed referendum required another means to continue the Full Employment achieved over the war. 

There was a shift in thinking as a new economic paradigm emerged. The collective conscience within our society was driven largely by remembrance of what was experienced over The Depression, what was possible as seen over the war and a desire to maintain the same level of production during peacetime. Within academia, elected representatives and a new generation of public servants – Keynes’ General Theory gave them the authority to implement what only a decade prior was seen as ‘radical’.

These events led through to the 1945 Tax White Paper on Full Employment and The Commonwealth Bank Act 1945 which created the Commonwealth as a central bank. Coombs in his text Trial Balance writes

‘Generally the functions of a central bank are: to print and control the issue of legal tender notes; to hold the country’s international reserves of gold and foriegn currencies; to act as banker to other banks, holding deposits from them; to exercise control over banks’ lending policies; to act as banker for governments and their major agencies, and frequently to arrange their borrowing; and to influence the policies of non-bank financial intermediaries which make loans.’ (Coombs, 1981 p.142)

A position that was resisted by capital for decades was finally defeated and our elected representatives had more discretion on controlling an interest rate and fiscal policy (having been subject to various impediments prior) to achieve their socio-economic outcomes.

The Mainstream are Trying to Stay Relevant

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I’ve read a few articles over the last few days that discuss full employment and how we voluntarily keep hundreds of thousands unemployed. It is a welcome change to the doom and gloom messages we have paraded about debts burdening our grandchild or insolvency if we spend too much. That narrative should be well and truly dead! I recall asking myself questions on what government debt is and why does a government need to borrow if it issues the currency in my senior years of school as I stared outside the window wishing I could be doing something more exciting.

This article from the ABC has Ross Garnaut plugging his latest book. The article details what economist call the Natural Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment (NAIRU) Apart from being completely useless as a metric to measure against because you can never know what it is until you get there, it is still being used as a framework amongst the mainstream.

“Professor Garnaut says Australia’s policymakers have repeatedly miscalculated the NAIRU in recent years, meaning they have often suspected the economy is getting close to full employment when it is far from that point.”

So the fallacy that our economic superiors have just made a horrible mistake and needlessly left hundreds of thousands without jobs is paraded over the more accurate description that Unemployment is a political choice. Currency issuing governments can always purchase what is for sale, including idle labour. When economist think about costs (actual economist, not the frauds you read in the mainstream media) They are refereeing to real resources. People, raw materials, physical infrastructure, social impacts etc…And the cost of unemployment always far outweighs the cost of inflation. There are serious consequences as a result of involuntary unemployment. Loss of income, social exclusion, physical and mental health impacts, relationship breakdowns, poverty.

The mainstream narratives of deficits being a negative continue…

“At current levels of economic activity, having several hundred thousand people unnecessarily unemployed holds annual gross domestic product [GDP] down about $50 billion below what it could be, and, all other things being equal, raises Australia’s public deficits by nearly $20 billion each year.”

The deficit itself is irrelevant in determining a governments ability to spend. It is the residual number and accounts for the savings desires of the non-government sector. As an accounting rule it has to equal the non-government sectors savings. The question we should be asking is whether the fiscal balance is enough in achieving full employment and whether we have organised ourselves in a way that serves a public purpose. That is how much of the labour force do want engaged in public provision, what are the services we want delivered and what do we leave to private enterprise?

The article then continues to describe bond issuance and whether the Government should allow ‘the market’ to ‘fund’ deficits or whether The Reserve Bank should ‘fund’ the deficit spend. I wrote why that thinking was wrong here. I’ll reiterate parts of it below.

The Australian Government spends via an appropriation bill (through the parliament) and the finance minister then approves the transaction and someone within the Department of Treasury uses a computer to mark up the relevant exchange settlement account (ESA). These are accounts that financial institutes hold with the RBA. The smokes and mirrors of issuing bonds is irrelevant to the spending operation.

Intrinsically for a financial institution to purchase a bond the ESA’s have to be marked up first. So the act of issuing a bond changes the portfolio mix within the RBA’s system. ESAs are drained and dollars are added to a securities account. (The latter earns interest)

Now that the RBA is purchasing bonds it effectively owns the ‘debt’ that the Treasury is issuing so the Treasury can pay the RBA (via an appropriation bill) who then pays it to the Treasury. *eye roll* The whole operation is a charade to confuse the masses that all this somehow matters and great minds are at work pondering over these dilemmas to help save humanity.

Garnaut does state “I’d say, let’s take away their free lunch.” Huzzah! stopping the issuance of government debt is sensible. It is an unneeded operation that has its origins under a gold standard and necessary within the Bretton-Woods system. (a discussion for another time)

However Garnaut shoots himself in the foot and shows his interest in maintain the current class structures.

“The circumstances call for an Economic Stability Board, with power to constrain demand by fiscal as well as monetary means — to place a surcharge on major taxes if that serves better than raising interest rates.”

‘Independent boards’ are usually a mechanism to depoliticise a process the minister would rather not be responsible for and take away democratic accountability.

Under Garnaut’s thinking this operates under a NAIRU paradigm. The ‘independent’ board would have the power to raise and lower taxes (as well as interest rates) if it felt the employment rate and wages growth was too high or low and it would force the unemployed onto a substance payment in their pursuit of a desired rate of inflation.

“Professor Garnaut has also thrown his support behind the idea of a guaranteed basic income for practically all adults, paid at the same level as the dole“

Basic incomes should not be part of a progressive agenda. (Though we need a welfare system that cares for those in need)

We are more than just consumption units and there is value in contributing within our abilities. We should be aiming to eliminate involuntary unemployment and underemployment.

A Job Guarantee scheme forms a replacement for the NAIRU and replaces it with a Non Accelerating Buffer Employment Ratio (NAIBER). The social policy manifestation of the NAIBER is the JG.

It serves the purpose of disciplining an inflation rate to a politically acceptable rate (Would you be bothered if inflation was 4% and you had less people in a JG over a 3% inflation rate?)- It isn’t ideal but it is a hell of a lot better than using an unemployed buffer stock. It isn’t there to create masses of minimum wage jobs.

It is the role of Government to use their spending capacity to create career public service jobs and act as competition to the private sector; eliminating lousy employers by ensuring enough high paid career positions matching people’s skillset are on offer.

The linked to article above and Garnaut’s mention of an independent fiscal and monetary board reminded be of the 1924 amendments to the Commonwealth Bank Act. A friend told me not everybody reads various pieces of banking legislation and their amendments from a century ago, so I will describe it here.

By 1923 under the Bruce Government (Nationalist), the responsibility for note issuance was transferred to the Commonwealth Bank (previously under Treasury) and maintained in the note issuance department. Changes were made to the Commonwealth Bank Act in respect to note issuance in 1924  ‘(1) The Bank shall be managed by a Board of Directors composed of the Governor and seven other Directors. (2.)   Subject to this Act, the seven other Directors shall consist of— (a) the Secretary to the Treasury ; and (b) six other persons who are or have been actively engaged in agriculture, commerce, finance or industry.’

The Governor of the board was a banker by the name of Sir Robert Gibson. A staunch deflationarist (wage cuts, cut deficits) and was responsible for inviting another banker Sir Otto Niemeyer to Australia over the Great Depression. The Sydney Morning Herald reported regarding the changes to the board ‘ …the board, although permitted to decide all other questions by a majority of votes, will not be allowed to determine questions relating to the note issue unless the determining majority includes two of the following, namely the Governor, the secretary to the Treasury, and the two directors appointed because of their knowledge of the currency’ (SMH, 14/ 6 /1924:15-16) The Governor wasn’t required be answerable to the Government of the day unless legislation compelled them. (Which didn’t exist) And unless the ‘radical’ Labour Party was in Government and controlled both houses this was an improbability. A constraint that we will witness over the depression when the Scullin Government tries to spend and lower the unemployment rate.

At the request of Gibson to observe the current Australian economic situation, Otto Niemyer, an official from the Bank of England along with Professor T.E. Gregory of the London from the School of Economics arrive in Australia on 14 July, 1930. Niemeyer  had tabled the below plan that was rejected by most Australian economists across the political spectrum.   

The Niemeyer plan (Parliamentary Papers 1929-31, vol.2, No. 81, p. 45) called for 1. Budgets to be balanced at any cost in human suffering. 2. Cessation of overseas borrowing until the then short-term  indebtedness had been dealt with. 3. No public works, which would not pay for interest and  sinking funds on loans, to be put in hand. 4. All interest payments to be credited to a special account  in the Commonwealth Bank, to be used only in favor of  the bond-holders. 5. Monthly accounts to be published in Australia and overseas, showing summaries of revenue and expenditure, also state of short-term debt and loan account.  

As the Labour Government of Scullin was wrestling with The Depression the note issuance board was denying the Government additional expenditure. In March of 1931, the Treasurer presented to The House a bill relating to the issue of a fiduciary currency. 

These fiduciary notes were to be called Treasury Notes as opposed to an Australian Note (notes issued under the Commonwealth bank act 1920 in pursuance of the Australian Notes Act 1910-1914) and differed in that there was no need to hold gold reserves in relation to their note issue. The Bill specially stated ‘Treasury Notes shall not be deemed to be Bank notes within the meaning of the Bank Notes Tax Act 1910’

The bill also made provision for Treasury Note issuance of £18million, six million of which was for the purposes of the Wheat Act 1931 and the remaining twelve million on providing employment for reproductive works.  These ‘reproductive works’ would be made by appropriations of any Acts or by means of loans to the States, local governments or other corporations approved by the Governor General.

During the second reading of the bill Australian Labor Party member for Bendigo, Richard Keane stated ‘This Government has made endeavours to obtain money, but has been thwarted in its attempt by the Commonwealth Bank and other authorities’ (House of Representative Hansard, No.13, p.577, 1931)

The Commonwealth Bank Act in 1924, as described above, had put in place approval of note issuance (and thus the ability for Treasury to spend without borrowing) to a seven member board.

With The Depression and many unemployed the Labor Government was looking for a means to directly decrease unemployment.

‘In this country we have an army of unemployed totalling about 300,000; loan expenditure has been reduced from £43,000,000 to £14,000,000, and the Government last year made a grant of £1,000,000 for the relief of unemployment.’ (House of Representative Hansard, No.13, p.578, 1931)  Keane makes mention ‘We on this side of the House take the view that, orthodox methods having failed, it is necessary to adopt what may be regarded as unorthodox proposals.’ and points to ‘…the fact that for many years Great Britain has had Fiduciary issue of £260,000,000’ (House of Representative Hansard, No.13, p.577, 1931) 

Theodore’s efforts on a Fiduciary Note failed in the Senate. Economist in Australia, despite the rejection of the Niemeyer Plan still necessitated wage cuts were necessary. Yet at the February 1931 Premier’s conference there was such disagreement amongst economist who were in charge of tabling a report it was never released to the public.

The Treasurer E. G. Theodore and Scullin repudiated the report: they would not have it signed by their public servants. Gibson then refused to sign it. The report was never issued. (Coleman, 1959, p.119) [Gibson was an economist within the Australian Government that would come round to the emerging Keynesian consensus rested by his collegaues]

With Theodore’s Fiduciary Notes bill thwarted, The Copland Plan was devised.  The Plan though proved unpopular with the electorate. 

It recommended a reduction in the deficit from £39m to £11m, to be secured by a £13m reduction in outlays, £12m increase in taxes, and £3m from reduced interest. There was to be a 20 per cent cut in expenditure, and a 15 per cent reduction in interest payments.….

…a deal specifying how the pain would be shared out; it sought to establish agreement by observing measures of equality of sacrifice. Australian bond holders, public servants and pensioners were all to take a cut. (Bond holders experienced the heaviest proportionate contraction in incomes: legislative fiat reduced interest on government debt by 22.5 per cent.) This universal sharing of the pain made it universally unpopular. (Coleman, 1959 p.120)

Figures within the ALP such as Curtin argued Labor should surrender Government rather than implement The Copland Plan. Though the plan was adopted. The Labor Party split and delivered a majority Government to Joseph Lyons United Australia Party (UAP), a key figure responsible for orchestrating the failed bills, leaking information to London financial interests, and leaving the ALP to assist in forming the UAP. 

The events of the economic malpractice continued and the Australian population was forced to endure the 1930’s with unnecassary levels of unemployment. As economist argued over how much to cut spending and wages by or whether to increase public expenditure masses of people needlessly suffered.

The ‘independent’ board under Gibson responsible for the note issuance desired real wage cuts and had no concern for the well being of the population! That is very well articulated in the Niemeyer Plan and we needn’t experience anything that atrocious again!

Read Chapter 6 of Giblin’s Platoon by Coleman et al., for an account of the economic disagreements that ensured over the 1930’s

Conclusion

So as the mainstream economist try to stay relevant by saying ‘Oh hey turns out there isn’t a need to issue debt’ despite the messages they’ve been pushing on balanced budget nonsense for decades. They’re trying to maintain current pools of unemployment and using them in a fight against inflation by offering them meagre subsistence living instead of what we desire, a job that is meaningful and allows us to contribute to society. All while attempting to ensure we have depoliticised technocratic bodies instead of democratic accountability. That doesn’t work for the EU and it won’t work here.

This article was on edited on 29/03/21 to fix a grammatical error.