Editorial Note
p. 50 · Read in the full issue
ON the question “hand money”—the following is from an article in “Rabaul Times” of March 4:— A matter that concerns both employer and employee is the new clause that pay shall be half current and half deferred.
It concerns the natives because the prime cause of most of them in coming to work is to return home with suf ficient capital to buy a wife, some worldly goods for their relatives and friends and to satisfy the tax collector.
Under the new law the majority will return with but half. The other half either will be lost, stolen or spent and the sullen idea that they have been em bezzled out of the other half. Very few take into consideration their current pay and judge their total by the amount re
ceived at the expiry of their contract and for this reason the employer will find it hard to get “re-signs” or new re cruits from that village.