Word: billioned
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Public Works. Government is the country's biggest business, and the Treasury takes in so much money that it actually has a problem spending it. In the last fiscal year, expenditures came to a record $1.1 billion, but income (60% from oil) reached a record $1.6 billion. To get rid of it all, the government depends on lavish public works totaling 57% of the budget. Grafters do their bit to balance the books by taking from 10% to 30% on contracts...
Since 1950, gross national product has almost doubled to $5.9 billion. Oil production has nearly doubled to 2,700,000 bbl. a day, and with new wells coming in at record rates, oilmen foresee that it may rise another 85% by 1966. Oil now accounts for about $2 billion in exports, or about 95% of the yearly total. Iron-ore production, mostly by the United States Steel Corp. mines at Cerro Bolivar, increased by a third in 1957 to about 15 million tons. Irrigation projects and rapid farm mechanization have boosted agriculture until Venezuela now produces...
Scores of companies set new sales and profit records, and so many others came close to old records that 1957 easily topped the peaks of '56. The gross national product increased another 5% to an alltime high of $436 billion. Industrial production edged up to a record average for the year of 144; employment reached an alltime peak of 67.2 million before dropping at year's end; corporate assets swelled to $229 billion. Wages continued to rise. The average hourly pay rose from $2.05 in January to $2.10 near year's end. Despite worry over the squeeze...
...rise in industrial expansion, piling up of business inventories and increases in consumer purchasing-the Fed squeezed tight on the nation's credit supply. As the demand for money kept rising, interest rates rose to the highest point since 1932. Even so, corporations floated some $12.7 billion worth of public securities. 16.5% more than ever before. As costs went up until they hit 4.5% for the biggest borrowers and 6% or more for smaller firms, many a corporation withdrew its issues and postponed plans for new plants...
King-Size Necessities. With more money to spend (personal income rose to $343 billion v. $326.9 billion in '56), the U.S. spent more of it ($280 billion) than ever before on a shopping list of modern-day necessities that included 6,400,000 TV sets, 4,000,000 phonographs and hi-fi sets, 5,308,000 automatic washing machines, dryers and ironers and a big budget for fun. Example: nine years ago Detroit Auto Dealer Everett Kircher raised $100,000 to install a ski lift on Boyne Mountain in Michigan. Today Boyne Mountain has a heated swimming pool, private...