Word: grains
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Some of the recent estimates of Soviet grain requirements are frightening. -Federal Reserve Board Chairman Arthur Burns
...were up 12% in some areas, while the overall increase in farm products, including hogs and poultry, was 6.6%. The reasons for these increases were intricate, but many Americans focused their anxiety and anger on one new element: the sudden Soviet orders for some 10 million tons of American grain. In typically blunt fashion, Burns predicted that the Russian purchases will cause consumer prices to rise "sharply." Butz insisted that the prices will climb, if at all, only "nominally." Who is right may not become completely clear until fall, but the outcome could well influence not just the price...
Already, emotions are rising as economically interested groups argue the pros and cons of the new Soviet grain deals. Last week an ad hoc committee of the AFL-CIO maritime unions, which are threatening to boycott the Soviet shipment, met with Butz to protest the sales. "This sounds like the 1972 rip-off all over again, and we won't stand for it," said the Longshoremen's Thomas Gleason, referring to the Soviet purchase of 19 million tons of U.S. grain three summers ago. "Nobody is going to be ripped off," Butz assured the seamen. Said Don Woodward...
...power. Other suggestions focused on improving mass-transit finances. Several people proposed that municipal buses, trolleys and subway cars earn additional Income by hauling freight in off-hours. To produce perhaps $1.5 million in annual revenues, Benjamin Lawless of Washington, D.C., urged that a grain crop be grown on the 5 million acres of federal land bordering the interstate highways. Then there was San Diego Bus Fleet Owner Jack Haberstroh's idea: he charges no fares on his buses, but makes a profit nonetheless by turning each vehicle into a rolling advertising medium that is not only completely slathered...
Further inflationary surprises may be on the way, though. Most worrisome are the possible price implications of renewed Soviet hunger for U.S. crops. Big purchases of corn, wheat and barley an nounced last week brought the total amount of U.S. grain the Soviets have contracted to buy to 9.8 million metric tons. That is still within the 10 million tons that Agriculture Secretary Earl Butz figures the U.S. can sell with only a minimal impact on domestic prices. But continuing drought in the U.S.S.R. is raising worries that the Soviets might later seek to buy huge additional quantities; at midweek...