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Hard Words. The Shah, whose government will spend $1 billion this year to subsidize imports of meat, wheat, sugar and soybeans, insists that rising oil prices are no different than rising commodity prices. He seeks to tie the two together in an economic index that would help to limit further increases. The U.S. position is that oil is artificially priced, which the Shah himself admits, while agricultural increases are a response to free market conditions. President Ford, and Kissinger in his latest United Nations speech, abruptly cautioned the oil-producing nations not to price their product at disastrously high levels...
...relative to corporate earnings and the economy's longer-term prospects, but the sentiment is that the bear market is not over. Still, investors were grasping at straws of good news: the prime lending rate declined to 11.5%, and if just for one month, the wholesale price index rose at an annual rate of only 1.2%. Investors also appreciated that much in Ford's program had the potential to help industry, including his calls for greater investment tax credits, deregulation of natural-gas prices, easing of the Clean Air Act (see ENVIRONMENT), liberalization of the capital gains...
There are still plenty of economic shocks ahead. Unemployment will soon pass 6% and might reach 7%. Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, predicts that although there will be declines of two or three percentage points in some inflation measures by next spring, the consumer price index will be slow to show improvement. "We can see the light at the end of the tunnel," says Simon. "The question is, how long is the tunnel...
INFLATION will continue steaming along at double-digit levels through the year's first quarter, then begin tapering to as low as 7% or 8% by year's end, as measured by the Consumer Price Index. A main reason will be economic slowdown in other countries, as well as a moderation in commodity prices. Robert R. Nathan, who heads an economic consulting firm in Washington, feels, however, that an effective controls program could reduce inflation by three or four percentage points from current levels. In the absence of tougher Government controls, Joseph A. Pechman of the Brookings Institution...
...cost of alternative sources of energy. Second, whatever the oil price, it should change with the rate of inflation in the industrialized countries in order to protect our purchasing power. Beyond that, there will be no geometric rise. We are even willing to tie the oil price to an index of 20 or 30 other commodities. We want to work with you. We are the last people to want to see the economies of the West...