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Prices are certain to go even higher. The wholesale index in August soared 3.9%, to a harrowing annual rate of 46.8%. Says Economist Otto Eckstein of Harvard: "If the wholesale index does not do dramatically better by, say November or December, then the outlook is pretty grim." One hopeful sign: after several years of going straight up, prices are dropping on many raw industrial commodities, including cowhide, copper, rubber, wastepaper, cotton, lumber and steel scrap. They are declining largely because of reduced demand...
...worst off, as always, are the poor and the blacks in ghettos. Unemployment among blacks-as usual much higher than among whites-is 9.8%, compared with 9.2% in 1973. Prices of the foods that the poor depend on have risen far faster than the consumer index as a whole in the past year. Rice is up 90%, sugar 132%, bread 27% and milk 20%. The aged on fixed incomes are often devastated. "I walk into the supermarket, pick up a few oranges and lemons-and then count my money to see if I have enough," says Leah Binder...
...rate cut, plummeted, reflecting disappointment that Morgan Guaranty's initiative did not take hold more quickly. The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 49 points during the week, to close at 622, beneath the twelve-year low of 627 touched in mid-September. The Commerce Department's "composite index of leading indicators"-those that supposedly give reliable clues to the future direction of the economy -fell 1.2% in August, its biggest monthly drop since December. It is still 5.7% above August 1973, but since this index is not discounted for inflation, the gain may be more apparent than real...
...battle against inflation took on renewed magnitude last week when the Labor Department reported that the consumer price index, paced by rises in food, clothing and medical services, jumped in August by 1.3%, equal to a compound annual rate of 16.8%. It was the biggest inflationary surge in a year, and it cut factory workers' real take-home pay by .9%, down to a level 4.1% below a year ago. At the moment, consumer prices are more than 50% higher than...
...Santiago puts it, "there is no way they can have avoided real hunger in the poblaciones [shantytowns] this winter." To ease the pressure on the poor, Pinochet last week announced a 23% hike in the minimum wage and regular wage adjustments every quarter, based on the consumer price index...