Word: less
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...stark facts are revealed each month in the trade-deficit figures. Despite recent improvement, the U.S. still imported $80 billion more in goods than it exported in the first seven months of the year. At the current rate, the 1988 trade deficit will total some $130 billion, 23.5% less than last year's record $170 billion. That progress has resulted primarily from the 40% drop of the dollar against major currencies since early 1985, which has made imports more expensive and U.S. exports a bargain overseas...
...quality of products from abroad. Other firms are running into production bottlenecks because they have skimped on investment. Some industries have been virtually wiped out by foreign competition: the share of the U.S. consumer electronics market held by American companies has plunged from almost 100% in 1970 to less than 5% today. When the Japanese started coming up with innovative products like VCRs and hand-held video cameras, U.S. firms decided to sell Tokyo's models rather than try to make their own. In short, U.S. industry no longer has the capacity to produce the quantity, quality or variety...
...both on independent stations and network affiliates. Many of the latter are shoving aside network fare for syndicated shows (on which they can sell more advertising time). The ABC and CBS stations in New York City, for example, have shifted their networks' evening newscasts from 7 p.m. to the less watched 6:30 time period to make room for syndicated game shows...
...networks' financial woes are increasingly being reflected on the home screen, for good and ill. News programming is becoming more popular with network executives because it costs less to produce. CBS now has three hours of news in prime time; ABC has one and is planning a second for January. The networks are looking more kindly at other "reality" shows as well. ABC, for instance, has just set up a new subsidiary to produce nature shows and other nonfiction specials, both for the network and for other outlets...
...might seem strange that commercials would play such an important role on Homewood Avenue when a flesh-and-blood candidate, Dukakis, was appearing last Tuesday at the Jeep plant, less than a mile away. But in a TV era, Dukakis was glimpsed by fewer than a thousand chosen Toledo residents during his four hours in the city. Local television was his true target. While the early- evening news stressed Dukakis' planned message ("I care about working men and women"), the media glow quickly dissipated. By 11 p.m., Dukakis was upstaged on two of the three local newscasts by a murder...