[PEN-L:202] BLS Daily Report

[Richardson_D]

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BLS DAILY REPORT, MONDAY, JULY 13, 1998

__After two months of rising prices, the producer price index for
finished goods edged down a seasonally adjusted 0.1 percent in June
after rising 0.2 percent in both April and May, BLS reports.  Most
economists expected the downturn in producer prices.  Many predict
wholesale prices will continue to exert downward pressure on the overall
cost of living....  (Daniel J. Roy, Daily Labor Report, page D-1).
__Producer prices for finished goods fell 0.1 percent as a second big
monthly jump in pharmaceutical costs was offset by falling energy
prices....  The decline was in line with economists' expectations.  It
supported the view that inflation still poses no threat to the U.S.
economy and will allow the Federal Reserve to keep interest rates
steady....  (AP story by Martin Crutsinger, Washington Post, July 11,
page D1).
__Producer prices fell in June for the first time in three months as
energy costs retreated, the latest evidence that inflation is not
threatening the economy....  (Bloomberg News story, New York Times, July
11, page B3).  
__Producer prices slipped 0.1 percent, the fourth decline of the year,
mostly because of a 1.7 percent drop in energy prices.  Prices excluding
food and energy are rising faster than last year, but most economists
aren't alarmed.  If it weren't for the cigarettes and prescription
drugs, inflation would have continued to be well behaved this spring....
(Christina Duff in the Wall Street Journal, page A2).

Asia's economic crisis has had a powerful impact on markets for oil,
metals, and timber, hurting Canada, Mexico, Chile, and other exporters
of basic commodities....  (New York Times, July 11, page B1). 

Newcomers from Mexico, El Salvador, and Guatemala represent a tide of
humanity that is having a profound effect on the economy of the United
States, says the Washington Post (page A1).  Immigrants today do some of
the dirtiest, most difficult, and dangerous work in America, the work
native-born Americans - of any ethnicity or race - often will no longer
do, or no longer do for the wages offered....    

DUE OUT TOMORROW:
   Consumer Price Index -- June 1998
   Real Earnings: June 1998


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