STATE OF BUSINESS: Food Up, Refrigerators Down

For the fifth month in a row, the consumer price index rose to a new high in June, the Labor Department announced last week. It was only a tiny rise (.02%), but what cost $1 back in 1947-49 now costs $1.26½. The department bases its index on about 300 items—food, clothing, durable goods, services—but it was primarily the higher cost of food that sent the index up. Prices have crept up 1.6% in the past year, while the gross national product has shot up much more. In the second quarter of 1960, according to new figures last week, the...

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