The Consumer: Behind the Nine Ball

INFLATION is no laughing matter, but the prices of so many products have risen in 1969 that some Pittsburgh newspapermen have concocted a new game based on inflationary psychology. According to them, it now takes three to tango, four's a crowd, and that favorite song of a few years back has become Four Coins in a Fountain. Similarly, the number 14 is bad luck, and so is four on a match. A stitch in time saves ten, cats have ten lives, two birds in the hand are worth three in the bush, a bluffer is a fiveflusher, and that soft drink should really be called Eight-Up. Life, these days, begins at 41, girls are Sweet 17 and never been kissed, and inescapably, the American consumer is behind the nine ball.

The pastime is a wry reaction to a far more serious numbers game. As fast as incomes rose, the price of necessities seemed to rise even more steeply in 1969, and few wage-earners felt that they were better off than when the year began. An inflation sampler:

FOOD. The Department of Labor food-price index jumped 5% from January to October. In Pittsburgh, the price of eggs almost doubled overnight from 43-c- to 83-c- per dozen. The price of pork chops in Boston increased from 99-c- to $1.39. One shopper in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, Mrs. Richard Davis, protested: "This can of soup had four prices on it when I bought it." The final price was 11-c- more than the first. The nickel Hershey bar vanished, and practically nobody could find a 10-c- cup of coffee.

HOUSING. The average cost of a home reached $25,900 compared with $24,200 a year ago. In San Francisco, for example, the price of a home climbed 12% in twelve months. One survey of the Bay area disclosed that there was enough low-cost housing to provide shelter for all the area's poor--but the comparatively well--off occupants refused to move out. Taxes took an ever deeper bite. In San Francisco, for example, property taxes jumped from $102.30 per $1,000 valuation to $122.90.

MANUFACTURED GOODS. Appliances cost more across the U.S. The price of a new car rose by an average $107. Clothes were more expensive almost everywhere, and rose an average 10% in Boston. Men's neckties commonly went up by 50-c- or $1--or more.

MEDICAL CARE AND PHARMACEUTICALS. In the year's first ten months, the price of medical care--doctors' bills, hospital services and drugs--rose by 5%. In Boston, a hospital bed could cost $85 a day, $10 more than last year, and the price of dental care advanced from $6 or $7 per filling a year ago to $9 to $10 today. Even aspirins were up, from 89-c- to 98-c- per 100 tablets. A mouthwash named Binaca cost 29-c- when it was introduced by a Swiss company five years ago; it has since been taken over by a U.S. firm--and now sells for 79-c- in some places.

ENTERTAINMENT. Movies were more expensive, up 25-c- per ticket in Manhattan's Radio City Music Hall. The cost of watching a Pittsburgh Steelers home game rose from $6 to $7--plus a 15-c- surcharge to help pay for a now abuilding stadium, whose estimated price increased from $32 million last spring to $35 million at present. In the taverns of the steel city, the 15-c- beer could be found no more; it now costs 20-c-.

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