Business Notes BAILOUTS

Eager to flee Washington last week for a monthlong recess, Congress worked well past its deadline, arguing over how to finance a ten-year, $166 billion federal rescue plan for more than 500 insolvent savings and loans. The busted thrifts are losing about $20 million a day. When a compromise with the White House threatened to unravel Friday, it looked as if the lawmakers would leave town without solving the problem.

House leaders wanted to charge the $50 billion first-year cost of the program to the federal budget. President Bush had threatened to veto the legislation unless Congress agreed to keep most of the outlay off budget, a plan that Nebraska Senator James Exon called a "continuing grand scheme to fool the American taxpayer ((about)) the real cost of the bailout." Near midnight on Friday, Congress approved a compromise worked out with the White House in which only $20 billion of the program's costs will be charged to the budget. The Government will issue special 30-year bonds to raise the rest. President Bush is expected to sign the legislation this week.