CBS Morning News open - 1977-06-17

Channel: malgent

Transcript

Language: English (YouTube automatic captions)

[0:04] This is the CBS Morning News with Hughes

[0:07] Rudd in New York and Bruce Morton in

[0:10] Washington.

[0:11] >> Good morning. This is Friday, June the

[0:14] 17th, and in the next hour, we'll hear

[0:16] that the employment forecast sounds good

[0:19] for a change. Lieutenant General Don

[0:22] Story will report to the Pentagon today

[0:24] on that speech he made a week or so ago,

[0:27] forecasting war between China and the

[0:30] Soviet Union, a war he said would

[0:31] probably involve the United States. In

[0:34] 20 minutes, we'll have a report on new

[0:36] ways of tracking down people who set off

[0:39] bombs. And we'll have a look at what's

[0:41] happened to the principal figures in the

[0:43] Watergate case 5 years after it all

[0:46] began. Well, the college graduation

[0:48] season's pretty much over now, and a

[0:50] survey just put out by the College

[0:53] Placement Council finds that it's

[0:55] getting easier and easier for graduating

[0:58] students to find work. In fact, the

[1:00] survey finds that employers hired 18%

[1:03] more college seniors this year than they

[1:05] did last year. Onethird of the employers

[1:09] covered by the survey said they expect

[1:10] to increase their hiring rates even more

[1:13] next spring. and more than half of them

[1:15] said they expect their rates to stay

[1:17] about the same. The College Placement

[1:19] Council says the graduates with the best

[1:21] job prospects are those in engineering

[1:24] and other technical fields. And in other

[1:27] signs of the times, as far as the job

[1:29] market's concerned, a count of the

[1:30] number of help wanted ads and leading

[1:32] newspapers around the country has found

[1:34] that that's going up. And the the Horton

[1:38] School at the University of Pennsylvania

[1:40] is out with a prediction that the

[1:42] national unemployment rate will drop

[1:44] from 6.9%

[1:46] where it was last month to about 5 and a

[1:48] half% by early in 1979.

[1:51] Now with more on the economy, here's

[1:53] Bruce Morton and Wesman. Bruce,

[1:56] >> morning Hughes. They don't call

[1:57] economics the dismal science for

[1:59] nothing. It's all numbers and often the

[2:01] numbers are confusing. But George

[2:03] Herman, our man in charge of clarifying

[2:05] all that, says that behind some of the

[2:07] more recent numbers, there is genuine

[2:09] good news.

[2:11] All of us who report on the economic

[2:12] scene have become just a bit

[2:14] self-conscious about spouting off stacks

[2:16] of ratios and percentages. Ever since

[2:18] the appearance of a certain magazine

[2:20] cartoon, it showed an earnest reporter

[2:22] peering out of a television screen at a

[2:24] beused viewer and saying crisply,

[2:26] "Meanless statistics were up 1.6%

[2:29] today." It must sometimes seem that way

[2:32] as the endless figures pour in from the

[2:34] Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Commerce

[2:36] Department, and the Federal Reserve. But

[2:38] in the past three days, we've had three

[2:40] clearly meaningful statistics,

[2:42] especially taken together, and they

[2:44] bring us good tidings. Industrial

[2:46] production, the output of our factories

[2:48] and mines, is up strongly. So were

[2:50] business inventories for the month

[2:52] before. This is a figure that always

[2:54] comes in one month late. In this case,

[2:56] though, that's a happy coincidence. A

[2:58] strong rise in production following a

[3:00] strong rise in inventories is a

[3:02] particularly welcome sign. And finally,

[3:05] builders started new construction

[3:07] projects at an increased rate last

[3:09] month. Housing starts are up 1.6%. I

[3:12] almost hate to use that figure. And

[3:14] permits for future construction were up

[3:16] 3%. It all adds up to pretty much what

[3:19] administration economists have been

[3:20] saying. Business is better than expected

[3:23] lately. And it looks as though the

[3:24] second quarter of this year, the quarter

[3:26] which run through June 30th, will be

[3:28] another strong one. And if consumers are

[3:31] left with enough money, enough real

[3:33] buying power to purchase all this

[3:35] production and inventory accumulation,

[3:37] the current business expansion will

[3:39] continue for a while at least. And

[3:41] budget director Bert Lance says he

[3:43] thinks the expansion will continue

[3:44] through 1981.

[3:47] George Herman, CBS News, Washington.

[3:50] The House today continues to work on the

[3:52] appropriation bill for the departments

[3:54] of labor and health, education, and

[3:55] welfare. The deal between the House

[3:57] leadership and the administration is

[3:59] holding. White House lobbyists are not

[4:01] trying to cut the bill, and the

[4:02] leadership is resisting efforts to

[4:04] fatten it. Yesterday, the House voted to

[4:06] bar the use of any funds to bust pupils

[4:08] in school districts that merge, pair, or

[4:11] cluster their schools. That language

[4:13] would prevent HW from trying to enforce

[4:15] the 1964 Civil Rights Act, but it would

[4:18] not affect court-ordered busing.

[4:21] >> The United States Steel Corporation and

[4:23] the Federal Environmental Protection

[4:25] Administration have announced an

[4:27] agreement in a big water pollution

[4:29] dispute. And an EPA spokesman says the

[4:32] reduction of pollutants, quote, in the

[4:35] receiving water is critical to

[4:37] establishing and maintaining a viable

[4:39] aquatic biota. Translated into English,

[4:42] that means that eventually US Steel

[4:44] should stop killing fish and plants in

[4:46] Lake Michigan.

[4:49] >> US Steel's Gary Indiana Works discharges

[4:52] 750 million gallons of waste water into

[4:54] Lake Michigan and the nearby Grand

[4:56] Calumet River every day. 60 million

[4:59] gallons of that containing such toxic

[5:01] chemicals as ammonia and cyanide. The

[5:03] company was under the threat of severe

[5:05] fines and possible criminal penalties if

[5:08] it did not meet a July 1st, 1977

[5:10] deadline to end that pollution, but the

[5:13] Environmental Protection Agency and US

[5:15] Steel announced a settlement of the

[5:16] case. The company will be given until

[5:18] August of 1980 to install $70 million in

[5:22] water pollution control equipment, and

[5:24] the company reluctantly has agreed to

[5:27] pay $3.2 million in fines. Our relief at

[5:31] having reached this agreement does not

[5:33] however soften our disappointment over

[5:35] the penalty we must pay.