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Show ieonesflie tiELiGring cion't Alarmed by the 1.3 percent per-cent jump in wholesale prices in January, U.S. Senator Sena-tor Jake Garn (R-Utah) told the Carter Administration's top inflation fighters that "economic tinkering" will in enforcing the Administration's Adminis-tration's "voluntary" wage and price guidelines. Giving the council more staff and funding, Garn said, could suggest to the courts that Congress is granting post hoc authority to the council to act in a manner prohibited prohibit-ed by law. "If the Council ... believes be-lieves that it must use coercion co-ercion and veiled threats to work its will, let us make sure such behavior is specifically speci-fically authorized by Congress," Cong-ress," he added. "We all know only two well that bureaucracies tend to develop de-velop a life of their own unless Congress forbids certain procedures and behaviors." not solve the nation's inflation in-flation woes. The federal government "is a primary engine of inflation" because of deficit defi-cit spending, "and if we don't put restraints on that source, our entire economic system may suffer damage," Garn said in a discussion with Alfred Kahn, the Administration's Ad-ministration's chief inflation in-flation fighter, and Barry Bosworth, director of the Council on Wage and Price Stability. Kahn and Bosworth were testifying before the Senate Banking Committee, on which Garn is the ranking Republican, in favor of legislation expanding . the funding-and staffing of the wage and price council. "No task is more important im-portant than bringing inflation in-flation under control," Garn said, "But I fear no task could be more difficult, especially es-pecially when the tools to accomplish that task are inadequate in-adequate or misdirected." Garn directed his skepticism skepti-cism at Carter's voluntary wage and price guidelines program and the controversial contro-versial "real wage insurance" insur-ance" plan in which workers who adhere to the guidelines would be reimbursed by the government whenever inflation in-flation exceeds 7 percent annually. an-nually. "As long as the Administration Ad-ministration persists in the notion that tinkering with the mechanism of the marketplace mar-ketplace is the way to bring inflation under control, it is doomed to frustration and failure," he said. "So long as inflationary pressures created by the Federal government itself are ignored ig-nored or half-heartedly made, the subject of rhetoric rhet-oric but not of action, inflation in-flation will remain a permanent perm-anent part of our economic landscape." During an earlier taping session for a U.S. Chamber Cham-ber of Commerce television program, Garn said a Con-, stitutional amendment requiring re-quiring the federal government govern-ment to balance its budget would be an important step toward quelling inflation. The Utahn said the amendment amend-ment would have to allow some spending flexibility to enable the federal government govern-ment to cope with emergency situations. Garn told Kahn and Bosworth Bos-worth that he is reluctant to grant more authority to a government agency (the Council of Wage and Price Stability) "which I fear has, already overstepped its authority and purview . . ." |