Food Prices and Inflation

Dale E. Hathaway

DEH

Dale E. Hathaway International Division, The Ford Foundation

Discussants: Hendrik S. Houthakker and

HSH

Hendrik S. Houthakker

John A. Schnittker

JAS

John A. Schnittker

EVERY ADMINISTRATION SINCE WORLD WAR II has worried about inflation or recession at one time or another during its term in office-sometimes simultaneously. But except for the period immediately after World War II and the Korean War year, 1951, the price record of the United States was admirable by world standards until the mid-1960s, when the pressures of expenditures on the Vietnam War again made inflation a serious economic and political issue.