Wholesale Price Index Edges Up 0.3% for Month

Wholesale prices, pushed upward by large increases for gasoline and home heating oil but restrained by a second straight month of stagnant food costs, rose a modest 0.3% in November, the government said today.

The increase would amount to 3.3% if it persisted for 12 months. Prices had held flat in October.

For the first 11 months of 1988, prices one step short of the retail level were up 3.8%, an indication that no significant surge in prices was just over the horizon. Prices had risen 2.2% for all of 1987.

“Inflationary fears exceed inflationary reality at the present time,” said Donald Ratajczak, director of economic forecasting at Georgia State University in Atlanta.

Earlier Reports

Economists said a monthly increase higher than 0.3% would have aggravated inflation fears, triggered by reports earlier this week that factories, mines and power plants operated at a nine-year high of 84.2% of their capacity in October while industrial production rose half of a percentage point in November.

Energy prices rose 1.2% overall, with gasoline up 3.4% and home heating oil skyrocketing 12.2% after falling 10.0% in October. Natural gas prices fell 2.5%.

Food prices, which had been rising at an annual rate of more than 8% before October because of the summer drought, showed no overall change last month after falling 0.1% in October.

Prices for fresh fruits jumped 9.4%, while those for canned fruits and vegetables gained 1.1%.

Pork and beef prices each dropped by about half a percentage point. Large declines were also recorded for a wide variety of other food items, with egg prices off 14.5%, rice down 2.7%, pasta products off 4.7%, chickens off 7.4%, turkeys down 4.1% and coffee off 2.9%.