Word: consensus
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...wanting to meet Soviet leaders eventually. He and Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko privately discussed the possibility in Washington last year, but agreed that progress on access to Berlin and arms limitation must come first. Now there has been a preliminary four-power agreement on Berlin, and a consensus on limiting defensive missiles seems near in the SALT talks. Gromyko returned with a formal invitation last month, and Nixon accepted. Throughout, the matter was handled with the complete secrecy of which the President is so fond. Thus Nixon was able to complete his trinity of stunning surprises: the Peking trip...
Professional economists were more cautious, but mostly approving. Robert Nathan and Beryl Sprinkel, two members of TIME's Board of Economists, believe that the President was wise in trying to form a consensus on wages and prices before establishing specific guidelines. Sprinkel, although an ideological opponent of economic controls, added that Nixon acted realistically in setting his goal as 2% to 3% inflation by the end of 1972, rather than specifying some lower number that would be more attractive but unreachable...
...Nixon has spoken of a program with "teeth" that would bite into "all of the economy," but in practice would affect mostly big unions and big companies. That reflects a surprisingly broad consensus that is forming among many business executives and economists. The program recommended by a majority of TIME'S Board of Economists goes like this...
...True enough, the more moderate consensus approach has serious drawbacks and risks. It consists, as Okun says, of "controls for the big fellow and sermons for the little fellow." Okun justifies the seeming unfairness by drawing a distinction between economic "whales" and "minnows," and contending that "careless swimming by the whale and careless swimming by the minnow are very different matters so far as the safety of the creatures of the sea is concerned...
...strongest argument for the moderate consensus approach is that the alternatives are worse. A more ambitious program-strict controls on all wages and prices-would be impossible to enforce without the kind of public support that Americans have granted only during wars that were regarded as necessary. A weaker program-wage-price guidelines that could not be enforced by law-would simply invite violation...