Message to the Congress Transmitting the Cost of Living Council's Quarterly Report on the Economic Stabilization Program.

To the Congress of the United States:

Through the Economic Stabilization Program, which was introduced as part of the New Economic Policy of August 15, 1971, we have taken forceful steps to curb the spiraling inflation that was eroding the buying power of the American wage earner--and that program is working. This fourth quarterly report of the Economic Stabilization Program describes the solid gains which have been made in revitalizing our economy and stemming the erosion of the value of the dollar.

I invite your special attention to the rise of more than 4 percent in real weekly spendable earnings which the American worker has enjoyed over the past year. This is three times the average rate of increase from 1960 to 1968.

To the average production worker, this gain represents an annual growth in purchasing power of more than $200--the equivalent of two extra weekly paychecks. Clearly, the treadmill of inflation is being transformed into wheels of economic progress.

Each American can take pride in the encouraging achievements which we have realized in the past year, for they have been made possible only through the determined efforts and the voluntary cooperation of all our people.

As this report points out, problems remain--but if our stabilization program continues to receive the wide public support it has received over its first year, and which it enjoys today, they will be solved.

This Administration will continue to exercise strong leadership in furthering that progress--we are determined to control inflation. Ultimately, however, it will be only through the determination, resourcefulness and patriotic cooperation of the American people that the victory of a full new prosperity will be won.

RICHARD NIXON

THE WHITE HOUSE,

October 13, 1972.