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THURSDAY. JAN. 11, ISW NUMBER NINETEEN
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Scene From Top 0’ The Hill
By: Jack Kelly
Congress w.ll be back in ses
sion any day now and its Mem
bers have a bit.cl a job cut out
for them. They have to do some
thing about the money situa
tion even as you and I. The
only dfferrence, and a huge
difference it is, between Con
gress figuring out the money
deal fur the Country and our
figur ng out the personal domes
tic situation, is that Congress
doesn't understand money and
nuist do something about it,
whereas you and I do not under-
Maud money and do not have to
sihr rfrrjrthmr ’SbdDr'Mt.- Stands
miv.-d up o Os course it does.
M°ney is all m xed up. We have
easy we just tote up what
>•< 'M.. and pay what we can.
us. -» dollar is a dollar. With
(or,gross, things are different.
A dollar is not necessarily a
dollar any more.
Value is the key word. From
, it we got valuation, de-valua
tion and re-evaluation. The
Brit st pound is worth so many
dollars a certain amount of
fcanrs equal a dollar; and so
forth Wliqt does a dollar equal?
That is the big question. Frank
ly no one knows. Brill ant eco
nomists write today and com
pare our dollar with what their
figures show ti was worth back
n 1 o:i,> or whatever year they
•’hose. 'o equate it with. When
we accept their figures, we learn
'hat our present dollar is worth
only 40 .>r 45c or somesuch fig
ure due to the fact that a ; five
dollar trill back then w*uld have
purchased twice as much in the
grocery store as it w'll today.
Those figures are ckay so long
as ;eu don't tear them apart.
Those figures are accurate so
lore as you do not include such
farts as the present salary of
•’P idoyecs in the grocery, store
oi’ich are bxtav much
!*'nn thev wore back in the s°’s
>f ~.,1 d'vbt it, copper w'lh
HrotPer Peterson or fK e Ray
Brothers i also, the nurrbaser re
rei‘-es a comwensnrafe and
higher salary than he did way
hack then As a matter of fact,
no matter what the economists
cla m the dollar is worth, every
one seems to have more of them
now than, they did back then.
Wo still buy our grocer es. pay
our rent or mortgage, and we
slid have a few bucks more
than wn did. On that basis, the
_ dollar is worth more than it
was. As a younger fellow, away
back in school-days. I once read
Adam Smith’s Wealth of Na
turns I didn't understand it then
(( for te 'he fact I passed an
exam on it) and I read it at a
much later age ami still d d no*,
understand it! Even today, 1
road financial r.rt cles and keep
right along! with the wrter un-
Id a certain pont then
whammy' I «m lost
The most recent lost - cause to
s:e was the Trending of an expla
nation of the "Euro-Dollar*".'
These are actual dollars, used
in trade, but you can’t get any.
You can’t see them. No one has
etfer seen them. The most re
cent explanation of them that I
read stated that they are used
in bus ness deals of one-quarter
ft a million to ten million dol
lars, and are constantly loaned
and borrowed by businessmen
by telephone and teletype and
recorded in the ledgers of banka
and b g businesses. These dol
lars are in common usaee in
Europe, South America, Canada
and Japan. They work like th s:
. ~X» Company in Be , gium delivers
rubber boots to Spain. Three
months later, Spain has to pay
5 mill cn bucks to the X Com
pany. Meanwhile, the As : atic
place that funvshed the rubber
for the boots manufactured has
to be paid 2 mill on bucks that
the X Company doesn’t have.
TTtus we have two companies
in bad shape fnancially. If Spam
pays X, then X can pay As'a.
However, Spain can’t pav for 31
days. Asia can’t wait 90 days.
X Company doesn’t have the
cash. Now comes the “Euro-
Dollars*’. X Company. be : ng re
liable. phones its bank and. in
less than five minutes, borrows
the money for the Asiatic pay
ment, then sits back and waMs
for the Span sh payment. X\.
When the other money comes
in flvm Spain, the X C..mpany
can take .t or put it into the
Bank that handles the ‘‘Euro-
Dollars’’ and get. interest, be
cause its money is now being
loaned to other companies that
find then.selves in a bnd. It all
makes a lot of sense when I
read it but I keep wondering if
it isn't some sort of a continu
ing bubble that, if one of them
gets busted, m ght blow up in
everybody’s face.
The present estimate is that
there are some 15 billion of these
dollars floating about and keep
ing the- internal onal bus nesses
afloat. 1 hope they are not as
shadowy and disreputable as
they appear to my be clouded
and mixed-up mind. These
"Euro Dollars" if my under
stand ng is correct, are funds
not, repeat not, controlled by
any Government, yet they are
dollars that our Country has to
account for. I am happy that I
do not understand it because
that would lie an additional wor
ry and I have just enough right
now. However, if you are short
qn worries, feel free to take th : s
«W to vour bosom
If 'i n.u. )i! fei 'he shortness
of space, 1 could really mix aU
of us up by going into some of
the experts views on .."devalua
tion” of the various monevs and
-the “Gold Standard" or lack of
it. The more you read on those *
subjects, the oftener you fnd
yourse'f shj>k ; " ,T
your back, talking to yourself,
and other things that make you
feel real stupd
IT NEVER FAILS
"'WT IT AIN’T MV UNCLE THERE
W I tell vfou ym inspirin' me yr ocua -wveNreo I futur£ in it» don
■ Tuts kid op W enough to put I a auto Tiee j aviecwe an' spencer 1
“min£ is a boon a poot in it i I that coul© toacv has already Ja
C'mon wexel J death at p/i L tpvin’ V
No Reliable Method Known To Determine
Sox Os Child Before Birth
CHAPEL HILL The expect
ant mother who asks her doctor
whether to paint the baby’s
ft V \ or blue is triggering
a guessiog game that dates
back as far as childbirth.
But despite all the medical
progress since childbirth hegan
doctors still come up with ans
wers little more reliable than
anyone else.
The sex of babies continues to
resist predictability.
Doctors know a lot of new
things about heredity.
Using X-ray, they can sneak
a peek at an unborn baby’s
bone development for a sex clue.
And they have one other fairly
reliable gimmick: they can
count the unborn baby’s heart
beats. If the heart rate just be
fore birth is 120 or less, bet on
a male; if 140 beats or more,
think female.
“We still go with the laws of
probabilities,” confesses Dr.
Robert A. Ross, former chair
man of the Department of Ob
stetrics and Gynecology at the
University of North Carolina of
School of Medicine.
"We haven’t found a complet
ely reliable method ye t to de
termine sex before birth.”
The laws of probabilities
the mathematical tools for mea
suring chance suggest there’s
just about an equal chance of
a baby being born male or fe
male.
Ken Poole, a graduate student
in biostatistics at the UNC
School of Public Health, says
that each chance of having a
boy or girl baby is like each
chance of drawing a red or
black card from a deck of play
ing cards provided you re
place each card before you draw
again.
But, interjects Dr. John B.
Graham, UNC pathologist and
geneticist. “Having babies isn’t
exactly like drawing cards or
like flipping a coin.”
He says there’s no “definitely
established biological pattern for
it," but he knows that a sperm
bearing the chromosome which
determines the male character
istic has a slightly greater chan
ce of mating with an egg than
a sperm with the female charac
teristic the odds being about
115 to 100 in the male’s favor.
This alters the laws of proba
bilities slightly in the early stag
es of the game. But this natural
biological phenomenon doesn't do
much to favor the actual birth
of boy babies.
Somewhere between concep
tion and birth, the male advan
tage declines.
Glenn A. Flinch urn, chief of
the Statistics Section for the N.
€. State Board of Health in
Raleigh, reports that the sex
ratio of births in North Carolina
have averaged about 105 males
to 100 females “for as far back
as we have reliable data avail
able."
Generally, then, you’ve got
about one chance out of two of
having a baby of either sex. And
this law of probability applies
each time you expect a child.
“A common fallacy," Poole
points out, “is in thinking that
if you have a string of one sex,
the next child will probably be
the other sex.
“This isn’t necessarily true be
cause you still have one chance
in two of continuing the string."
Suppose a couple wants to
have two children. What are
the chances of one boy and one
gir l ? Two hoys? Two girls?
Since boys and girls are born
with equal frequency, you nor
mally would figure on three
possibilities. You’d figure one
chance in three of having any
one of the three possibilities.
But here’s another common
fallacy. Actually, Poole says,
there are four possibilities: a
boy first and a girl second; a
girl first and a boy second; two
boys; two girls.
There’s one chance in four,
then, of any one of the sequen
ces. But given a girl first, you
still have a 50-50 chance of ano
ther girl. Or given a boy first,
there’s one chance in two of a
second boy.
Suppose you have no children.
What are the chances of having'
three boys in a row? Three girls
in a row?
One chance in eight.
SSuppose your family planning
calls for four children. What are
the chances of a string of four
boys or a string of four girls?
One chance in 16.
What is the possibility of two
boys and two girls?
Three, chances in eight.
Is it pure chance when a fam
ily has 10 kids and they’re all
boys or all girls?
“Yes," says Poole. “This could
happen by chance, but it’s one
chance in 1,024."
Dr Graham agrees and disa
grees with this statement He
suggests it might 1* helpful to
study carefully the families in
which all the children are of one
sex only.
He believes some long strings
of one sex could occur by
chance alone. “But," he adds,
“seme may have occurred this
way for reasons which would
help all of us if we could ex
plain it."
While the theory of probability
seems to dominate the mathe
matics of sex, doctors are cau
tious and sometimes cagey about
their predictions.
It is not uncommon for a doc
tor to predict a boy while in
the presence of the expectant
parents and then proceed to
write “girl" on the. hospital re
cord. This is called “hedging
your bets.”
Another practice is to predict
a girl if the family wants a boy.
The philosophy here is that the
doctor is correct about half the
time.
When he is incorrect, the er
ror is forgotten or forgiven dur
ing the rejoicing over the arriv
al of the desired sex.
The doctor who doesn’t like
to take chances with probabili
ties and is leary of philosophi
cal answers usually reacts in the
is-it-going - to- be-a-boy. -or girl
query with a simple: "Well, it
usually is."
Census To
Be Taken
During the week of January
15, the Bureau of the Census will
obtain informal on from work
ing people in this area on the
length of tir-.e they have been
cn their present jobs, accord ng
to Director Joseph R. Norwood
of the Census Bureau’s Region
al Office in Charlotte.
This job tenure informat'on is,
being obtained for the U. S. De
partment of Labor's Bureau of
Statistics. The question wll be
asked 'n addition to the regular
monthly inqu'ries on employ
ment and unemployment includ
ed every month in the Bureau’s
Current Population Survey.
The informat’on w<ll be col
lected from scent if ically select
ed sample households in the
area as wgl| as in u* r*hisr ar
eas throughout the Nation.
Census Bureau Interviewers
who win vis t samn'e households
in this area during January In- j
c’ude Mrs He'en W Ci’dwett. j
Ountrv o„i, r>,-j Ve w a yne«- 1
ville, N C 23736