GM car and truck prices to climb 3%

General Motors Corp. said Tuesday its 1992 cars will cost 3.1percent more and light trucks will be about 3 percent more expensivethan 1991 models. Chrysler Corp. said its base car prices will beabout 1.4 percent higher than last year and popular options will comein specially priced packages. GM said it has made features such aspower door locks and tilt steering standard on some models. To alesser degree, anti-lock brakes have been made standard on somemodels. GM said the price increases were needed to meet higherproduction costs brought on by federally mandated safety equipment,especially passive restraint devices being installed in all 1992cars. Ford Motor Co. has yet to announce prices, but the No. 2automaker said last month its pre-introduction prices for 1992 modelcars would be 3.7 percent higher than 1991 models. The sticker priceon trucks will be 3.9 percent higher. Air traffic: United and Delta airlines Tuesday reported healthyincreases in July traffic from a year ago, while Midway had a steepdrop due to closing its Philadelphia hub. Systemwide, United'srevenue passenger miles grew 11.2 percent last month due to a bigjump in trans-Atlantic operations, while the Pacific traffic was off0.3 percent. Domestic RPMs increased 4.5 percent. Its load factorwas up 1.7 points to 72.7 percent. Delta, which doesn't break outinternational results, had a 13 percent increases in RPMs and itsload factor increased nearly 2 points to 65.6 percent. Midway, dueto the phase out of its Philadelphia hub, had a 30.8 percent decreasein traffic and its available seat miles dropped nearly 28 percent.American Airlines is expected to report its July results today. Pan Am bids: Transportation Secretary Samuel Skinner said Tuesday hewanted to insure that all potential buyers interested in Pan Am Corp.have a fair chance to bid for all or part of the troubled airline.He said the regulatory agency was willing to look at any bids for theNew York-based airline company, including those that wouldrestructure it to keep Pan Am flying. "We're going to look at all ofthe options," Skinner told Reuters. Stead to AT&T: Jerre L. Stead, the outgoing chairman and chiefexecutive officer of Square D, will become president-businesscommunications systems at AT&T Sept. 1. He will replace Jack Bucter,who is moving to another job within AT&T. T-notes fall: Yields on three-year Treasury notes fell in Tuesday'sauction to the lowest level since 1987 as the government began arecord $38 billion quarterly refunding. The average yield was 6.92percent, down from 7.09 percent at the last auction on May 7. Thenotes will carry a coupon interest rate of 6 7/8 percent with each$10,000 in face value selling for $9,988.00. A total of $14.1billion in notes were sold out of bids totaling $42.8 billion. Therefunding continues today with the sale of $12 billion in 10-yearnotes and concludes tomorrow with the offering of $12 billion in30-year bonds. Thrift merger: First of America Corp. said Tuesdayit has signed a letter of intent to buy Champion Federal Savings &Loan Association, Illinois' fifth-largest thrift, for an undisclosedsum. If the deal is approved by federal regulators, Kalamazoo,Mich.-based First of America would increase its presence in Illinois,where it already operates 72 offices. Champion has 31 offices, mostin the Chicago metropolitan area and central Illinois. Hair spray labels: Melrose Park-based Alberto Culver Co. has agreedto sell off existing supplies of aerosol hair spray labeled"ozone-friendly." Alberto labeled seven brands of its hair spray"ozone-friendly" because they didn't contain chlorofluorocarbons,which depletes the ozone layer. The brands, however, did containpropane and isobutane, which is also harmful to the atmosphere.Last March, the company voluntarily agreed to remove most of theproducts but some still remained. The firm will pay each of the 10states that pursued the issue $5,000 for the cost of theinvestigation. The company has 60 days to sell-off its supplies. Marmon takes over TIE: Chicago-based Marmon Group Inc. has takenover operations at TIE/communications after the firm failed to repaya Marmon Group subsidiary a substantial amount of money. HCRPartners lent TIE/communications an undisclosed amount of moneyseveral years ago, but TIE filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy recentlyand was unable to repay the debt. As part of TIE's reorganization,Robert A. Pritzker was elected chairman of the firm's board ofdirectors replacing Thomas L. Kelly Jr., TIE's founder. Kellyremains on the board. TIE is a telecommunications equipment salesand service company headquartered in Seymour, Conn. Marmon Group isa management consulting services company that advises Marmoncompanies. Marmon Group is controlled by the Pritzker family, whichowns Hyatt Hotels. Gloom in manufacturing: The construction andmanufacturing industries showed little improvement over the pastthree months and probably won't do much better anytime soon, Dun &Bradstreet Corp. said in two surveys released Tuesday. The surveys,done in mid-July by the New York-based provider of businessinformation, gave new evidence that the economic recovery justgetting under way could falter and help push the nation back into arecession. D&B's monthly survey of 1,000 manufacturers showedproduction levels and new orders both went down while export ordersremained steady. The manufacturers predicted continued decline forthe coming three months. In the construction survey, companies saidproduction and employment were down during the past three months,prices weakened sharply, and expectations for the coming three monthsremained low.