OTHER NEWS - Sept. 10, 1992

Business Confidence Dwindling: After rising through the first half of the year, business confidence fell sharply over the summer, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce said, as fears mounted that a recovery was withering rapidly. The chamber’s latest business confidence index, measuring the attitudes of 5,515 businessmen and women, shows they turned markedly pessimistic by August after six months of buoyant hope. The index--a bimonthly average of three subindexes measuring the economic outlook, business sales and hiring prospects six months ahead--fell to 58 in August from 64.2 in June, when it was last compiled. It was the first time since December that the index had fallen.