STRIKE TALK over the guaranteed annual wage in the auto industry is lessening. Autoworkers' Walter Reuther is not adamant on the union's guaranteed-wage plan, says he will listen to other proposals that might be "better or more practical." And with output at a peak, auto companies are anxious to work out some reasonable settlement.

RECONFIRMATION RULE, which has plagued air travelers for more than three years, will be dropped June 15. After that, passengers will no longer have to check in six hours before flight time to confirm their reservations. Airlines decided that the savings were more than offset by passenger ill will.

BIGGEST URANIUM MINE in the U.S. is being developed by Anaconda Copper on the Laguna Indian reservation in New Mexico. AEC says that Anaconda's Jackpile Mine is the first multimillion-ton deposit to be found in the U.S. Reserves are estimated at 5,000,000 tons or more.

REDISCOUNT RATE, at which banks borrow from the Federal Reserve, may be nudged higher in the near future to tighten up credit all around, block any new inflation. The FRB's flexible-money policy, which switched from one of "active ease'' to "ease" last fall, is now described as "light restraint." Officials are moving cautiously, and the rediscount rate is not likely to go up by more than one-eighth of one percent from the present 1 1/2%.

IKE'S ROAD PROGRAM has hit a dead end. The plan to raise cash from bonds issued by a separate Government corporation and thus keep from raising the national debt was attacked by conservative Democrats as "financial legerdemain." The Administration is now resigned to the prospect that its $101 billion, ten-year highway program will be sharply scaled down. Nevertheless, chances are that the final bill will call for federal spending considerably above the present $6 billion a year. To help pay the bill, the 2-c--a-gal. federal gasoline tax may be hiked.

ATOMS-FOR-PEACE PLAN will soon result in the first firm agreements with foreign nations for use ot U.S. uranium and know-how. The Administration is close to agreement on six bilateral pacts under which the U.S. would lease fissionable materials abroad in exchange for radioactive ores, and other nations would buy reactors from U.S. industry.

PROXY FIGHT for control of famed machine -toolmaker Niles -Bement-Pond is over. With stockholders' meeting still a week away, opposition group led by Penn-Texas Corp.'s President Leopold Silberstein already has more than 50% of the votes, is sure to take over the company.

TAX RETURNS will not have to be filed by some 40 million wage earners, if the Internal Revenue Service has its way. The bureau has worked out a system under which employers would report quarterly on amounts withheld from each employee's pay, and the Government would bill the taxpayer for any balance due. Plan would apply to most taxpayers earning up to $10,000, who take the standard 10% deduction and have little outside income.

DREAM CAR from this year's General Motors Motorama is moving to the assembly line. Cadillac's "Eldorado Brougham," a low-slung, four-door hardtop, will soon go into production to compete with Rolls-Royce. Price: $8,500.

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