MINIMUM WAGE will probably be boosted from 75-c- to $1 this summer (v. 90-c- proposed by Ike), but coverage will be extended to few, if any, additional occupations. For 1956 campaign oratory, big-city Democrats will pay lip service to the $1.25 that labor is demanding, but Congress' realists expect that $1 will turn out to be the top point of compromise.

COFFEE PRICES are due for another drop. In the face of a huge coffee surplus (3,100,000 bags in Brazil alone), Colombia, Costa Rica, Brazil and other coffee countries are having trouble agreeing on international price controls. Reports of a price war caused green coffee on the New York exchange to slide from 58-c- to 53-c- per lb. Maxwell House slashed its retail prices first (from 95-c- to 90-c-; other roasters are expected to follow suit.

ATOMS -FOR -PEACE program pledged to the world by President Eisenhower is moving faster. Next bilateral agreement for sharing U.S. materials and know-how will be with the Philippine republic (first country: Turkey). Japan's Cabinet has also voted to accept a U.S. offer of enough uranium for a pilot reactor.

NEW COMMON-STOCK issues are being floated at close to a record rate. SEC reported that during 1955's first quarter, U.S. corporations put out $760 million in new issues, more than double the comparable period of last year, and second only to the $860 million in 1929's third quarter.

U. S. STEEL CORP. is the first American purchaser of a new executive version of the Vickers Viscount turboprop; it has ordered three to replace its DC-3s.

TVA is due for a bare-knuckles policy fight when the Hoover Commission task force on water and power brings out its report next month. Headed by Jones & Laughlin's Admiral Ben Moreell, the task force plans to recommend that the Government either sell off TVA plants to private industry or turn them over to AEC, appropriate no more money for power or reclamation, finance any such projects by selling bonds to the public (without Government guarantee). TVA Democrats are up in arms, accuse the Moreell task force of being "stacked against public power."

SECOND ATOMIC SUBMARINE, the U.S.S. Sea Wolf, will be launched in mid-July by General Dynamics. Faster than the Nautilus, the Sea Wolf will also have a different type energy reactor, cooled by sodium instead of water. The Navy has money and plans for two more atom-powered subs, expects Congress will approve three additional A-subs in the next budget.

PAN AMERICAN AIRWAYS is bidding for a polar route from the U.S. West Coast to Europe. Scandinavian Airlines System, which pioneered the run is booked to capacity for the summer. Pan Am has asked CAB's O.K. to fly one-stop from Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland and Seattle to London and Paris.

PAY-AS-YOU-SEE TV will get a dress rehearsal in Washington. To demonstrate its Phonevision system of toll TV to FCC, Congressmen and a broadcasters' convention this week, Zenith Radio Corp. has teamed up with WMAL-TV to transmit live programs and special movies during the morning hours to some 50 Zenith receivers set up in the capital.

A NEW TITANIUM SMELTER, which short-cuts older methods by turning out pure crystals easily pressed into ingots, will be put into pilot production by National Research Corp. under a $1,183,495 contract from the General Services Administration. National Research expects that it can lick the big problem of impurities in the metal that has caused aircraft makers to balk at wide use of it.

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