Business Notes SURVEYS

Are the children of Marxist-Leninist teachings really a bunch of closet capitalists? Perhaps. According to the report released last week by a team of U.S. and Soviet scholars, citizens in the Soviet Union seem fully prepared to embrace -- in theory, anyway -- the free-enterprise system.

The study, undertaken by Yale economics professor Robert Shiller along with Soviet sociologist Vladimir Korobov and economist Maxim Boycko, involved interviews with 391 people in Moscow and 361 in New York City last May. The objective was to compare the free-market inclinations of the two groups. Among the questions asked: Does a table manufacturer have the right to raise prices if the company can't keep up with private demand? Most of the Soviet and U.S. consumers responded just as Adam Smith would have: yes, the manufacturer ; should be able to raise prices.

This free-enterprise spirit is already much in evidence among Moscow street artists, who are doing brisk business with a variation of the famous matryoshka dolls. The new set contains caricatures of five Communist leaders from Lenin to Gorbachev. Cost: $56.