Financial: IEEE: Another AMA? The inside story off how inflation and recession - Those masters off extortion - Are devouring professional society dues dollars

Do you think you've been paying more and enjoying it less? By the end of this year the dollar bill you socked away in a savings account in 1967 won't be worth more than 59 cents. By the end of next year, that dollar will have been torn in half by a decade of money-hungry inflation. Successful "Big Business" has learned to live with this inflation spiral. In some instances, so have the trade unions - a number have negotiated rigid "cost-of-living clauses" into their contracts assuring their members annual cost-of-living raises. But among professionals, few have been able to keep pace with soaring costs, and the same holds true for many of the professional associations to which they belong and to which some look for relief when times get hard.