First-quarter US incomes up 2.6%; inflation up 3%

Personal income in the United States increased only 2.6 percent during the first three months of 1980, while inflation rose at 3 percent, the Commerce Department reported. But there were wide differences in the amount that income increased among regions and individual states. People in New England, the Southeast, and Rocky Mountain West generally fared best. The largest increases were in New England (3.5 percent), and the West, ranging from 3.1 percent in the Far West to 3.4 percent in Rocky Mountain states.