83-model cars fuel wholesale-price rise

New car costs pulled wholesale prices up 0.5 percent in October - an annual rate of 5.7 percent - despite declines in the cost of food and fuel, the Labor Department said Nov. 16. New car prices showed a 4.1 percent increase over the marked-down dealer costs for leftover 1982 cars.

Wholesale prices had dropped 0.1 percent in September, one of four months this year in which inflation was replaced by disinflation.

So far this year the annual rate of wholesale price increases has been held to 3.3 percent, raising the possibility that 1982 as a whole may have a better price performance than even the 3.7 percent annual rate in 1976.