Federal Spending Totaled $4,599 a Person Last Year

UNCLE Sam spent an average of $4,599 for every American last year, handing out money for grants and benefits, to buy goods and services, and to pay government salaries.

That was up more than $200 per person from the year before.

The federal government spent $1.25 trillion last fiscal year, according to the United States Census Bureau. Entitlements and grants for Medicaid, family support, and housing accounted for 60 percent of domestic spending.

Alaska, where military salaries give the economy a boost, remained the top recipient, receiving $7,697 per resident in 1993, according to the reports.

The other top 10 recipients were New Mexico, Virginia, Maryland, Hawaii, North Dakota, Massachusetts, Missouri, Maine, and Rhode Island. Not ranked was the District of Columbia, home of the federal government, where federal spending averaged $35,034 per person.

The bottom 10: Illinois, Delaware, Vermont, Utah, Minnesota, North Carolina, Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, and New Hampshire. Wages in China beat inflation

CHINESE salaries are rising faster than inflation, thanks to a near doubling of pay by foreign-invested firms and private enterprises, an official report said Sunday.

In January and February, China's total payroll outlay was 82.9 billion yuan ($9.56 billion), up 26.3 percent from the same period last year, the China Daily's Business Weekly reported, citing figures from the State Statistics Administration.

Retail prices nationwide rose 20 percent from a year earlier. Company executives well-compensated

WHILE 10,000 layoffs are expected at Electric Boat (EB) in Groton, Conn., over the next three years, compensation to executives at the submarine maker and its parent, General Dynamics, rose dramatically.

EB President James Turner Jr. received compensation totaling $7.17 million in 1993, while William Anders, outgoing chairman of General Dynamics, received $17.9 million, most of it in stock options, according to the General Dynamics shareholders report.

Mr. Turner earned $365,000 in salary, with bonuses, perks, and $6 million in stock options making up the rest. He made $1.7 million in 1992. James Mellor, who took over for Mr. Anders as president and chief executive officer last May, earned a salary of $670,000 last year, but with a $1.3 million bonus and other stock awards, his compensation totaled about $16.5 million.

Union leaders say downsizing, which will shrink the work force to about 7,000, created profits to give executives compensation packages. Donald Gilleland, corporate director for public affairs at General Dynamics, said management compensation ``is tied to the performance of the company and General Dynamics stock.''

The company paid shareholders three one-time cash dividends totaling $1.5 billion in 1993. The stock rose from $20 a share in 1991 to $92 a share a week ago before the stock market faltered. ``We don't lay off people because we don't have enough money to pay them. We lay off workers because the defense market is shrinking and we don't have any work for them,'' Mr. Gilleland said.