WASHINGTON, D.C. -- President Clinton on Monday directed Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater to meet with both sides in the Northwest Airlines strike in an attempt to jump-start stalled negotiations.

However, Clinton showed no signs of reversing his decision not to use his presidential powers to intervene and order a halt to the strike.

Slater scheduled a meeting in his office today with Northwest President John Dasburg; Randy Babbitt, the international president of the Air Line Pilots Association, and Steve Zoller, chairman of ALPA's Northwest chapter.

Slater's "aim is to understand why the parties, which have said that they both wish to go back to the bargaining table, have not done so" since the pilots walked off their jobs at 11:01 p.m. Friday, said Bill Schulz, a spokesman for the secretary.

Meanwhile, Minnesota Gov. Arne Carlson said he proposed to White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles that an independent analyst evaluate the financial effects of the union's contract demands on the airline. All sides appeared receptive to the idea, Carlson said.

Pilot negotiators repeatedly have said that Northwest can afford the contract they have proposed, and the pilots' union has completed its own financial analysis of Northwest.

Paul Omodt, a spokesman for the 6,200 striking pilots at Northwest, said today's meeting appears to be "a positive sign. . . . I think that using his good offices, and knowing our relationship with him, it could play a positive role."

Northwest spokesman Jon Austin sounded a less-optimistic note. He said Northwest will "of course honor the secretary's request -- we'll meet with him any time he wishes."

The economic effects of the Northwest strike were drawing close attention from top administration officials as they assessed whether the president should intervene, as he did 18 months ago to block an American Airlines strike. Clinton has authority to appoint a Presidential Emergency Board and order a 60-day cooling-off period if he finds that Northwest's shutdown is depriving some regions of essential air service.

Slater briefed Gene Sperling, chairman of the National Economic Council, and other senior presidential aides on the effects on travelers on the first business day since Northwest's planes were grounded. In a command center at the Transportation Department, a crisis team scrambled to gather up-to-date information, surveying airlines and airports across the country.

The department does not make public its analyses of the effects of airline and railroad strikes, partly because one or both sides in a contract dispute might use the information to tilt the negotiations.

Meantime, both sides waged a publicity war.

In other strike-related developments:

•   Northwest announced that it has canceled its flights for Wednesday. For the duration of the strike, Northwest will maintain a "rolling schedule" of officially announcing cancellations with two days' notice for domestic flights and three days' notice for in-bound international flights.

•   KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, Northwest's transatlantic partner, said it could lose as much as $500,000 per day in passenger revenues because of the strike. Northwest funnels passengers onto KLM flights as part of their code-sharing alliance. The strike has grounded nine daily Northwest flights between North America and Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

•   American Airlines said it has added service to Minneapolis-St. Paul and Detroit because of the strike. Spokesman John Hotard said the expanded MD-80 jet service that began Sunday will be continued past today depending on demand. From both Northwest hubs, American added three MD-80 flights to Chicago, American's second-largest connecting hub. He said that American's passenger loads out of Detroit and the Twin Cities were strong over the weekend but that the planes were not full.

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