Consumer issues: March 2008 Archives

Picture this:

Joey and Susy are sitting in the living room talking about baseball players who have been inducted into the Hall of Fame trying to remember who the inductees were a few years back. Susy is positive it was one player, while Joey swears it was someone different. Joey says hold on, runs out of the room and Googles the information. Susy sits in the living room awkwardly because the conversation has died.

Now change the scenario and instead of Joey leaving the room to look up the information, he pulls out his iPhone to look it up. That still leaves Susy sitting awkwardly on the sofa because the conversation is still dead because Joey is focused on the phone.

In the world we live today, we are used to having instant access to information. While people may think twice about actually abandoning a conversation to leave the room to look something up, most think nothing of pulling out their smart phone to do the same thing.

Earlier this week, I attended a seminar for parents on how to teach children to be financially responsible. And even though it was geared toward kids' saving and spending habits, I found that I was learning quite a bit.

For example, did you know the best age to start an IRA (individual retirement account) is at 15? I sure didn't.

Last month I wrote about how excited I was that Maryland was banning smoking in all bars, restaurants, etc. and how I was hoping Pennsylvania would follow suit.

In order for that to happen the House and the Senate need to decide on a bill both will agree to sign. Right now they both have passed separate bans, but aren't seeing eye-to-eye on some details. For more information on the specifics you can check out the article in today's YDR.

The next big step in the process is April 1, when a committee made up of members from both the House and the Senate will meet to try to work out the differences. Right now the big points of contention are whether to include bars, taverns and casinos in the ban.

I'm all for an all-out ban on smoking in public places. Part of it is absolutely for selfish reasons. I don't want to be breathing that crap. The other part is because I have had friends who work in these places and I don't think they should be forced to breathe second-hand smoke whenever they are working. Why should some servers, hosts, etc., be protected by this law, but not others?

It doesn't seem to make a whole bunch of logical sense.

Getting fed up with modern life, going home and starting a farm is hardly something new. John Wayne's character went home to farm in 1952's "The Quiet Man." (My shameless plug for a great Irish movie on this St. Patrick's Day)

But what might be odd today is the number of people doing it.

About 50 percent of teenagers didn't buy a single CD in 2007.

This fact didn't surprise me in the least, but it surprised my editor, who in absolutely no way could be considered old and out-of-touch with technology.

So when she saw the above statistic in a wire story and asked me if I could believe it, I said yes because I don't know a single person (well except my editor, who picked up Thriller 25 last month for her husband for Valentine's Day, and my college roommate, who has insane artist loyalty) who still buys CDs.

To me CDs are a thing of the past, replaced with downloaded MP3s.

The New York Times had a piece on a new group that is opposing the opposition to biotechnology in agriculture. Our local Rutter's Dairy isn't named in the piece, but the image of the debate is in fact the bottling plant. Check it out here.

It's been some strange coincidence that every time I've gone to get an oil change I've always had a male in the car with me. Once it was my dad, who had offered to pick up the cost because I was home visiting my parents. Once I had my friend in the car because we were preparing for a road trip to North Carolina. Needless to say, I never had any problems with people trying to sell me more than I needed.

Yesterday, I went to get my very first oil change by myself. I was feeling a little bit proud of myself when I told the guy I only wanted an oil change. Nothing else.

It turns out that along with the oil change, I also needed a new windshield wiper and a fresh air filter. Yes extra costs, but things I legitimately needed.

What happened to the green movement? When did it transform from being all about conservation to being all about consumerism?

Going green is about cutting back --spending less money and wasting fewer resources and in the process leaving less of a carbon footprint.

Today's green movement doesn't conserve at all. It throws away and buys more.

Now that it's hip, trendy and mainstream to be "green," the grassroots movement is getting farther and farther away from it's original cause.

This article in the Washington Post says it best.

That's the bottom line, isn't it? So here are a few tips to really save money on your daily drive, without the caveats of saving the planet that can actually cost you money in the end.

It's just cold economics.

And interestingly enough, the main tip to take away from this: Having a little beater car for the commute can save hundreds of dollars - and hundreds of gallons of fuel - per year. You don't need a Prius to save gas, and you end up helping the planet by default.

So maybe what we need to see on the long road south to Baltimore every morning is a string of cars that looks more like our old high school parking lots than the Detroit auto show circa 2015.

With everyone having trouble getting through to Comcast customer service, this article in Sunday's Baltimore Sun seems especially timely.

One of the reporters ran a test with several companies, including Comcast, Verizon and Verizon Wireless. She called in to their customer service lines and timed how long and how many automated messages she had to wade through before she got through to a real person.

Verizon Wireless scored well, but both Verizon landline service and Comcast score poorly.

Once a month, I scribble out a check to Met-Ed with the knowledge that my electric rates rank among some of the lowest in the nation. Thank the state's decision to restructure its electricity market along with rate caps for my piece of mind. However, like most expenses, affordable electric rates in this area look to be coming to an abrupt end. On Dec. 31, 2010, Met-Ed's rate cap will expire threatening to push bill increases into the double digits. Some state lawmakers have proposed measures that would extend utility rate caps by two years. Other lawmakers and utilities contend that extending the rate caps would simply postpone inevitable jumps in monthly payments. Are you concerned that you may not be able to afford a jump in electric rates? What are you doing, if anything, to prepare for such increases?