I stopped at a Redbox in Dover Township this afternoon and was not pleased to discover that the popular DVD rental kiosk had raised its price from $1 to $2 per night.
What's up with that?
Redbox made its name by renting DVD's for $1 per night, a good and inexpensive form of entertainment during this time of recession.
My first inclination, as if I was personally slighted, is to stop renting from Redbox. What do you think?
By now, many people have heard that a U.S. Commerce Department's report has found that the national economy grew by 3.5 percent in the third quarter, heralding the end of the Great Recession.
But is the recession really over? It depends who you ask.
An economist might put up numbers and charts to support that the recession has ended.
But, what about the 8.6 percent of unemployed residents living in York County? What do you think their answer might be?
When I read that the government had started to tout nation's economic recovery, an image of a frazzled police officer with arms held high yelling into a riot that "there's nothing to see here" popped into my head.
What do you think? Is the recession really over?
I have to believe that residents are doing double takes as they cruise past local gas stations.
In the past week, the average price of regular gas has jumped 17 cents from $2.416 to $2.59 per gallon, according to AAA's Daily Fuel Gauge Report. Driving to work this morning, I spotted a few stations that had bumped prices to $2.65 per gallon.
What's up with that? I have a theory.
The value of the dollar, thanks to stimulus money and bailouts, has tanked and remains at its lowest point in more than a year. To make up for that shortfall, investors have turned to oil and gold for their monetary ventures.
That leaves the rest of us pump poor. I wonder how high gas prices will go this time? Are we looking at $4 a gallon, again?
We had the governor visit York County -- specifically, Voith -- on Tuesday touting energy jobs and hydropower.
Voith has seen its fair share of news lately. After some negotiations, the company and union reached a contract agreement in September.
And it was only a short year ago, that then, Senator Barack Obama visited the plant on a campaign stop.
Talk to most area new car dealers and you'll likely learn that the government's Cash for Clunkers program has been a success.
Thanks to the program, demand for new cars is on the rise while dealer inventories are shrinking.
However, there seems to be a dark side of the program that many customers will likely experience soon.
And that dark side is debt. Lot's of debt.
The program has attracted the wallets of people not in the right financial position to buy a car. Advertisements seem to scream that you can save up to $4,500 on a new car.
Who could resist that kind of offer. Even I was thinking of buying a new car.
But I knew that, even if bought an $18,000 car and saved $4,500 by trading in my current set of wheels, I would still be stuck with a loan of $13,500. That's not a very wise decision to make during a recession.
I know the government needs people to spend money to get the economy back on track, but it shouldn't be at the expense of throwing more people into debt just to sell a few more sedans.
If you've ever taken the Route 30 exit off of I-83 and wonder why the immediate area doesn't sport a gas station, you're not alone.
Pending approval from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, Sheetz plans to open a location at Toronita Street and Route 30 in Manchester Township.
The store will have seven gas pumps and employ 30 to 50 workers.
This past weekend, my wife and I were cruising around our neighborhood and we noticed several yard sales that were in full swing.
What was odd were the signs that advertised the sales. It seems that, at least in York County, many yard sales are held on Friday and Saturday, but not on Sunday.
Why?
I mean, many people work on Friday and can't leave work to shop a yard sale. It seems that Sunday, when more people are off from work, would be a better day to host a yard sale.
