Economic Outlook: October 2009 Archives

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.