pa.general

In article <Xns98EF5FB577F9Edonnacroakerwoodscom@69.28.186.120>, Donna wrote: >though, is a nice guide to living frugally in Phillie. It would be >interesting to see the same type of guide to other cities. I would add consider Cavalier Telephone over Verizon if you get landline service. If you are going to get high speed internet and cable, then I would consider getting a package deal from a cable company for landline service - especially if you are in the suburbs where cable prices appear less outrageous. Especially in the city if you really want cable, consider alternatives such as satellite and Popvision. If you are living in Philly long term, one factor is that this is one of 3 large cities that hit my mind as having electricity cost well above the national average. The other two that I can think of are NYC and Chicago. It appears that these three cities get a significant amount of power from nuke plants that had expensive delays at a time that extended the need to borrow at a time when interest rates were at historic highs. Tips to save electricity: 1) Use air conditioning as sparingly as reasonable. 2) Get more energy-efficient air conditioning. Just do some research for getting units that are both more energy efficient and more comfortable, since more-energy-efficient units may remove less humidity. 3) Use more energy-efficient refrigerators. Keep a free path for air to flow over their condenser coils. 4) Use compact fluorescents where they will work well. http://www.misty.com/~don/cfapp.html Avoid dollar store compact fluorescents for reasons mentioned there. 5) When you must use incandescents, use GE, Philips or Sylvania ones, or store brand ones with the same lumen light output and same hour life expectancy figures as the "standard" "name brand" ones. Avoid superlonglife ones and lower lumen offbrand ones (including Sunbeam and Polaroid), all off-brand dollar store ones and ones that do not state light output in lumens. Avoid superlonglife and vibration resistant ones unless the need is actual and significant. Doing this often allows you to use one wattage lower. Good places to get good incandescents at low prices are Lowes and Target, especially Lowes. Stock up when you go there. Another Philly biggie is car insurance. It apears to me that the local culture has a higher rate of filing injury claims, and I have seen studies showing this on a statewide scale. Along in my mind with a few past news items along the lines of the local transit authority crashing a bus that was empty except for the driver and 30 of its passengers filed injury claims, and when a trolley with 30 passengers crashed 60 of them filed injury claims. Philadelphia also appears to me to have juries more generous than statewide and nationwide average. A high incidence of uninsured drivers does not help. Same for low rate of enforcement of traffic laws and of the state law against jaywalking and a culture favorable to jaywalking, even tolerating aggressive jaywalking. Best defenses are living outside the city limits, preferably not in a ZIP code bordering the city and having a significant population of basically Philadelphia city folks. Other than that, live in a neighborhood close to a good transit hub and don't have a car. A bike helps - with transit and a bike, you may not need your car for commuting, and that can get a break in car insurance. Living within 3 miles of your job (or within 3 miles of a parking lot for a transit line that you actually use for commuting) can get you non-commuter rate for car insurance allowing you to use your car less than 3 miles each way for commuting. Parking downtown is expensive to horrendous, though better than NYC and maybe no worse than in Chicago and a few other big cities. Parking in Philly's "University City" is only one level of improvement from downtown - look into transit, biking, walking. If you want to be self-employed, you may want to do so outside Philly's city limits to avoid their high business privilege taxes on gross receipts and net income and also their "net profit tax" (equivalent of their roughly 4.5% wage tax imposed upon sole proprietors and partners of partnerships). Philly is second to NYC in local tax burden with property taxes low on a PA statewide scale and PA has corporate taxation as I heard second to Iowa among the 50 states. Philly local tax burden includes a property tax below the PA statewide average, although with high business taxes, a high 4.4-4.5%-or-so wage tax (a little less if you work within city limits and live outside city limits), a similarly high tax on most "unearned income" (including dividends) if you live within city limits, and a 1% local sales tax on top of the 6% statewide one. The city also has a liquor-by-the-drink tax that at least sometimes extends to 6-packs from places where you can get mugs and pitchers. Many of Philly's suburbs have 1/2-1% tax on wages and maybe other classes of income. Hardly as bad as in the city at least! The state of PA is one of the few of the 50 where you cannot buy beer in a supermarket and where wine and liquor to take home by the bottle is only sold from "state stores". - Don Klipstein (don@misty.com)