Cost Of Living | featured news

Bob Greene says a friend's hospital bill from his 1947 birth is a reminder of how health care costs have skyrocketed, but also of how technological advances have made having a baby safer.

Attaf Abu Ali, who drives a taxi van, had a hand-lettered sign on his vehicle Thursday that said: “Car for sale, with driver.” “I can’t live off of this,” Abu Ali said of his work, ticking off a list of operating expenses, the most onerous among them the rising price of diesel fuel.

When cost of living is factored in, most of the places that boast the highest effective pay turn out to be in the less celebrated and less expensive middle part of the country... In first place is Houston, where the average annual wage in 2011 was $59,838, eighth highest in the nation. What puts Houston at the top of the list is the region’s relatively low cost of living, which includes such things as consumer prices and services, utilities and transportation costs and, most importantly, housing prices...

Tens of thousands of people gathered across Israel Saturday to call for lower living costs in an effort to show the government their protest movement has countrywide support.

Israelis demonstrated against a high cost of living and lack of affordable housing in the largest showing in three weeks.