Selling Papers Doesn’t Make Cents Anymore

In the mood for a doughnut, I stepped in a bakery this morning, and when the clerk rang up my two sour cream doughnuts, the kind that used to be buttermilk and not quite so sweet, I decided to pick up a Washington Post as well. $2.20 changed to $3.26. Surprised, I looked at the front page, and sure enough, in the corner where it used to say 75¢, it now says $1. Answering my question when that happened, the clerk said since Monday.

It was January three years ago, that the newsstand price was raised from 50¢ to 75¢. Only a couple years before that in 2007, I could buy it for 35¢. Changing from 35¢ to 50¢ didn’t make a big difference—two coins either way. Seventy-five cents felt different. Three quarters. Something to think about, scan the front page first, maybe decide against. Now it’s a whole dollar, as much as a somewhat overpriced doughnut. It’s about four years since I picked up a paper from a coin box. Doing that now must feel like parking downtown or running a load at the laudromat.