[PRCo] Re: living in PA

[Richard Allman]

one correction, Fred to your epistle-I-83, not 78 from York to Bal'mer.
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Fred Schneider" <fwschneider at comcast.net>
To: <pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org>
Sent: Friday, June 13, 2008 6:05 PM
Subject: [PRCo] Re: living in PA


> This again is for Jerry but the rest of you can delete or read  
> depending on how much you care to be abused.
> 
> It's all about labor economics in southeastern Pennsylvania by a guy  
> who worked in the field and ultimately managed all the field analysts  
> doing the work in this part of the state.
> 
> No, Jerry, York isn't stagnant.   It's unemployment rate in April  
> 2008, seasonally adjusted, was 4.3 percent of the labor force, which  
> is about half a percent better than the national average.  In  
> general, for the last 50 years, there has been a prosperous growth  
> belt that lies south and east of the Appalachian Mountains and  
> outside of Philadelphia County proper.  In more recent years there  
> appears to have been a decline or at least a stagnation in some of  
> the  parts of Delaware County close to the City of Philadelphia.   
> Chester has gone down hill just like Philadelphia.   I've noticed  
> that the Sharon Hill line of Red Arrow has changed from suburban  
> white to suburban black but it still has a middle class look to it.    
> But we all know there are people who hire people because they look  
> like themselves, which could hurt some of those people.
> 
> Lebanon, Pennsylvania was also hit when Bethlehem Steel closed its  
> screw and bolt mill.  However, so many people have commuted to jobs  
> with Hershey Foods and with the state government in Harrisburg that  
> Lebanon  is sometimes a separate MSA and then a new census is taken  
> and O. M. B. merges it with Harrisburg.  It is marginally on it's own  
> and there is cheaper housing there than in Harrisburg or Hershey or  
> Lancaster but not a whole lot cheaper ... not cheap when you compare  
> it to housing in Bedford or Sayre or Wilkes-Barre.  Lebanon had the  
> lowest unemployment in the state at 3.8 percent of the labor force.
> 
> York tended in the past to be dominated by heavy industry York  
> Corporation (Yorkaire), Caterpillar tractor, Harley-Davidson, while  
> Lancaster firms manufactured consumer goods and in many cases  
> discretionary consumer goods (boats, recreational vehicles).   
> Caterpillar closed the factory about 20 years ago leaving only a  
> warehousing operation and that did hurt York.   On the other-hand,  
> southern York County has become a bedroom community for Baltimore and  
> its extended suburbs.   Between 5:00 and 5:30 on any weekday  
> afternoon, Interstate 78 coming north from Baltimore into lower York  
> County behaves like an accordion.   Baltimore is not a destination,  
> but its suburbs are and many of those people work in the Baltimore  
> suburbs.
> 
> The next big growth area is the Chambersburg - Waynesboro area far to  
> the west of York southwest of Harrisburg.   Like Lancaster, low-wage  
> rates in the mid-century caused a lot of firms to choose to locate  
> there.   But more recently I can see that area becoming suburban  
> Washington DC.  I kid thee not.   Ed Lybarger's daughter lives in  
> Thurmont, Maryland, which is on US 15 between Gettysburg and  
> Frederick, MD.   She works in the Washington area and commutes in  
> every day.   The National Bureau of Standards found itself unable to  
> get competent workers in the District of Columbia and moved out to  
> Frederick or Hagerstown about 40 years ago.  If you drive I-70 west  
> from Washington in the late afternoon, it's gang busters.   And look  
> at the MARC schedules -- again we have commuter service to  
> Frederick.   So I can see that, eventually that whole Hagerstown,  
> Frederick, Gettysburg, Chambersburg, Waynesboro area can become a  
> massive western suburb of Washington.   Washington DC itself has  
> grown by as much as dropping Pittsburgh on top of it since Metro  
> opened in 1976 and this growth to the west is just in addition.  What  
> happens with $4, or $5 or $10 gasoline.   Your guess is as good as mine.
> 
> If any area in southeastern Pennsylvania has stagnated, it might be  
> Berks County where the principal city is Reading (pronounced like the  
> color Red'-ing).  The Reading Railroad, during the period when  
> anthracite coal was used for home heating, was one of the most  
> profitable class one railroads in the nation.  It probably grossed  
> more per mile of track than any other Class 1.  It's principal shops  
> were in Reading.   Even though the electric MU cars were maintained  
> at Wayne Junction (Philadelphia), heavy repairs on those cars was  
> done in Reading too.  Reading built locomotives up through the G3  
> Pacifics and T1 Northerns in 1948.   The railroad was probably the  
> largest employer in town.  The second largest employer that hired men  
> for skilled, high paying jobs was Carpenter Steel (Cartech today).    
> Well we all know what happened to the steel industry.   At the  
> Reading railroad shops was one of those facilities that Conrail  
> decided it did not need after 1976.   The largest employer of women  
> was Berkshire Knitting, which employed several thousand girls making  
> nylon stockings.   Berkshire decided not to install the new looms for  
> panty hose when the mini-skirt craze came in in the late 1960s.    
> Horst and Nolde was also in that same business: just slightly smaller  
> than Berkshire.   They are also gone today.   About the only  
> garment / textile firm I can think of that is still in business in  
> Berks County might be Valley Forge Flag Company ... makes American  
> flags but they have a hard time competing with the Chinese.   I can  
> think of one boot company that remains.   Hamilton Bank built a huge  
> corporate office downtown and just after it opened, Wachovia closed  
> it.   Reading had the second highest unemployment in April at 5.1  
> percent of the labor force.
> 
> Bethlehem was hurt in the early to middle 1980s, just like  
> Pittsburgh, in this instance first by the closure of the basic steel  
> operations of Bethlehem Steel Corporation and then later by the  
> closure of Bethlehem's coke works in Hellertown.  Initially, however,  
> it did not have a profound affect on that area because people were  
> moving into the area who were commuting every day over Interstate 78  
> jobs in northern New Jersey or New York City.   Let's just say to  
> jobs in the New York Consolidate Metropolitan Statistical Area ...  
> that saves trying to define which county between Bridgeport CT and  
> Somerset County NJ.   However, the Allentown - Bethlehem - Easton MSA  
> had a lot of the same things going for it that made Lancaster strong  
> and it has, until now, been able to weather any problems.   The  
> $4.00, $5.00 and $10.00 a gallon gasoline is going to be a whole new  
> issue in an area which has become a bedroom community for New York.   
> This April, A-B-E was showing the highest unemployment in  
> southeastern Pennsylvania at 5.3 percent of the labor force.
> 
> Now when I toss out unemployment figures, you need to understand the  
> definitions.   They represent people who are out of work and who have  
> looked for work in the last 30 days.   Do not be misguided by people  
> want you to believe it has anything to with people whose unemployment  
> claims have run out.   Has nothing whatsoever to do with claims.    
> You can be working less than normal hours, be drawning a partial  
> unemployment check and be considered employed.   You can also have  
> exhausted benefits or been disqualified for benefits but if you  
> looked for work in the month and had no work, then you meet the U. S.  
> definition.   How do we know that you were out of work?   There is a  
> monthly household survey done by the census department that selects  
> about one percent of all the homes in the United States at random.    
> That survey yields national accuracy to within 0.1 percent, i.e. if  
> the unemployment rate moved from 4.4 to 4.5, maybe it did, maybe  
> didn't.   But if it moved from 4.4 to 4.6, it did move and it went up  
> by somewhere between 0.1 and 0.3.  The local and state rates are  
> adjusted to that same household survey.   Are they as accurate?   
> No.   But the annual averages certainly are in Pittsburgh or  
> Pennsylvania or Philadelphia.   Is Rhode Island?   Who knows.   What  
> are the chances of having a valid one-percent same in Rhode Island?   
> Or  Wyoming?   But Pennsylvania data has always met reasonable tests  
> of a 100% census count every ten years.
> 
> Notice the big flaw in this argument ... 'LOOKED FOR WORK IN THE LAST  
> 30 DAYS."  Southwestern Pennsylvania can post very low unemployment  
> rates but those counties can also have very low labor force  
> participation rates (that is the share of people working out of the  
> population age 16 and over).   Note that I said 16 and over and not  
> 16 to 65 or not 16 to 70 or not 16 to 75.   There is no upper  
> cutoff.   Because the Allegheny, Fayette, Westmoreland, Greene,  
> Blair, Cambria, and Shenango counties have very elderly populations,  
> they will tend to have low participation rates because many of the  
> people are retired.   They are not working.  They are not looking for  
> work.   But they are also not unemployed.  That is why Pittsburgh can  
> come in with a 4.9 percent unemployment rate with so few people working.
> 
> Philadelphia County can also come in with a perhaps surprisingly low  
> rate because some of those people are dumb as foxes.   They are on  
> welfare.   They're not looking for work.
> 
> But you get into areas like Allentown, Bethlehem, Easton, and some  
> suburban Philadelphia Counties ... if you are out of work ... you are  
> used to working and you are younger ... it is what you understand ...  
> if the household survey gets you, you admit you have looked for  
> work.  You are unemployed.
> 
> On Jun 13, 2008, at 3:32 PM, Jerry MATT Matsick wrote:
> 
>> Fred - when I was up at York in April 2007,  a friend and I drove  
>> from Lancaster to Harrisburg, I could
>> not believe the growth, where are these people coming from:?    
>> Philly / Balto areas?   Where do they
>> work?      Lancaster seems to be booming and yet York just 45  
>> minutes to the west seems to be
>> stagnant?    What ever happend to the "Trolley" talk that went on a  
>> year or so ago in Lancaster?
>> --
>> From the RIVER CITY by the Sea!
>> Jerry "Matt" Matsick
>> J A C K S O N V I L L E, Florida !
>>
>> -------------- Original message from Fred Schneider  
>> <fwschneider at comcast.net>: --------------
>>
>>
> 
>