With the price of flour down so low that even PETA activists can afford to hurl the stuff at Lindsay Lohan, you might think bagel and pizza costs might drop a bit. But most pizzeria and bagel shop owners in NYC—who raised their prices earlier this year in response to skyrocketing flour cost—have not been passing the savings along to their customers. Vinny Camporeale, owner of the East Village pizzeria Vinny Vincenz, tells the Daily......

Is the economic free fall already leading to higher crime and degentrifying neighborhoods, as previously speculated? Brooklyn's 88th precinct, which includes Fort Greene and Clinton Hill, is reporting that so far this year robberies have spiked 7.6 percent and burglaries are up 18.6 percent. And a cardboard box of bloody human remains discovered on fancy Washington Park isn't exactly putting residents at ease; one of them tells The Brooklyn Paper, “This hasn’t happened since the......

The Times went around fretfully asking experts and 'men on the street' whether the economic downturn is going to lead to higher crime. The consensus? Well, it couldn't hurt to get renter's insurance, and hide those iPod earbuds as you stroll home through your increasingly blighted neighborhood. While this isn't an exact science, the article does draw some persuasive parallels between today's meltdown and the crime explosion that followed the 1987 Wall Street crash, as......

The cost of tuition at Columbia and NYU has passed the $50,000 mark; a year at NYU now costs $50,182, including room and board, up 5.9% from last year. And Columbia now sets you back $51,866, the Sun reports. But according to NYU professor Amy Ellen Schwartz, it's actually a sweet deal when you look at the big picture: "What is true about understanding the college market, is that the economics are very complicated. In......

The state-controlled price for a gallon of milk went up another 44 cents this morning, bringing the maximum amount that a retailer can charge to $4.37. But an investigation last month revealed that many retailers haven’t even heard of this law and charge whatever they want. The rising prices are due to high fuel costs, corn shortages and floods in the Midwest, according to WABC. And at $4.37 a gallon, inventors’ dreams for a milk-powered......

While skyrocketing food prices are sparking riots around the world, in New York the crisis is forcing restaurants like Good Enough to Eat to make due with frozen blueberries in their pancakes! The owner tells the Times the blueberries she gets shipped from Maine are now $38 per flat, up from $24 last summer. A five gallon jug of Canadian maple syrup is now $250, up from $200. And a 100-pound sack of flour costs......

The total annual cost (including room and board) of NYU has gone up 65% in the past decade and next year it will reach an all-time high of $50,182 – a 5.9% increase from last year. The Washington Square News notes that the university is cash poor, drawing 60 percent of its resources from tuition. In an attempt to soften the blow, NYU plans to increase need-based aid to "more than $150 million" total. This......

Charitable food banks are also suffering from the recent increases in the cost of food. Last year food banks were being squeezed by the increased demand from the city's hungry, who were finding that rising rents, fuel costs, and transportation costs were limiting the income they had to devote to food. More and more people were turning to New York's charitable food organizations to make ends meet. As the cost of living continues to increase,......

The cost of rice has shot up dramatically in recent months, and some analysts say a domestic shortage is on the horizon. The price increase is part of an alarming trend that’s seen the cost of flour rise 13 percent, milk 10 percent, eggs 30 percent and soon – make sure you’re sitting down – beer 10-15 percent. According to the Daily News, Sam's Club and Costco are now limiting how much rice customers can......

“It’s horrible. I don’t know what we’re going to do,” Arye Lewkowitz, owner of Daniel’s Bagels on Third Avenue, recently told Metro. “We’re going to have to sell a bagel for over $1.” Lewkowitz isn’t alone; bagel and bread prices are soaring nationwide due to the skyrocketing cost of wheat, which more than doubled in the past year in New York, from $5.31 a bushel to $14.22. The main reason for the spike is drought......