Lifestyle

Heads up, New Yorkers. You may want to reconfigure your latte budget thanks to the M.T.A.’s increased fare and toll prices. Now one subway or bus ride will cost you $2.75, which is .25 cents more than it was before. This is the second hike since 2013, when fares cost $2.25 per ride.

The New York Times says that, “The subway system has recently seen record use, with more than six million riders on some days, but the authority is facing questions over how to pay for long-term improvements to its infrastructure.”

Read more about the city’s proposals and price changes at NYTimes.com.

By Wendy Rose Gould

Image credit: Flickr: Jonathan Lopez

As one of the largest snowstorms to ever hit NYC comes bellowing in with a mighty fury, there’s one thing we can’t help but notice: New Yorkers are having fun with it. Sure, there’s a little bit of panic in the air, as the long, long lines at Whole Foods (pictured) may allude to. But there’s also a spirited sense of excitement and, perhaps, even rekindled youthdom. See for yourself via these tweeted images.

@AnthonyQuintano snapped a panoramic shot of the mall in Central Park amidst the NYC whiteout

@artofdessert: “My sister-in-law in the #NYCblizzard with her umbrella.”

@RapidAndi: “Times Square in the snow with @nicole_rae eating a Cake Pop.”

@SalAbbinanti‘s shot of this nearly nude cowboy in the middle of Time Square makes us cold, but kind of warms our hearts.

@zahraS: “Even during a snow blizzard New York manages to find a way to cheer up!”

@JessicaPilot212 says, “Live from Central Park” and asks tweeters to caption this lovely photo.

@wisnefski‘s got this eerie photo of an empty 6th avenue — “a strange sight at 5 p.m. on a Monday,” he writes.

@FinnHarries: “Bring on the New York snow storm.” One pro for this crazy blizzard: You have a really good reason to break out that fuzzy winter apparel.

@EverythingNYC says, “Huge flakes in Times Square!” It’s hard to make out the clothing, but true to New York form we’re seeing lots of black.

@cubieking snapped this image of a man with an umbrella and a cane.

@RowNYC‘s image makes us wonder just how much the snow makes us feel like children again.

@BusMinCommunity shared this photograph with a little bit of advice via GrubHub: “Tip your ‘Food Heroes’ well during #Blizzardof2015.”

@christinaaa28 tweets this picture live from NYU: “Snow selfies on campus.”

@CarianneHix demonstrates that despite a gnarly blizzard, you can still look fabulous. We’re not sure if that’s a polka-dotted or snowflake-dotted umbrella, but we dig it.

@AmandaWills writes, “Lines wrapped around the block at Whole Foods.” The preppers are patting themselves on the back right now.

By Wendy Rose Gould

Image credit: via Twitter

What does a nearly 11,000-square-foot, two-story luxury penthouse suite in NYC cost a person? Oh, just an easy $100 million. We’ll give you a second to lift your jaw off the floor. Yes, that $100 million apartment — which is roughly four times bigger than the average house in the United States — has officially been purchased by an undisclosed buyer. We’ll just call him Richie Rich.

The extravagant home includes a steam room, a theater, a personal library, sweeping views, and, of course, plenty of floor space. The kind of floor space that costs $9,000 per square foot. Refinery29 has pictures of the apartment, so feel free to check it out in the comfort of your subpar living quarters.

By Wendy Rose Gould

Image credit: One57

Oxfam America recently released a new brief stating that, by the year 2016, the richest 1% of the world will have more money at their fingertips than the remaining 99% combined. This new issue brief, published in January 2015, “outlines how the richest 1 percent of the world have seen their share of global wealth increase from 44 percent in 2009 to 48 percent in 2014, and will likely surpass 50 percent in 2016.”

Now, this news may make some readers gasp, but most likely it’s followed by a yawn and a, “Yeah? Big surprise.” But before you form any concrete opinions on the seemingly forever expanding inequality gap, first consider how Oxfam’s data may be just a little misleading.

For starters, it excludes both wages and income and instead solely takes into account, “the value of an individual’s financial and non-financial assets, mainly property and land, minus their debts, to determine what individuals ‘own’”, says a BBC report.

Taking all this into consideration, the wealthiest 1% of the world, according to Oxfam, would be any individual who’s worth slightly more than a half million pounds. To many of us, that sounds like a lot — and in the scheme of things, it is.

To put it all into perspective, consider what BBC’s head of statistics Anthony Reuben says: “It is not necessarily talking about people who own yachts and ski chalets. Owning an average house in London, without a mortgage, would just about put you in the 1%.”

Sure, owning a house in London certainly puts you at the top of the bracket where financial value is concerned — especially when you approach it from a global standpoint. That said, it does make for a slightly less dramatic headline, as owning a house in London feels more attainable than, well, owning a frivolous yacht or personal jet (which is the lifestyle we think of when we hear “the 1%”).

If anything guts you regarding this new data, it may be the stark disparity between your average London house-owner and the poverty-stricken poor.

On the one hand, some may argue that the capitalism model is working, and that the rich must be doing something right and to let them carry on. Others, however, find the drastic gap between the rich and poor unsettling. Especially when you consider the fact that one out of every nine people in the world don’t have enough food to eat and that more than a billion — yes, a billion — people live on less than $1.25 a day, says Oxfam.

We want to know where you stand. Read more about the topic here, and then share your opinions on the matter in the comment section, or on our Facebook page.

By Wendy Rose Gould

Image credit: Flickr: mSeattle