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The week that was for 09/23/12
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Eager buyers were camping overnight outside Apple stores so they could be among the first to get their hands on the new iPhone 5 on Friday. Orders for the iPhone 5 exceeded 2 million the first day, more than double the previous version of iPhone, pushing Apple's stock price to a new high of $700. The new phone is 20 percent lighter, and buying one will make your wallet lighter as well -- the phones (with a service contract) sell for $199 for the 16 gigabyte model and up to $399 for a 64 gigabyte model.
Old-time favorites Furby and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are making a comeback this Christmas, according to Toys R Us, which released its annual hot holiday toy list this week. Hasbro's Furby retails for $59.99.
New 2011 census data show that more young adults are moving out of their parents' homes and that poverty is slowing, leading one academic to speculate, "We may be seeing the beginning of the American family's recovery from the Great Recession." Meanwhile, Pennsylvania's unemployment rate just bumped up to 8.1 percent to match the national average, homeownership nationally has dropped for the fifth straight year and food stamp use is at an all-time high.
A couple hundred protesters showed up near the New York Stock Exchange on Monday to mark the first anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street movement, but -- other than a handful of arrests -- the event was largely uneventful. Occupy made big news a year ago with nonspecific demands for economic and social justice, but the movement started to fall apart within a few months.
The South Dakota company that makes the so-called "pink slime" beef additive -- they prefer to call it "lean, finely textured beef" -- has sued ABC News for suggesting the product was unhealthy and unsafe. Beef Products Inc. is seeking $1.2 billion in damages. Company officials say that after the ABC reports they had to close three of the company's four U.S. plants and lay off 650 people as fast food restaurants stopped using the product, supermarket chains stopped selling it and many school cafeterias banned it.
First Published September 23, 2012 12:00 am
