Unpredictable. Unfocused. Just like life.

And no, I'm not talking about the price of gasoline.

I currently live in Canada, and I subscribe to the New York Times. I picked up my paper this morning, and noticed the price - $4.50 (U.S.)/$8.40 (Canadian).

Now I'm used to things costing more in Canada - lots more. An article on the front page mentions the price of gas at $3 per gallon. I can't remember when gas was only $3 per gallon - it's around $4.25 a gallon here. But the cost of the New York Times dwarfs even that. At an exchange rate of around $0.85 Canadian to $1 US, the Canadian price should be about $5.30, netting the paper a tidy profit of $3.10, or almost 59%.

It's not as if there is any shipping cost to account for either. The paper is actually printed in Mississauga, Canada, about 45 minutes from where I live.

Is this how newspapers intend to make up for the shortfall from declining readership? By overcharging their readers?