I got a letter in the mail from the New York Times, informing me that the cost of home delivery is going up – again. I thought, didn’t I just have an increase recently? I get the Sunday Times delivered to my home, and with that includes digital access every day. I love the Sunday New York Times, I often read it throughout the week, as it’s almost impossible to read it all in one day. Granted, the front page news section becomes outdated by the time it’s delivered – I can find the latest news with digital access with the simple tap of the app on my cell phone. But it’s all the other sections – arts and leisure, real estate, business, the Sunday Magazine, the T Magazine – these are all features that aren’t as time-sensitive, so I have long enjoyed reading them with my morning coffee as time allows.
But here’s how my mind works – I know the cost includes digital access, which is like getting the paper 7 days a week. I should base my assessment of the cost on the fact that I’m getting 24/7 coverage at the tip of my fingers. But while my mind knows this, my emotions say: one print-edition newspaper per week will now cost $936 per year? That’s almost $1,000 for one newspaper a week? This is insane!!! Then I go back to reality, and realize it includes pay for the delivery driver, the cost of printing the paper, and again – it includes access to the digital news 7 days a week. But “$1,000 for one paper a week” is what keeps screaming out of my mind.
This is all ridiculous, I know. But it’s also a reflection of the Gen X experience. I grew up with print newspapers, my Dad and I used to sit at the kitchen table for breakfast when I was a kid, and as soon as I sat down, he handed me the sports section and we both read the paper together. I was a newspaper delivery boy for 6 years during junior high and high school, which gave me spending money during my teens. I would buy the Times (and sometimes the Post and the Daily News) from the corner deli when I lived in New York City, and I got home delivery of the Times when I moved to the suburbs.
So I’ve been getting inky fingers reading the newspaper for 45-50 years, and like having the hard copy in front of me, but now – faced with my perceived cost of $1,000 per year, I’m thinking I need to finally go all-digital only.
One might ask – how much did it go up in price? Haven’t you been paying a hell of a lot of money for home delivery all this time? To be honest, I thought of the weekly cost and never really bothered to think about the annual cost, because I enjoyed my Sunday Times. Looking at my billing history now, I see it was $13.75/week as recently as the end of 2024, went up to $15.75/week in 2025, and is now going to $18/week in 2026. It’s funny (or not) – but the billing is monthly, and was noted as an amount per month that equals 4 weeks. But while there’s generally 4 weeks in a month, the year is longer than 12 four-week months, which equals 48 weeks, but the real year is 52 weeks. So the “monthly cost” listed is not the true “monthly cost” as one should really multiply the weekly cost times 52.
I’m going to stop now – this is getting too granular and is not important in the bigger scheme of things in life – including the insane news of current events that shows up in the New York Times every day! But I guess what I’m really reflecting on is how a Gen X person in his mid-to-late 50s grew up with print media, and the idea of giving that up for digital-only was kind of a hard idea to swallow. My kids have been digital news only pretty much their whole lives – they’ve never sat down at the kitchen table and read the print edition with me. They have no interest in holding a newspaper. And believe me, it’s not like I’m a dinosaur, I read the news online all the time. But I love my Sunday Times.