How is the job market in south central Pennsylvania?

Moving to in or around Reading, Pennsylvania?

• My wife and I plan on moving in or around Reading, Pennsylvania in the upcoming year. Can anyone give me a brief summary as to the job market, crime, quality of life situation in Reading or in surrounding boroughs such as Sinking Spring, West Lawn, Wyomissing, etc. Thank you

• Answer:

  In general, the area's not bad, but probably I would avoid the city of Reading itself like the other poster suggested and look into one of the suburbs. Reading has a Double-A Eastern League baseball team, the Reading Phillies, an East Coast Hockey League ice hockey team, the Reading Royals, and an American Indoor Football League team, the Reading Express. The Phillies play in the city's 9,000-seat FirstEnergy Stadium, while the Royals and Express play in the 7,000-seat Sovereign Center. Among the athletes native to the Reading area are Brooklyn Dodger outfielder Carl Furillo, "the Reading Rifle," and Baltimore Colts running back Lenny Moore. Five institutions of higher education are located in Reading: Albright College, Alvernia College, Berks Technical Institute, Penn State Berks and Reading Area Community College. The city's cultural institutions include a symphony orchestra and museum, GoggleWorks art gallery Since the November, 2006 relocation of St. Joseph's Medical Center, Reading no longer has any hospitals within its city limits. There are, however, two hospital satellites in downtown Reading: The Reading Hospital Health Dispensary on Penn Street, and St. Joseph's Medical Center Community Campus on 6th Street The median income for a household in the city was $26,698, and the median income for a family was $31,067. Males had a median income of $28,114 versus $21,993 for females. The per capita income for the city was $13,086. 26.1% of the population and 22.3% of families were below the poverty line. 36.5% of those under the age of 18 and 15.6% of those 65 and older were living below the poverty line. In recent years, Reading, like many of its peers in the Northeastern United States, has seen an influx in Hispanic immigration and migration as gentrification has made traditional points of entry in the New York metropolitan area prohibitively expensive. In 2000, 23.46% of Reading residents were of Puerto Rican ancestry. There are also sizable numbers of Dominican Americans and Mexican Americans. In 2003, the United States Department of Justice filed suit against Berks County for failing to provide this influx of Spanish-speaking residents with voting equipment and information, as well as alleging that pollworkers had harassed Hispanic voters.[2] In 2000, the Reading metropolitan statistical area was the second most segregated place for Hispanics in the United States, behind only the Lawrence, Massachusetts area. Only 2.1% of the rest of Berks County is Hispanic or Latino, while this ethnic group is highly concentrated in certain city neighborhoods.[3] Reading is also seeing some migration of college-educated whites fleeing high housing costs in the Philadelphia metropolitan area, although this number of dwarfed by the number settling in the city's eastern suburbs such as Exeter Township, closer to the border with Montgomery County. The Greater Reading Area (Reading and its outlying suburbs) generally refers to the whole of Berks County (estimated 391,640 in 2004). While the land area of Reading itself is 10 square miles (26 km²), the land area of Berks County is 435 square miles (1,127 km²). Some of the more immediate suburbs of Reading are the boroughs of West Reading, Wyomissing, Shillington, Sinking Spring, Mt. Penn, St. Lawrence, Laureldale, and Mohnton and the townships of Spring, Cumru, Muhlenberg, Bern, and Lower Alsace. Reading Regional Airport (Gen. Carl A. Spaatz Field) is located in Bern Township and is home to the Mid-Atlantic Air Museum. Here are some good sites for demographic info: http://www.city-data.com/city/Reading-Pennsylvania.html Things to Do in Berks County: http://www.aboutberks.com/