Posted on 07/05/2025 8:03:28 AM PDT by ChicagoConservative27
Chicagoans can’t catch a break when it comes to the cost of living—at least, according to a new study from home-goods pros Highland Cabinetry, which ranks the most overpriced cities in the U.S.
Analyzing a diverse range of metrics that consider not only the cost of living but also the quality of life in the Windy City—including the exorbitant expense of housing, earned income, relative safety, traffic and so on—the study sourced its data from the likes of the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Zillow real estate stats.
While Newark, New Jersey earned the number one spot for being the most overpriced city in the U.S., earning a perfect score of 100 (not an A+ in this case), followed by New York City with a score of 98.17, Chicago sailed in at No. 7 with an overall score of 89. Given that Chicago is a major city with 2.75 million people, the third largest in the U.S., those expensive results aren’t entirely surprising.
According to the study, rent plus cost of living will set you back $3,704 in the Windy City. With a median household income of $74,474, the dollar doesn’t stretch too far in Chicagoland. The safety index comes in at 33.9, quite a low score; pollution rates at 50.69; and the traffic index comes in at 189.12—all of this is to say that Chicago can be a tough place to thrive, especially if you’re not a high-income earner. (The 5.3-percent unemployment rate, the worst on the list, doesn’t help matters
(Excerpt) Read more at timeout.com ...
Hey, bedbugs don’t come cheap. Neither do criminal firearms homicides.
The architecture is impressive from the air.
Just don’t go near the ground.
Lol.
How is the Miracle Mile looking these days?
rent + cost of living ? for a studio maybe...
https://www.apartments.com/rent-market-trends/chicago-il/
If real estate is being leased and sold, the market is not overpriced.
American cities are becoming third world.
That means a two tiered market—one for the wealthy and another for everyone else.
They should be analyzed separately—but most articles lump them together to create useless data.
Keep voting democrat.....they deserve what they get
Expensive? Gotta be worth it. Why else would so many live there?
I went to Chicago once when my youngest graduated from Navy boot camp. I WASN’T IMPRESSED. What was Capone thinking?
Chicago is a hellhole.
Blah
But LIFE there is real cheap, so...
It was a magnificent place to grow up in the 50’s. Housing was brick and yards were small, but the neighborhoods were safe and the schooling was excellent.
Transportation was difficult in that it was blocks to walk to the bus and there weren’t protective areas to hide from the chilling wind while you waited FOREVER for the bus, which often passed you by with people standing on the doorway stairs. But as soon as one would pass, all the others stalled behind it were sure to show up quickly. Never did figure out what the bunching buses problem stemmed from.
But taxis were also common and right on your door. Checkers, yellow cab. Not as cheap as a bus, but still not expensive. And safe. It took you to Illinois Central train stations that were a pleasant way to reach downtown Chicago. Or, for husband on the north side, the elevated train to downtown.
And downtown was magic. Not just Grant Park and the view of the lake. And if you drove to downtown, there was the magnificent Outer Drive to enjoy the whole way with biking trails, runners and waves crashing in windy weather. Every spring was the cherry blossoms and apple blossoms. They’d surround Buckingham Fountain and Grant Park with its magnificent evening concerts. Again, safe and friendly. The whole city was just a small town, built large.
The architecture was also magic. I was raised by an art student and my entire childhood was a fantasy of education on the buildings we passed.
***
The hikes that we took, when I was a child,
Wound through canyons and prairies and sweet sylvan nooks
Filled with wildflower storefronts and auto-clogged creeks.
I walked with my mother and saw with her eyes
Carrying all of her years with a ten year old’s pride.
She didn’t have money, we’d only have tea,
But she stuffed me with cupcakes of sweet memory.
***
Tea was Marshall Fields. Shopping was Carsons or Mandel Brothers. EVERYTHING there beautifully laid out in marble and gold decorations. Elegant and a place to rest before catching your breath for another visit to endless possibilities. And if you needed something special, like music, you’d find it under the elevated tracks - like Lyon and Healy.
Most important, it was midwestern. Totally. People on the street - total strangers - made continuous eye contact with you, often with smiles. I had no idea what that meant until I moved for work to LA and then to NY. In LA, they couldn’t have cared less if you were dead on the ground as long as they didn’t get blood on their shoes. In NY, they were terrified of you and dropped their eyes to the ground the minute you got close. I never knew loneliness until those moves. You had to work at getting to know anyone and among randoms you were always alone.
In Chicago, you were NEVER alone. You were part of a community and, because it was a city, you were constantly surrounded by people who would have run to your aid.
Mother was also raised in Chicago and her poem of the city got her a letter from a Boston publisher offering to publish a book of her work if she had others like it.
https://www.iment.com/maida/family/mother/jeanpoet.htm
That wasn’t her way and she never responded. But Chicago was a city to love and to be grateful for knowing during its good years. Now just memories.
Great post
I spent about two-thirds of my time downtown in the 2004 - 2012 era. I would have six month stints where I would commute to Chicago leaving KC on Monday morning and returning Friday. Part of the time I sub leased a downtown condo aside Marshal Fields in their final days but i also spent time at a hotel where i was a regular knowing the staff by name and always being upgraded to a suite. Around my ten hour work days I enjoyed great food and walking and shopping downtown and the near west side.
By 2012 it was all less secure and more attention was needed even though I was a large fellow. The stints away and then returning made the subtle changes more obvious. Great people start to finish.
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