Why Do People Love New York?: The Pros and Cons of Living in NYC

The Purposely Lost ^ | 12/10/22 | Lyndsay

[DallasBiff]

Although there’s no shortage of things to do or sights to see in this American melting pot, living in New York City isn’t always as glamorous as it sounds.

Why do people love NYC?

Yes, New York is expensive. Yes, it can be challenging to find affordable housing. Yes, some elements of city life are difficult.

But those challenges pale in comparison to the benefits.

In New York, you can meet new people every day. You can discover new places to eat, drink and shop. You can explore your creativity.

Writing your novel, designing your website, building a business—it all feels attainable here.

[Ikeon]

From what Im reading about the pros, it seems new york is a good place for the self absorbed. where’s the neighborhood get togethers, knowing and hanging out with your neighbors? the churches to belong to? the high school football games? The peace that comes from knowing you belong to a community that everybody knows your name? the decent schools?

[SeekAndFind]

RE: it’s not like they walk down the street asking you who you voted for or how you feel on the political questions of the day. They just don’t care. They are minding their own business.

Yep. One thing you can say about residents of NYC is the VAST MAJORITY of registered voters are INDIFFERENT. They don’t even bother to vote and most don’t care who governs them.

For 3 consecutive mayoral election cycles, I have observed that at best, only 22% of registered voters bothered to vote on Election Day. With a Democrat to Republican registration ratio at around 7:1 in NYC, it goes without saying that you’ll get the likes of Bill De Blasio and Eric Adam’s as Mayor and Alvin Bragg as Manhattan District Attorney.

[Vaduz]

Indeed it’s a dumping ground for criminals and the insane Biden takes a bow.

[T.B. Yoits]

Sure, the residents here vote overwhelmingly for the Democrats but it's not like they walk down the street asking you who you voted for or how you feel on the political questions of the day. They just don't care. They are minding their own business.

Keep telling yourself that. They're walking in their own myopic world thinking everyone they pass on the street is like them. Show them even the slightest bit of sanity and rationality and they'll turn on you like a rabid animal.

I'm not even talking about wearing a MAGA hat or letting them know you're on Free Republic. Just question their worldview and watch them explode. You'll find out about the absolute of their cult called "Cancel Culture" if you're lucky; you're just as likely to be physically attacked.

[Dilbert San Diego]

Why do people live in New York? why do people love New York?

Some people love the performing arts, every conceivable ethnic restaurant, or museums.

Some people live in New York because they were born and rasied there. Some people live somewhere their whole lives just because of that. Other people gravitated to New York because of work in some key businesses, such as finance, publishing, advertising, which have major jobs there.

All of us can ask ourselves, why do we live where we live? Do we live there because we love our hometowns? Are we there by default, because we were born and raise there? Or did we choose to live there because of work, because it’s a spouse’s hometown, or other reasons. The same reasoning can apply to why anyone lives in New York.

[T.B. Yoits]

One thing you can say about residents of NYC is the VAST MAJORITY of registered voters are INDIFFERENT. They don’t even bother to vote and most don’t care who governs them.

There's indifference and then there's awareness of unfettered corruption.

Until We The People have "None of the Above" on each ballot, we'll be choosing one of two Uniparty puppets.

Democrat run cities don't have elections, they have selections and you can't outvote your grifting neighbors.

[Dr. Sivana]

I live in Connecticut, and a distinguishing feature between the home town people you describe and too many New Yorkers, both real and transplanted, is a suggested superiority of being in New York City, and a concomitant denigration of places that are not New York City.

I have spent plenty of time in NYC, and to me the most notable feature is the Dustbuster Drone that is constantly hovering around my left rear pants pocket.

One time, decades ago, I was determined to not even turn off the car, go and pick up my friend in Queens, and drive back to Connecticut, figuring I’d only be out the toll for the Tri-Borough Bridge. As I passed by JFK, some fun loving youths dropped a piece of concrete onto my windshield. The $7.00 trip (plus gasoline) turned into a $257.00 trip very quickly.

[alephnull]

The last time I was in NY was around 1996 on a one day business trip. I don’t intend to go back again.

[SamAdams76]

September-October are the best weather months. Today, November 6, pretty nice!

[Rummyfan]

[Rummyfan]

My daughter has been living there six years and she loves it.

I just returned from a weekend visit and had a very nice time. Just be prepared to spend money.

[TBP]

I’m a native New Yorker. I can tell you from growing up there that two things are true:

Every New Yorker loves New York.
Every New Yorker hates New York.

[Jim W N]

Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind - try when no hurricanes are headed that way that is...

Why does it feel like we’re in a race to get to all the good places before the Left destroys them. Maybe it’s not like that but sometimes it feels like that.

For instance with NYC, I think of all the great restaurants and then wonder how many will still be there when I get there what with all the insane minimum wage, high taxes, and crime. (Government-forced minimum wage = Government-forced fewer goods and services including wonderful restaurants.)

[nopardons]

There are an ENORMOUS, MULTITUDINOUS amounts of churches in NYC, with some of THE oldest in the nation!

The John Street Methodist Church is the OLDEST Methodist continuing congregation in this country and still has the clock that John Wesley gave it, when the first building was consecrated by him or Charles..I forget which one. And yes, they have the usual fellowships, even though it's situated in the Financial District.

In the same area, there's Trinity Church, which is Episcopal and was begun in Colonial times as well. Many of our well known FFs are buried in their cemetery.

Up town, is SAINT PARTRICK'S CATHEDRAL ( Roman Catholic ) on Fifth Ave.

And all over Manhattan there hundreds of neighborhood churches of all kinds!

And yes, when I grew up and lived there as an adult, whilst I didn't know ALL of the people in those different neighborhoods, I knew many of them and NOT only the ones who lived in the same building. Heck, I even knew some of the people, when I was an adult, who lived in my parents' building and neighborhood.

Decent schools are hard to find, NOW, no matter WHERE you live. Then there is SAINT JOHN THE DEVINE, farther uptown and is an ANGLICAN Cathedral.

[nopardons]

Ooooops...don't know HOW my post got messed up ate the end; I hope everyone can figure it out.

So SORRY for the messed up end of it!

[mass55th]

"I thought that Rochester went to $hit because of Kodak."

Kodak was the only thing holding the city together. I left there around 1972. My brother worked at Kodak from the time he got discharged from the Army in 1968, until he died in 1995. He and his wife had bought a house a couple of blocks from where we grew up. The house is right across the street from the grammar school we all went to. That was turned into senior citizen apartments sometime after my brother moved to Colvin Street. By the time my brother died, that whole section of the city had turned bad. It only continued to extend into the other parts of Rochester, and eventually spread out to the suburbs.

After my brother died, my sister-in-law had the opportunity to move into her family home in Ontario, NY after her mother had passed. She asked me if she should go, and I told her to go while she was still able to make the move. If she waited too long, she'd be stuck there the rest of her life. She did make the move, and when my niece got married, and had kids, she and her husband moved into the house across from my sister-in-law. They both work in Rochester, and have to make the drive every day, and the areas they work in are bad. My niece runs one of the labs at Rochester General, and her husband works for City Rec Department, and he's supervises a rec center in a bad area from 12-8 p.m. every day. The only redeeming factor for him, is that he will be able to retire in a few more years.

Irondequoit and Greece were two of the better, and pricier suburbs. Pittsford has always been a ritzy suburb too. There was a beautiful two story shopping mall in Irondequoit. It opened in 1990 with 103 original stores. One of my sisters was living in Irondequoit at the time, and I went to the mall whenever I went to visit her. I can't remember the last year I went there, but I was only one of just a few white people in the mall. Lots of black teens in groups hanging out, inside and in the front of the mall. By 2000, the mall was barely profitable. It was sold in 2001 to an insurance company. By 2009, it had closed completely.

The same sister who had lived in Irondequoit, had gone to Bath, NY for a while before returning to the Rochester area. When she came back, she took an apartment in Greece, in the same complex she had lived in probably 40 years before. She based her decision on the way the place had been all those years later. She stayed the year, until her lease was up, and moved, because the complex had turned into a welfare haven.

[Made In The USA]

Born and raised there too. Remaining family in the suburbs tell me it’s not safe to go into the city. Damn shame, I was proud of that city and have a lot of good memories from it.