You're still going to spend an unholy amount of money to have a decent standard of living.
It's just math.
Chicago, no need for a car, rent is 1600$ within walking distance of a metro station.
A monthly metro pass is about 100$.
1700$.
In LA, 2700$ for an apartment. 500$ car payment, 300$ insurance, 200$ for gas. About 100$ a month on stuff like parking and basic maintenance.
3800$.
If you have an extra 2100$ a month to tell everyone you live in LA, that's great. But the next problem is most people in LA are struggling. It's complex, but this factors into the quality of people you meet.
Personally it's the difference between driving around a 30 year old Instagram model who has no real interest in you, but expects you to pay for stuff vs dating an amazing 30 year old with a solid career.
Outside of dating, in LA you have "friends" who will beg you for money and then resent when you help them out. This weird interiority complex develops.
I've lived in about 3 major metros for any real period of time. LA is by far the worst. Concerts are fun, the food is good, but it's just a really hard place to live.
Now 20 years ago, you still had 500,600$ apartments for working class people. It USED to be an affordable city. But that's gone now.
I miss that Los Angeles. I miss my 600$ Ktown apartment, 4$ tortas, 3$ bottles of Soju.
It was an amazing place once. Doesn't really matter if it's completely unaffordable now.
Not a compelling argument. Your opinion says more about you than the city.
Yes, it is expensive. But pay is higher too. If you are middle of the road earner, you will have to live in the valley or another suburb, yes. But even those are among the most prized places to live in the USA.
Your quantitative approach intrinsically flattens the qualitative dimension out of the lived experience. Where else can you find Mexican, Korean, Japanese, Armenian, and Thai culture alive and well within their own neighborhoods in a 5 mile radius? Or even all on the same block? NYC is the closest, but LA arguably has the better food and culture (people are more liberal and accepting in LA). LA is also ground zero for the resistance against the rise of Trump's fascist reich. For many people those things are invaluable, especially if they are non-white (which perhaps you're not, so that may be lost on you.)
It's fine if LA does not offer anything of worth to you, but that isn't going to be the case for everybody. Source: the 20 million or so people that live in LA County must like something, because they stay there (and that number is always growing) despite being the most expensive place in the US.
And for the record, I moved to LA 20 years ago. I remember the $600 apartments - I had one by UCLA.
I am sensitive to the rising cost of housing (though the new state law about zoning should ameliorate that in the coming years). But the reason you move to LA isn't for affordable housing.
Assuming you are good at what you do, you should not be making the same financial calculations today as you made 20 years ago.
I was making a solid 6 figure salary and found myself more or less barely making it in LA.
Everything you said about diversity and culture could be said about Chicago too.
I guess if I was at 250k LA wouldn't be that bad, but on a social level I found people much more pleasant in Chicago.
If you have a bad home life you can move out earlier in Chicago.
Back in LA half the time I went out with someone they'd complain about their Mom for 2 hours. I met a lot of people in very very bad situations with no real hope of escaping.
>For many people those things are invaluable, especially if they are non-white (which perhaps you're not, so that may be lost on you.)
I'm definitely not white. Chicago is liberal. It has one of the only Chinatowns in America that's actually growing. Boystown is one of the oldest LGBT communities in America.
I don't think I'm going to change your opinion here, but when it comes to numbers, LA is just a difficult city.
If you have the money, and LA is giving you something you can get elsewhere, great.
But that's not going to change the economics of the situation. I know I'd rather save money and strive in Chicago vs struggle in LA.
Years ago I was miserable in LA, scrolling through random jobs. I just happened to apply to one in Chicago.
The moment I landed everything was great. I met a great girl almost instantly, I can’t stress enough how nicer people are when they can afford their basic needs.
Diversity?
From what popalchemist is saying you’d figure LA is the only city with non white people.
In Chicago I frequent a Slavic/Asian restaurant. They don’t do fusion, no, you get Slavic and Asian food on the same menu!
Kingston Mines! Best Jazz I’ve ever seen. Excellent food, friendly staff.
The L( metro system) is a living museum, you get to ride trains which date back over a century into the office.
It’s not perfect, I found the job scene to be a bit boring, but it’s one of the last livable cities in America.
Yeah if only the L ran as often as it did ten years ago lol. Commuter rail in some cities runs more frequently now. I just bought an ebike, though, and it's totally changed the game for me. The entire North side is now within half an hour of my house, and i won't need a shower when i get there either.
Yeah the job scene isn't amazing but the average pay is well above what you need to live very comfortably. The winters aren't as bad as people think (and getting warmer), the summers are beautiful, the free neighborhood music festivals all summer are so much fun (Lincoln Square this weekend, wicker park is coming up).
>Yeah if only the L ran as often as it did ten years ago lol.
The price of good transit is everlasting vigilance. Make sure to always argue for increased funding.
A lot of people would rather spend another 10k annually owning a car vs 1000$ a year in additional taxes. Not to mention the more people drive the worst traffic is and the more miserable the actual experience or driving is.
My dream city would be more or less car free ( exemptions for emergency and commercial vehicles) with a full blow Autobahn as a connecting freeway.
When I drive I want to DRIVE. Not sit in traffic for an hour.
> Where else can you find Mexican, Korean, Japanese, Armenian, and Thai culture alive and well within their own neighborhoods in a 5 mile radius?
I mean yeah NYC and Chicago get very close (if not match--i mean idk about Armenian specifically but you'll find 5 different ethnic neighborhoods within 5 miles, easy)
LA (the city -- not even going to touch on Greater LA which is truly massive) is comprised of over 100 individual districts/neighborhoods/burroughs each with a distinct culture, many are home to a unique ethnic group. 5 doesn't even come close to scratching the surface. I can't say a number for sure off the top of my head but it's got to be more like 40.
I know this sounds made up but it's true - you can do the research yourself if you're inclined. LA is hands down the most diverse place in the world. Definitely beats out NYC, despite NYC having that reputation, because NYC has been culturally more hostile to the upward mobility and long-term settlement of immigrant populations, whereas LA existed as indigenous land, and as Mexico, before it was part of the US, and that attitude has allowed immigrants to set roots here and claim identity and belonging in a way that no other place does or has.
>NYC has been culturally more hostile to the upward mobility and long-term settlement of immigrant populations,
>On May 3, 1913, California enacted the Alien Land Law, designed to deny Japanese families their foothold in America by denying them the right to own land.
That singular thing is not representative of the culture or policy at large, is over 100 years old, and isn't the present reality. Broadly speaking California and specifically LA are the most culturally progressive places on earth.
Yes, those rules existed in various rich neighborhoods at times in the past. They don't anymore. What's your point? My claim is not that there were no racists or racist policies at all within the LA area.
So yeah, that's a straw man. And a very pathetic one at that.
>whereas LA existed as indigenous land, and as Mexico, before it was part of the US, and that attitude has allowed immigrants to set roots here and claim identity and belonging in a way that no other place does or has.
Your own comment references a time before California was even a part of Mexico.
A more recent example.
>When South Vietnam and Cambodia fell to communists in April 1975, Gov. Brown, who had just succeeded Ronald Reagan, fought the arrival of hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese and Cambodian refugees. In the process, Mr. Brown and other Democrats engaged in xenophobic rhetoric.
The reason for my comment about the historicity of Los Angeles was to establish that it has its roots in an indigenous and multi-cultural understanding of its people. Quite the contrast to the way things went down with the colonies.
Whereas the random bits of historical information you are bringing up do not speak to a lasting or pervasive reality.
LA is a "sanctuary city" and that is the reason it is currently being targeted by the fascists with the federal troop occupation.
Anyway you are making bad faith and low effort arguments. If you dislike the place, just admit it.
As for whether LA is magical - "Magical" is literally one of the most common words used to describe LA and SoCal in general, as in, it is part of the zeitgeist that LA is "La La Land" (meaning for better or worse, the place where creatives pursue their dreams and/or delusions).
Every detail of your comments fall apart upon close inspection.
You are not making valid arguments. You are hating. Admit it.
Definitely not California which is literally the birth place of modern conservatism.
Thank you for helping out. Usually I would of given up earlier, but I couldn't let someone say California has always been welcoming to immigrants unanswered.
Apart of being better as people is looking at the past and facing it.
Do you seriously think Chicago and NYC aren't also huge and full of neighborhoods? Chicago is literally known as "the city of neighborhoods" with nearly 100 within city limits.
I live in what was recently the most diverse zip code in the US. Not in LA, not in NYC, but in Chicago.
It's just math.
Chicago, no need for a car, rent is 1600$ within walking distance of a metro station. A monthly metro pass is about 100$.
1700$.
In LA, 2700$ for an apartment. 500$ car payment, 300$ insurance, 200$ for gas. About 100$ a month on stuff like parking and basic maintenance.
3800$.
If you have an extra 2100$ a month to tell everyone you live in LA, that's great. But the next problem is most people in LA are struggling. It's complex, but this factors into the quality of people you meet.
Personally it's the difference between driving around a 30 year old Instagram model who has no real interest in you, but expects you to pay for stuff vs dating an amazing 30 year old with a solid career.
Outside of dating, in LA you have "friends" who will beg you for money and then resent when you help them out. This weird interiority complex develops.
I've lived in about 3 major metros for any real period of time. LA is by far the worst. Concerts are fun, the food is good, but it's just a really hard place to live.
Now 20 years ago, you still had 500,600$ apartments for working class people. It USED to be an affordable city. But that's gone now.
I miss that Los Angeles. I miss my 600$ Ktown apartment, 4$ tortas, 3$ bottles of Soju.
It was an amazing place once. Doesn't really matter if it's completely unaffordable now.