4 ms·

California ranks last in quality of life in new report

26 points by Jerry2 9y ago

Skunkleton 9y ago
Not to be a prick, but this article says the highest quality of life is in North Dakota. Does that sound right?
- blhack 9y ago
  As somebody who has lived in North Dakota: yes it does.
  - Skunkleton 9y ago
    I am sufficiently convinced that I should learn more about North Dakota.
    - blhack 9y ago
      Grand forks North Dakota is basically Mayberry combined with a college town. It's difficult to describe how cold it gets though.
      - api 9y ago
        As with Canada it's best illustrated by the ability to make sculptures out of pee.
- frogfuzion 9y ago
  Yep. You are truly happy and don't have to worry about urban issues which are huge stressors.
  - not_kurt_godel 9y ago
    > You are truly happy* * If you like what North Dakota has to offer, which is a very narrow set of options on the spectrum of life possibilities. > don't have to worry about urban issues which are huge stressors. Urban living can be stressful, but I'll take urban stressors over being trapped in a small pond if it's the wrong pond. Rural life can be awesome but it can also get incredibly boring. It's also prone to souring quickly if you have difficulties with the dozen or so people you might have regular contact with. I lived in a rural area for a spell and it turned out the local handyman had been stealing from everyone for years. What do you do when that guy is the only handyman in the county and his family blames you for his problems when he goes to jail? Not a good situation. Urban conveniences are also awesome. It'll be hard for me to move somewhere that lacks the variety and quality of food options currently available to me now. People in rural areas seem quite content with comparatively awful and unhealthy food.
  - Skunkleton 9y ago
    I recently moved to California from a more rural state, and I agree that parts of California are a huge pain in the ass. I was just surprised to see North Dakota at the top because it usually gets such negative coverage.
- djcj88 9y ago
  I feel like they should have done a better job of defining quality of life. A person who is born and grows old and dies in North Dakota does not have a better life than a person who does the same in California. If only for the education, career opportunities, weather, culture, and earning potential. Yea there are problems, but there are enormous benefits too.
- seanmcdirmid 9y ago
  It depends on what you are looking for, I guess.
- adrianmonk 9y ago
  Things like this always depend on what you value most and least. The rankings always have certain weights for those things baked in, and those things may not be the same as how you value them. For example, the rankings put lots of northern states at the top of the list, whereas if you asked me what I value, not having to deal with much cold weather is important, so that would immediately disqualify everything they said was best. Other people, I'm sure, feel the exact opposite.
kilroy123 9y ago
As a native Californian who moved away years ago. I know many people back "home" who would agree with this. Lot's of those folks would love to move away if they could. Still, I can't help but miss home sometimes. California really is one of the most beautiful areas in the world. It has a bit of it all. Deserts. White sandy beaches. Mountains. Forests.
EggsOnToast 9y ago
I'm curious how much of this could also be related to cost of living. At a glance of Wikipedia, California actually has the highest poverty rate of any state once you account for the cost of living as I understand it. For the curious, the adjusted poverty rate is 23.8%. That's huuuuge!
stick_monkey 9y ago
“Worst air quality”, but only if you’re in Fresno. This ranking system seems pretty flawed and biases it towards smell, very average states. California has a lot of good and bad, and this ranking only looks at the bad.
- EggsOnToast 9y ago
  Things like weather and general natural beauty are often brought up when discussing the pros of California living. I'd also argue in favor of our food prices. Food, as a general good and not just staples like rice, is incredibly cheap in the parts of the state that I've toured.
purplezooey 9y ago
Indeed the only good thing happening here lately, aside from contributing two reasonably good senators, is how much one's house has appreciated. The traffic now is almost unpassable in the BA.
danans 9y ago
One should probably disregard any report that tries to rank anything as hard to pin down as quality of life over entities as large and diverse as states. Even the smallest states in the US have wildly different quality of life depending on income and geography. The large ones like California and Texas are practically like countries when it comes to how varied quality of life is within their borders. It's better to look at specific metrics (health, education, housing, opportunity) that comprise quality of life. California excels at some of those for some people, and fails at some for some people.
Keverw 9y ago
Doesn't surprise me. Housing is so expensive there, everything costs so much more, taxes are highest in the nation, multiple levels of government within the state is in direct violation of 8 U.S. Code § 1324. They let illegals get a driver license instead of stalling them while someone in the back calls U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to come and pick them up. Some of the rich billionaires even are leading a campaign to have California to leave the union, so that shows how much they hate the rest of the US. California is pretty and iconic, plenty of things to do for tourism but I surely wouldn't want to live there. Silicon Valley used to be the dream, but during the 2016 election I realized how much of a bubble it is. Kinda surprised Ohio was ranked worse than California at #40... Maybe because it's boring here with nothing to do. Less Debt, Less spending, Less unemployment. http://www.usdebtclock.org/state-debt-clocks/state-of-ohio-debt-clock.html http://www.usdebtclock.org/state-debt-clocks/state-of-ohio-d... and http://www.usdebtclock.org/state-debt-clocks/state-of-california-debt-clock.html http://www.usdebtclock.org/state-debt-clocks/state-of-califo... I personally would love to move to South Dakota. Small and efficient government, no income taxes, low sales tax, property taxes doesn't really seem much higher, no safety or smog inspections for cars. I hear you can get things taken care of at the DMV quickly unlike larger states where you wait hours and hours or weeks to get an appointment. Very friendly state to full time RVers and digital nomad's too as they are one of the few states that recognize fulltime travelers. So for you entrepreneurs that are interested in that lifestyle, a good state also.
- YuriNiyazov 9y ago
  > no safety or smog inspections for cars I am surprised to see this listed as an advantage.
  - Keverw 9y ago
    I think they are just another money grab, wastes people time and also limits people's freedom of movements. So if you live in a state that does smog inspections, and went to college across the county. Better do a cross country road trip!
    - 9y ago
mtraven 9y ago
I invite all the Fox News viewers and others who take this BS seriously to move out of this hellhole and go to states with a higher quality of life rank such as Mississippi (#6) or Arkansas (#7), and send us a postcard so we can be jealous.

26 points by Jerry2 9y ago

Skunkleton 9y ago

Not to be a prick, but this article says the highest quality of life is in North Dakota. Does that sound right?

blhack 9y ago
As somebody who has lived in North Dakota: yes it does.
- Skunkleton 9y ago
  I am sufficiently convinced that I should learn more about North Dakota.
  - blhack 9y ago
    Grand forks North Dakota is basically Mayberry combined with a college town. It's difficult to describe how cold it gets though.
    - api 9y ago
      As with Canada it's best illustrated by the ability to make sculptures out of pee.
frogfuzion 9y ago
Yep. You are truly happy and don't have to worry about urban issues which are huge stressors.
- not_kurt_godel 9y ago
  > You are truly happy* * If you like what North Dakota has to offer, which is a very narrow set of options on the spectrum of life possibilities. > don't have to worry about urban issues which are huge stressors. Urban living can be stressful, but I'll take urban stressors over being trapped in a small pond if it's the wrong pond. Rural life can be awesome but it can also get incredibly boring. It's also prone to souring quickly if you have difficulties with the dozen or so people you might have regular contact with. I lived in a rural area for a spell and it turned out the local handyman had been stealing from everyone for years. What do you do when that guy is the only handyman in the county and his family blames you for his problems when he goes to jail? Not a good situation. Urban conveniences are also awesome. It'll be hard for me to move somewhere that lacks the variety and quality of food options currently available to me now. People in rural areas seem quite content with comparatively awful and unhealthy food.
- Skunkleton 9y ago
  I recently moved to California from a more rural state, and I agree that parts of California are a huge pain in the ass. I was just surprised to see North Dakota at the top because it usually gets such negative coverage.
djcj88 9y ago
I feel like they should have done a better job of defining quality of life. A person who is born and grows old and dies in North Dakota does not have a better life than a person who does the same in California. If only for the education, career opportunities, weather, culture, and earning potential. Yea there are problems, but there are enormous benefits too.
seanmcdirmid 9y ago
It depends on what you are looking for, I guess.
adrianmonk 9y ago
Things like this always depend on what you value most and least. The rankings always have certain weights for those things baked in, and those things may not be the same as how you value them. For example, the rankings put lots of northern states at the top of the list, whereas if you asked me what I value, not having to deal with much cold weather is important, so that would immediately disqualify everything they said was best. Other people, I'm sure, feel the exact opposite.

kilroy123 9y ago

As a native Californian who moved away years ago. I know many people back "home" who would agree with this. Lot's of those folks would love to move away if they could. Still, I can't help but miss home sometimes. California really is one of the most beautiful areas in the world. It has a bit of it all. Deserts. White sandy beaches. Mountains. Forests.

EggsOnToast 9y ago

I'm curious how much of this could also be related to cost of living. At a glance of Wikipedia, California actually has the highest poverty rate of any state once you account for the cost of living as I understand it. For the curious, the adjusted poverty rate is 23.8%. That's huuuuge!

stick_monkey 9y ago

“Worst air quality”, but only if you’re in Fresno. This ranking system seems pretty flawed and biases it towards smell, very average states. California has a lot of good and bad, and this ranking only looks at the bad.

EggsOnToast 9y ago
Things like weather and general natural beauty are often brought up when discussing the pros of California living. I'd also argue in favor of our food prices. Food, as a general good and not just staples like rice, is incredibly cheap in the parts of the state that I've toured.

purplezooey 9y ago

Indeed the only good thing happening here lately, aside from contributing two reasonably good senators, is how much one's house has appreciated. The traffic now is almost unpassable in the BA.

danans 9y ago

One should probably disregard any report that tries to rank anything as hard to pin down as quality of life over entities as large and diverse as states. Even the smallest states in the US have wildly different quality of life depending on income and geography. The large ones like California and Texas are practically like countries when it comes to how varied quality of life is within their borders. It's better to look at specific metrics (health, education, housing, opportunity) that comprise quality of life. California excels at some of those for some people, and fails at some for some people.

Keverw 9y ago

Doesn't surprise me. Housing is so expensive there, everything costs so much more, taxes are highest in the nation, multiple levels of government within the state is in direct violation of 8 U.S. Code § 1324. They let illegals get a driver license instead of stalling them while someone in the back calls U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to come and pick them up. Some of the rich billionaires even are leading a campaign to have California to leave the union, so that shows how much they hate the rest of the US. California is pretty and iconic, plenty of things to do for tourism but I surely wouldn't want to live there. Silicon Valley used to be the dream, but during the 2016 election I realized how much of a bubble it is. Kinda surprised Ohio was ranked worse than California at #40... Maybe because it's boring here with nothing to do. Less Debt, Less spending, Less unemployment. http://www.usdebtclock.org/state-debt-clocks/state-of-ohio-debt-clock.html http://www.usdebtclock.org/state-debt-clocks/state-of-ohio-d... and http://www.usdebtclock.org/state-debt-clocks/state-of-california-debt-clock.html http://www.usdebtclock.org/state-debt-clocks/state-of-califo... I personally would love to move to South Dakota. Small and efficient government, no income taxes, low sales tax, property taxes doesn't really seem much higher, no safety or smog inspections for cars. I hear you can get things taken care of at the DMV quickly unlike larger states where you wait hours and hours or weeks to get an appointment. Very friendly state to full time RVers and digital nomad's too as they are one of the few states that recognize fulltime travelers. So for you entrepreneurs that are interested in that lifestyle, a good state also.

YuriNiyazov 9y ago
> no safety or smog inspections for cars I am surprised to see this listed as an advantage.
- Keverw 9y ago
  I think they are just another money grab, wastes people time and also limits people's freedom of movements. So if you live in a state that does smog inspections, and went to college across the county. Better do a cross country road trip!
  - 9y ago

mtraven 9y ago

I invite all the Fox News viewers and others who take this BS seriously to move out of this hellhole and go to states with a higher quality of life rank such as Mississippi (#6) or Arkansas (#7), and send us a postcard so we can be jealous.