> There are ~no good rural jobs. This depends on your definition of a 'good job'. If this is about pay, yes, wages in the countryside are lower - but so are li

> There are ~no good rural jobs. This depends on your definition of a 'good job'. If this is about pay, yes, wages in the countryside are lower - but so are living costs. If I average over my contacts, people working rurally seem to be generally happier with their occupation, though. > and other whining from people who would rather have their yard than replace that with a larger public park... If I have the choice between my own yard, where I can park my barbecue grill, and a public park, which most likely will become a magnet for the homeless/drug user population, I know what I will choose. People who believe public recreation infrastructure is the way to go ascribe an ideal to a public park that is rarely ever met - they live in a world where parks come right out of Edwardian England, with well-maintained flower beds and fences around them, where a park custodian closes the park at night[1]. The problem with that: That is incredibly expensive. So parks are lucky if they get their grass cut regularly, and are relatively calm areas to sleep in at night. The problem now is that with homeless/drug user populations, the area becomes 'unsafe' for local residents, who will now avoid that park, at which point it loses all it's recreational value. So ... why would I give up my own little yard, which I maintain, which is relatively safe, for a block-sized open sewer where it is only a matter of time for someone who ought to be in a mental hospital to shank me? [1] ... and ironically, that type of park was not public either - it was private property often owned by the landlord, and you had to have a residents-only key to access many of those.