The Best City to Live In is....

[Asher]

Originally posted by GePap
Except that our park is so busy because its rides are without a doubt the best. Again, people voting with their feet.

The difference in magnitude between what there is to see or do in Calgary vs NYC is, well, not even funny.

Which is why the only times a place like Calgary is ever mentioned within the same sentence as NYC is in surveys like this.

I must say thought, having been to Vienna, which surpassed Calgary in this survey, if that is true, Calgary is even more boring than I thought.

I'm curious, GePap.

Since you're obviously an interesting person, because you live in New York City, what kind of interesting things do you do there?

Do you go to the orchestra? Do you go to plays? Do you go to restaurants? Do you go to clubs? Do you go to live music/concerts?

Do you go camping with friends? Do you go skiing? Do you go snowboarding? Do you have an outdoor icerink for free in your neighborhood for pick-up games of hockey? Do you have nearby sport fields for games of soccer and baseball and football? Do you go to museums? Do you go to planetariums? Do you have weekend retreats to a friends cabin on a lake in the mountains?

I'm trying to figure out why all of the interesting people in New York. I can and do all of the above in Calgary, so obvious New York must have a lot of things I cannot do here that make it that much more of a compelling place to live. I'm pretty sure you can't easily do a lot of the things in the above list, though...the downside of living in the middle of nowhere like New York -- no good mountains.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Asher
I said cheap post-secondary. Reading comprehension is something that public schools in Canada apparently do better with.

SAT is an American thing, we don't use such a stupid system in Canada.

SATs are a standard test taken worldwide just like the ACT. You could be going to college in India and they'll still ask for your SAT score, GMAT score, etc...

You said education was better but you haven't shown better test scores on a standardized test we can compare. You've claimed that your universities were better but that didn't pan out for you. As for them being affordable... That's great but if you live in California then you can attend the University of California system (You know like the #2 ranked university in the world UC Berkley) for $5000 per year. Not to bad especially since the state and federal governments will likely give you enough financial aid to cover the whole amount.

[JimmyCracksCorn]

Maybe you're just a boring person, Asher. Thus the complacency with your BF nowhere locale.

[JimmyCracksCorn]

SATs are a standard test taken worldwide just like the ACT. You could be going to college in India and they'll still ask for your SAT score, GMAT score, etc...

No they don't. They'll only ask if you're an American, because they know you took it.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Oerdin
You've claimed that your universities were better but that didn't pan out for you.

NO, I did not. Quote me on it.

I said our education system (as in, public education system) is better. And it is. I know that from personal experience, and I'm sure there's all kinds of studies on it.

It's also pretty simple when you spell out why. In Calgary, for example, there are 200 school days a year -- in California, there's 180.

[Asher]

Originally posted by JimmyCracksCorn
Maybe you're just a boring person, Asher. Thus the complacency with your BF nowhere locale.

Huh? Boyfriend nowhere locale?

And I'm not sure who defines a boring person. From what I know about GePap, he's one of the most boring people on this site. That's why I'm amazed he's trying to use this argument.

Being at the base of the rocky mountains means you can do all kinds of interesting things here that you can't readily do in New York City. When was the last time GePap went rock climbing, for example...or even hiking...as I said before, there's more to life and being "interesting" than being packed like sardines in a crowded city.

[Jon Miller]

honestly, what cities are best to live in all depends..

the fact that clevland and pittsburg top their lsit for american cities suggeests that the list is a joke though..

JM

[Dinner]

Alright, you wanted specific infor so here it is. In Alberta the average household net worth is C$199,664 with a median net worth of C$81,000. To compare California in 2000, the only year I could find, has an average household net worth of $341,300 and a median net worth of $80,700. I'm sure those numbers have gone up in the last decade so I won't bother to convert C$ into US$.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Oerdin
alright, you wanted provence specific infor so here it is. In Alberta the average household net worth is C$199,664 with a median net worth of C$81,000.

Whats your source, these numbers are far lower than I've heard.

In Alberta the average household net worth is $236,198; median is $95,450 -- as of 1999. According to StatsCanada anyway, and these are as official as they get: http://www40.statcan.ca/l01/cst01/famil99i.htm

[Asher]

I can't find anything conclusive about the average Californian's net worth. Some sites say it's $10,000(!) while others suggest it's well over $100,000.

Are we comparing the same numbers? The StatsCanada link I gave includes figures for everything, they even include credit card debt, student loans, etc. in the figure...none of the stuff I've seen for California had any detail...

[Dinner]

Sorry, I read the all Canada line.

http://www40.statcan.ca/l01/cst01/famil91a.htm

$235,990 & $95,400 are the numbers for Alberta and they are indeed 1999.

Governments need to keep the stats up to date. :

[Asher]

Where's the California data?

I don't think net worth is entirely accurate on its own either. A 3,000 square foot house is, what, $300,000CDN in Calgary an it's probably pushing $800,000US in California...at least it was in the suburb I was living in.

Such figures usually mean US employees get paid more compared to comparable Canadians, but the Canadians spend a lot less as well...

[Alexander's Horse]

I saw a story about the raccoons in Toronto - looks like they're taking over.

[Ecthy]

Re: The Best City to Live In is....

Originally posted by Asher
Vancouver...

When I saw the thread title I thought "Vancouver", when the thread was loading I thought to myself "oooh, it's this lovely place called Vancouver" as in parodising some tacky line the way you do it when you just heard it a few times too often. When I read the opening post I just had to giggle at it

[techumseh]

God, I'm torn! Help Asher, the neo-con Calgarian, against a gang of Americans, who are beating him up for daring to compare his city to one of theirs? Or stand by while a bunch of imperio-centric, arrogant yanks get away with embellishing their national self-image yet again?

On the one hand, Asher is defending Calgary. On the other hand GePap is saying NYC is the centre of the universe. On the first hand, Asher is using public health care as an argument, despite not actually supporting it. On the other, the yanks compare NYC to Constantinople. But I can't defend Calgary, I'm an Edmontonian. Gawd, what a dilemma.