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Like any place, there is good and bad. I absolutely and thoroughly enjoyed my time in Lima. As mentioned in my previous post, I would never drive in that city and it is great to see mass transit infrastructure being built. As a former city planner I was somewhat amazed that the place works as well as it does. The city is divided into around 43 districts and each district has a mayor responsible for their own district for some city services. There is an umbrella city/region government that tries to coordinate and provides city-wide services. At the time I was visiting, there were around 400 bus companies so riders had to know what bus they wanted among the hundreds that were coming and going...it seemed to work. A lot of country-side people moved into Lima during (and since) the Shining Path insurgency and the place continued to grow faster than it could manage. A friend's family owned a small plot of land and had a truck garden but had to vacate when they were overrun by people who moved in and stayed. When I asked about stop signs not being observed I was told that there used to be a problem with kidnappers who took advantage of wealthy drivers stopping at stop signs...so now it is perceived more like a caution sign and people commonly just roll through if there is no traffic. The city was doing quite well economically even during the world-wide recession. I can't comment on poverty statistics but there seemed to be some obvious economic extremes. People living on the hillside do have a million dollar view of Lima but might be lacking in other areas.
There are obviously still a lot of issues with Lima, but the Peruvian economy is really one of the best performing ones recently. Even as Colombia and Chile are slowing down, Brazil is faltering, and Argentina is being Argentina, Peru just keeps on growing. In the past 10 years, Peru has cut its poverty in half, and that's just since 2004, in the 90s you can bet it was even worse, while in the 80s Peru had a comparable GDP to Bolivia, BOLIVIA. That says all you need to know about Peru's growth
There are obviously still a lot of issues with Lima, but the Peruvian economy is really one of the best performing ones recently. Even as Colombia and Chile are slowing down, Brazil is faltering, and Argentina is being Argentina, Peru just keeps on growing. In the past 10 years, Peru has cut its poverty in half, and that's just since 2004, in the 90s you can bet it was even worse, while in the 80s Peru had a comparable GDP to Bolivia, BOLIVIA. That says all you need to know about Peru's growth
That's my thought as well. Peru is a fantastic little nation and they are on a really good path, they just need to keep stability to prevent falling down again.
Lima is a bit chaotic but I really enjoyed the lifestyle, food, friendly people. You can definitely enjoy the good life on a discount in Miraflores, I could live here long term. The climate is crazy as it's comfortable but never rains and is overcast, not sure how to rate that.
There are obviously still a lot of issues with Lima, but the Peruvian economy is really one of the best performing ones recently. Even as Colombia and Chile are slowing down, Brazil is faltering, and Argentina is being Argentina, Peru just keeps on growing. In the past 10 years, Peru has cut its poverty in half, and that's just since 2004, in the 90s you can bet it was even worse, while in the 80s Peru had a comparable GDP to Bolivia, BOLIVIA. That says all you need to know about Peru's growth
Colombian economy slowed down but its expected to grow at a higher rate in 2017 vs. 2016. (something like 3% vs 2% from past year).
The 80s thing with Peru was caused because of a populist dictator whom took the country to the abyss with him. Something like a Peruvian Maduro.
That's good for Colombia, hopefully they just hit some rocks this year and that they can keep on growing. Peru hit rock bottom a bit earlier than Colombia so they've had more time to climb out of it, Peru bottomed out in the 80s up until 1990, while Colombia suffered all through the 90s and only started improving after 2002. Peru also has a lot less crime problems to deal with, the homicide rate of Peru is like 1/4 of the rate in Colombia, and Lima's is 1/3 of the rate in Bogota
Lima is a great city but just to put the story straight even through Colombia's worse times, it has been a stronger economy than Peru.
That can be seen in its infrastructure of all its 20 major cities, so much so that Colombia's 17th city (Armenia) is more advanced than any Peruvian city bar Lima and Arequipa. Arequipa, Peru's second city, doesn't even compete with Bucaramanga, Colombia's 6th city in infrastructure, economy, quality of life and education. FYI: In 2015 Colombia grew nearly twice as much as Peru.
Interesting insight into the Chinese-Peruvian economic ties
Interesting data on Peru's economy
Economic growth has created a shortage of skilled workers (an opportunity for well educated foreigners willing to live in Peru; shortage of workers usually means high wages for those that qualify)
In fact, thousands of Spaniards have opted to develop their professions in Peru instead of in Spain/Europe/North America
That's good for Colombia, hopefully they just hit some rocks this year and that they can keep on growing. Peru hit rock bottom a bit earlier than Colombia so they've had more time to climb out of it, Peru bottomed out in the 80s up until 1990, while Colombia suffered all through the 90s and only started improving after 2002.
all LatAm countries had their highs and lows during the XX century. For Colombia, I think the 20s and 30s were very good, the 50s, not so much, and so on. But it's also much more complicated. For one, during the 90s, even with all the terrorism and violence boom, Colombia was one of the countries with the highest Human Development Indexes outside of the First World
This is the HDI map of 1998, based on data from 1995 (the darker shade of green, the more developed the country is):
Also, during the Latin America economy crisis in the 80s, while many countries saw their economies shrinking, Colombian economy just stagnated (didn't grow but didn't shrinked either).
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Peru also has a lot less crime problems to deal with, the homicide rate of Peru is like 1/4 of the rate in Colombia, and Lima's is 1/3 of the rate in Bogota
There are many kinds of crime aside from homicides. As I showed here, Peru might have less homicides, but other kinds of crimes and violences (like violence against woman) are more recurrent than in Colombia.
Lima is a great city but just to put the story straight even through Colombia's worse times, it has been a stronger economy than Peru.
That can be seen in its infrastructure of all its 20 major cities, so much so that Colombia's 17th city (Armenia) is more advanced than any Peruvian city bar Lima and Arequipa. Arequipa, Peru's second city, doesn't even compete with Bucaramanga, Colombia's 6th city in infrastructure, economy, quality of life and education. FYI: In 2015 Colombia grew nearly twice as much as Peru.
I'm not down on Columbia, in fact I'm dying to visit there but I don't agree that any great difference in the relative infrastructure, economy, quality of life as you suggest. I checked the World Factbook and Columbia does have a 10% higher GDP per capita and the we know that Columbia's murder rate is 4 times higher. Plus I lived Arequipa and have to say the quality of life there is really pretty good.
As an aside, I good friend I work with grew up in Columbia but emigrated to Australia 15 years ago and is visiting Columbia for the 1st time in 15 years, I anxiously want to hear his report (he is pretty down on Columbia but has heard things have gotten better).
Just my own opinion but I consider Peru and Columbia pretty equal but Peru getting the edge due to a much lower murder rate.
I'm not down on Columbia, in fact I'm dying to visit there but I don't agree that any great difference in the relative infrastructure, economy, quality of life as you suggest.
I didn't say Colombia has a better quality of life than Peru, I said Bucaramanga edges out Arequipa in infrastructure, economy, education and quality of life (maybe not for OPs but in general) and I said Colombian cities have better infrastructure (apart from Lima that's building great infrastructure) than Peru due to decades of having a larger economy.
Bucaramanga has a mass transport system, the 75th and 76th highest ranked universities in Latin America (also in the top global 1000) and 3 more in the top 300. Arequipa has only one university in the top 300 of LatAm. The medical industry is also much more proficient in Bucaramanga with many clinics ranked in
the best in the region, not to mention economy.
Lima concentrates 52% of the entire Peruvian economy, which means the rest of the country lives on very little, whereas Bogota only concentrates 23% of the Colombian economy. There are more pockets of development in Colombia than in Peru, that is undeniable.
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