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1. Employment: Minneapolis; Seattle; Denver; Phoenix (MSP has lowest unemployment rate in USA plus a pretty high average wage)
2. Cost of living: Phoenix, Minneapolis, Denver, Seattle (Although comparing utility costs with a friend in Phoenix mine are lower in Minneapolis)
3. Professional sports: Denver ties Minneapolis, Seattle and Phoenix pretty much wash each other out.
4. Climate: Denver; Minneapolis; Seattle; Phoenix (MN winters are no joke but the rest of the year is awesome. Denver has nice winters where the snow usually melts off in days and you can have 70 degree days in January)
5. Outdoors: To me Denver ties Minneapolis and not sure who to pick over Phoenix or Seattle. Both MSP and DEN are top ranked for active and healthy residents. Denver is based right at the foothills of the Rockies and MSP share the Mississippi river along with countless trail surrounded lakes. Both are top bike friendly cities to boot.
Taxes: Seattle; Denver; Phoenix; Minneapolis (MSP has a high income tax rate but provides a fairly high level of service which you may or may not find valuable. CO has a 4.3% flat IT where WA has no state IT.
Transit: Denver; Minneapolis; Seattle; Phoenix
Skylines: all cities except Phoenix have nice skyscrapers. Phoenix on its own is comparable to St Paul. However, if you factor in both Minneapolis and St Paul then I would rank the TC as having the most picturesque skyline.
I moved to MSP from DEN and if I could make a completely lateral move I would go back to Denver. I have good friends in both Seattle and Phoenix but have not been to either so I am basing ranking on discussion and online rankings and data points. Denver has a slightly more favorable climate to me. I like the arid western vibe and the lack of muggy dew points. If the winters in MSP weren't so extreme I would probably be quite content. The MSP metro is a really nice place overall. You have great quality of life, affordable housing, good wages and overall job market, nice mix of urban forestry with scenic rivers and lakes. It isn't super flat as the SP side has river bluffs. With the other exception of Phoenix all of these metros mentioned consistently rank towards the top of national rankings for Quality of life, careers, and residents health.
I'm not sure how CNN's cost of living calculator calculates the home prices but it seems way off, according to this data anyways. This is also what I've heard to be true about both regions and their home values and I never understood how somebody from Denver could claim it's "cheap".
I'm not saying Denver is "cheap", not by a long shot. But it's not outrageously expensive. On our recent trip to MSP, we noticed that St. Paul in particular has a lot of very old housing. Our daughter is living in an apt in a house that was built in 1889. You don't find those kind of houses in Denver, or not many of them anyway. Those houses tend to be less expensive, particularly if they haven't been rehabbed recently. I kind of have a feeling the same house would go for about the same amt. of money in either city, meaning Denver and Mpls, not Minn and St. Paul.
Now you're just being hypocritical, considering the veiled "pretty" comment-- which was exactly what that poster was responding to.
I was giving an example of a similar statement to "millions of dead pine trees throughout the Colorado Rockies waiting for the next lightning strike".
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