Second saddest city

[Bhaalspawn]

Originally Posted by 313Weather

Fargo is happy because they have plenty of jobs (while you're hard-pressed to find a part-time McDonalds job paying $7.40 here, they pay $15/hr full time there at McDonalds), and they have a low cost of living to boot.

I've conducted a job search in Fargo and the wages there aren't all that amazing. For fast food and retail jobs the wages are probably $9-10/hour. (Remember, North Dakota is a rural state that traditionally has lower wages. Not all of the state is part of the oil boom/patch area.) Fargo has low unemployment, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't have working poor. Fargo's cost of living is slightly lower than average.

In contrast, if you go 450 miles northwest to Williston (in the heart of oil boom country) then, in that very rare atmosphere can you find the $15/hour fast food jobs. Consequently, the cost of almost all goods and services are higher in Williston and a 2 bedroom apartment probably goes for $2000+/month. (It wouldn't make any sense to move there if your goal were to get a $15 fast food job; you'd have more purchasing power in Fargo with a lesser wage.) Wages rise as you get closer to the oil patch in the northwestern part of the state, but the cost of living rises too.

I can see how people could be happy in Fargo. The city has low crime, few traffic jams, a relatively low cost of living, a low unemployment, good shopping options, and affordable family formation, and when I drove around it looked like the town was growing rapidly with large amounts of new development in the southern area.