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Wait, let me get my checkbook ready so I can shell out $1200 to live in a crap apartment in the ghetto next to PJ and section 8 people while they pay next to nothing and pretend to look for work. All so my paycheck can go to them. Yes, you can have it all and keep it!
Excellent point. I agree 100% and feel the same way you do. Good observation!
Katie unless you are the top 1% of tax payers in NYC, the city really does not need you. The top 1% pays like 75% of taxes in NYC...so I think your income needs to be above $500,000 per year. And since you were paying $1,200 and living across the street from projects and section 8 people, it only means you are just like them and it's where you belong. You are just a working slob like everyone else you are complaining about..sucks to think you are one of them huh?
If you believe NYC is all about depressing/nasty people, you are better off somewhere else where people are far right, carry shotguns in their pickups, heterosexual and have the 3 teeth and married to their cousin to prove it, and nasty, just not to your face. Texas might be a good start.
And we are happy to have it all, the diversity of jobs and highest paying jobs, the access to the best entertainment and cultural venues in the country, the access to the global elite, the vast culture and diversity of neighborhoods, expansive public transportation, top schools, major airports, diversity of housing stock, and did I mention great people? But hey..enjoy the guns and low taxes in Texas.
Katie unless you are the top 1% of tax payers in NYC, the city really does not need you. The top 1% pays like 75% of taxes in NYC...so I think your income needs to be above $500,000 per year. And since you were paying $1,200 and living across the street from projects and section 8 people, it only means you are just like them and it's where you belong. You are just a working slob like everyone else you are complaining about..sucks to think you are one of them huh?
If you believe NYC is all about depressing/nasty people, you are better off somewhere else where people are far right, carry shotguns in their pickups, heterosexual and have the 3 teeth and married to their cousin to prove it, and nasty, just not to your face. Texas might be a good start.
And we are happy to have it all, the diversity of jobs and highest paying jobs, the access to the best entertainment and cultural venues in the country, the access to the global elite, the vast culture and diversity of neighborhoods, expansive public transportation, top schools, major airports, diversity of housing stock, and did I mention great people? But hey..enjoy the guns and low taxes in Texas.
LOL, omg talk about stereotypes! First off, I live in a "blue" state, in the north, not in Texas. People are not exactly polished or sophisticated, but they certainly aren't hicks from the backwoods either. Heartland, Midwestern people. People who live in NYC and don't venture into 'real America' need to get out more, you may be very surprised. Also, the top 1% certainly does not pay 75% of NYC taxes. Wall Street, the proverbial golden goose of the city, only pays 25% of it at most. A good amount of it comes from 'working slobs' as you call us. Just because I work certainly does not make me a slob. I take pride in it and it is exactly what separates me from the people I mentioned... to put me in the same pile is ridiculous and laughable. So it doesn't really suck to 'think I am one of them' because I never have been and never will be. I have never taken a handout in my life. And while it hasn't always been easy, I am doing quite well... well enough to afford to pay $1200 a month here, which would translate to like $1700-1800 a month in NYC. Which would be enough to live in a nice part of Manhattan, certainly much better than grosser-than-gross East Harlem. Not that I would ever be dumb enough to shell that out just for rent. I'm out to build my own wealth, not my landlord's or city's. It's called Common Sense 101. The part about high salaries, please. They are high for a reason, and you know it. Also... diversity of housing stock? Lol, I had a good long laugh at that sentence. Housing is one of the city's biggest problems. Don't hate me because I'm not like you. Hate me because when I'm in my late fifties I will be able to retire nicely and travel with a home I own outright, whereas in NYC I'd still be pounding the same stinking pavement every day with arthritis to boot. P.S. I am a Democrat and I wear Jimmy Choos. Just a normal Democrat, which means center-right. Not way off in left field like like the bleeding hearts and whackos that drain your city dry and keep people like me away. But I am sure you are immune to all of that and are so much smarter than me. If that is so, try citing proper statistics. Then maybe we can have an educated, mature conversation! P.S.P.S. The tax money from Wall Street will only last so long and go so far. You can only repackage toxic assets so many ways before people catch on and you start losing profit share. http://www.usatoday.com/money/compan...tm?csp=34money Don't insult people without knowing them, it's illogical and silly. And just so you know, I hate Texas just as much as you do!
Last edited by KatieMarie10; 01-26-2011 at 03:27 PM..
Yes stereotypes indeed, and you displayed a gross amount of it in your skewed depiction of NYC and New Yorkers in general. I don't hate you, but apparently you hate me (New Yorker), you hate my home (NYC), and you hate most things about it. So take your frustration of being a tiny guppy in a gigantic sea, and "at least I am not them" self-esteem some place where you will be happy. And really, NYC does not need people like you, complainers/whiners/I am entitled to XYZ, we have enough of those. We need people who will pay the taxes and BE HAPPY here, which clearly you are not..so no...we don't need you and you won't be missed.
You are not the first to throw the NYC tantrum of why they can't have what they feel they deserve, and why they have to live here or there or next to "those people," and you won't be the last. I hope you find happiness in your low-tax, gun toting, heterosexual, homogenous home, wherever that may be. As they say if you can make it here you can make anywhere. You clearly could not make it here, so maybe you can make it somewhere else..who knows. But why waste your time in the NYC forums complaining about it?
Yes stereotypes indeed, and you displayed a gross amount of it in your skewed depiction of NYC and New Yorkers in general. I don't hate you, but apparently you hate me (New Yorker), you hate my home (NYC), and you hate most things about it. So take your frustration of being a tiny guppy in a gigantic sea, and "at least I am not them" self-esteem some place where you will be happy. And really, NYC does not need people like you, complainers/whiners/I am entitled to XYZ, we have enough of those. We need people who will pay the taxes and BE HAPPY here, which clearly you are not..so no...we don't need you and you won't be missed.
You are not the first to throw the NYC tantrum of why they can't have what they feel they deserve, and why they have to live here or there or next to "those people," and you won't be the last. I hope you find happiness in your low-tax, gun toting, heterosexual, homogenous home, wherever that may be. As they say if you can make it here you can make anywhere. You clearly could not make it here, so maybe you can make it somewhere else..who knows. But why waste your time in the NYC forums complaining about it?
Lol, since when is complaining a bad thing? Isn't that one of the redeeming qualities of our country? If I am not happy with something and want to articulate why, that is something I think I have every right and reason to voice. I most certainly do not hate New Yorkers, or NYC, or you. I hate WHAT HAS HAPPENED to NYC as regular sane-minded people like me have no reason to move there. If rents were reasonable, policies and taxes were reasonable, if there was a solid middle class... I would probably take a much more serious look at living there. I never made any kind of attempt at living there long-term, so I can't really know whether I would 'make it' or not. All I know is the current climate and environment have made it very undesirable for me to consider that, and until things change and it is not a Disneyland for tourists/playground for the rich/entitlement zone for the poor I will not be exactly packing my bags. The middle class is what made NYC great. Without that and the creative class it has no soul, no heart. Once the powers that be wake up/wise up and find a way to facilitate that once again, NYC can rise up and regain its true character. The question is when, and at what cost.
NYC is in constant change, so if you don't like change, you would never have liked NYC. You would have made the same arguments when the Irish flooded into NYC, when the slums were REAL slums, when the Italians swarmed NYC and the MOB controlled much of the city, you would have despised the Jews, hated all the colored folks in the 50s and 60s, hated the destruction and economic collapse of the 70s, hated the outrageous crime of the 90s, and today you hate the outrageous cost of living.
You would have found plenty of reasons to hate NYC, because it is all about change. It may soon be all rich and poor with nothing in the middle, and you clearly hate that too. If you believe NYC has lost its soul, you never knew NYC and still don't. And for the record, the immigrants are what made and make NYC great, the never ending opportunity is what makes NYC great, the ability for the poor to become middle class or higher is what makes NYC great, and none of that has changed. The middle class has always been leaving NYC and it isn't anything new...however there is a new brown and black middle class and that's AOK and just as good as any other middle class before.
NYC is rising, just not the way you expect. SURPRISE! Nobody knows how NYC will evolve and that's part of what makes this city great. And NYC has been counted out more times than I can count, but it always comes back and is on the rise..you just don't like where you THINK it's going!
That is your opinion and that is fine, I respect that. But I know I am not alone in what I am complaining about. I don't really think there is much of a middle class there anymore whether it's black/brown/white or whatever. It's a polite way more or less of saying 'working poor'. It is much more comfortably phrased that way. I have known NYC ever since I was a kid in the early 80s. I am no stranger to its history even though I do not live there. I have been visiting since I was in my Huggies. Its problems are the same problems we are experiencing as a nation, especially in terms of a collapsing middle class. I don't point the finger just on NYC for that, however, it seems far more pronounced there than anywhere else I've been and I have literally been to 49 of all 50 states. The lower classes have far less opportunity than ever in times past. And when there were REAL slums, there still was a place better than that for ordinary people not strung out on drugs and crime where they felt safe to rest and pay normal rents. There was a real sense you could rise up. I feel now the only real sense is that you have a chance of rising from 'working poor' to 'working lower/middle class'. Little more than that is a spin on the roulette wheel, and the odds speak for themselves. It will change in a way you and I cannot predict, you are right. You say that makes it great. To me it means zero. You could say that about anywhere.
I used to live in a very small town at the end of Cape Cod. One winter we had 2 murders making us the murder capital of the USA for that year. Like I said it was a very small town. It is all relative.
My hometown, an Illinois suburb of STL (not East St. Louis) had a 7.92 violent crime rate in 2008, which appears to be on par with the 32nd precinct -- Central Harlem above 129th street. People scared of Harlem should check out North St. Louis and East St. Louis. Talk about urban decay. There are buildings that have been abandoned so long, the windows fell in on themselves.
And I'm not from what I would consider to be a scary town. Some people would ... small-minded people who are scared of the ~30% black population. The crime is pretty compartmentalized in certain parts of town and avoiding it is about as simple as not getting involved in drugs or gangs.
The one concession I'd make is that it would be a lot harder here for someone to get held up on a street corner since everyone drives everywhere. And the area is 16 square miles, so it's easier to be geographically distant from the crime epicenters.
Last edited by ErnestScaredStupid; 03-05-2011 at 11:29 PM..
What makes you think that my statement had anything to do with race? It was the whole atmosphere that had an unsettling feeling to it- the rundown buildings fenced in barbed wire, homeless people of all colors passed out drunk on the sides of stores and churches, shady street characters, etc. Where I live isn't utopia either BTW. And I think your city DOES need people like me badly- seeing as we make up the tax base and it seems things are quite strapped at the moment, to put it mildly. Not that I would. Too far left, too high a tax burden, too many roaches/bedbugs/rats/you-name-it. Depressing weather, nasty people, ridiculous gun control laws and violations of 4th amendment rights. Corruption everywhere, people begging for money a half dozen times a day, $12 for a pack of smokes. Guys are players or gay/bi, landlords that seem to reject anyone with a dog (even if it's 2 pounds lol), stench, filth, noise wherever you go. Sounds like a great deal! Wait, let me get my checkbook ready so I can shell out $1200 to live in a crap apartment in the ghetto next to PJ and section 8 people while they pay next to nothing and pretend to look for work. All so my paycheck can go to them. Yes, you can have it all and keep it!
Katie, you obviously have made the right decision for you and for NYC not to move here. Right has prevailed, and as a NY'er, I'm glad.
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