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The older you are, I think the more you need to be around others like doctors, hospitals, shopping, friends, etc. We live within 10 minutes of both of our sons and 4 grandsons in a large suburb of Phoenix, can't imagine a better set up with medical and shopping a few minutes away.
Safety in numbers? Are we suggesting cities/urban areas have lower crime rates than suburbs/rural areas as measured on a whole?
My relatively small hometown in Tennessee, Kingsport, has a higher property crime rate than Indianapolis, where I lived for several years.
Yes, violent crime is higher in Indy, but it's mostly confined to "known bad" areas. Crime is high all around Kingsport - many areas are bad, and it's harder to avoid.
Rural areas, at least here in Tennessee, are notorious for meth and opioid addiction issues. While I wouldn't call it "unsafe" if you aren't into those things, property crime from addicts is a constant concern.
My relatively small hometown in Tennessee, Kingsport, has a higher property crime rate than Indianapolis, where I lived for several years.
Yes, violent crime is higher in Indy, but it's mostly confined to "known bad" areas. Crime is high all around Kingsport - many areas are bad, and it's harder to avoid.
Rural areas, at least here in Tennessee, are notorious for meth and opioid addiction issues. While I wouldn't call it "unsafe" if you aren't into those things, property crime from addicts is a constant concern.
One off examples or personal experiences do not make for a good analysis. I believe, as you pointed out, location is very important, but on the whole... urban areas are risker = more crime than remote areas.
We downsized before retirement and I currently travel between small homes that I own in different locations. I like being around people and conveniences but also value the opportunity to decompress in a quiet location surrounded by nature. As long as I can swing it (physically and financially), I will continue to split my time.
Really depends on the person and situation in my opinion. We are going to upsize and move more remotely when we "retire", whereas I have co workers the same age that want to downsize, move to a community, and be close to shopping and healthcare.
Now if I was single, I would downsize, move somewhere warm and closer to everything.
Safety in numbers? Are we suggesting cities/urban areas have lower crime rates than suburbs/rural areas as measured on a whole?
Safety doesn't always have to be about crime rates. Having old-fashioned neighbors to look in on you can mean your" more safe". It really depends on the area, and the type of people that live there.
Last week, way out here in the boonies, a girl in a Jeep 4x4 got stuck in a snow bank trying to enter on to a main road, and since traffic was light, my wife and I stopped in the middle of the road and jumped out to help push her out. The trucks coming up behind us also stopped- no honking, and people started jumping out and running over to help push.
Safety constitutes a lot of meanings, and I prefer to focus on (and cherish), the best of humanity, not the worst which is what sells in modern media.
Last edited by MichiganGreg; 02-13-2024 at 06:43 AM..
Reason: edited for clarity.
The wife and I lived in a 55+ “active adult” community for seven years before moving out last year. The truth about these places is the average age is really more like 70+, and the demographic skews female to the tune of 2:1. Another aspect that is noticeable but can’t be quantified is the vibe of aging and death that permeates these places. When I heard the ambulance sirens daily and saw the flashing lights go by my house (they turn off the siren when pulling into the community streets), it had an accumulating, negative effect on my outlook. We developed a dark humor about it and joked that the coyote calls we heard at night were imitating the ambulance sirens. It was one of the big reasons we decided to sell our “dream home” and move.
Right now we are renting a home in a regular neighborhood with kids playing and no daily sirens. Cold weather and snow no longer appeal to us, so we might just downsize radically and travel as much as we can.
Safety doesn't always have to be about crime rates. Having old-fashioned neighbors to look in on you can mean your" more safe". It really depends on the area, and the type of people that live there.
Last week, way out here in the boonies, a girl in a Jeep 4x4 got stuck in a snow bank trying to enter on to a main road, and since traffic was light, my wife and I stopped in the middle of the road and jumped out to help push her out. The trucks coming up behind us also stopped- no honking, and people started jumping out and running over to help push.
Safety constitutes a lot of meanings, and I prefer to focus on (and cherish), the best of humanity, not the worst which is what sells in modern media.
Again... one off examples mean nothing when looking at the overall picture. Averages and mean values have their place when a 'general' question is asked.
Personal experienced DO matter, but not when we compare.
One off examples or personal experiences do not make for a good analysis. I believe, as you pointed out, location is very important, but on the whole... urban areas are risker = more crime than remote areas.
Not all risk is crime-related.
I've mentioned this before, but my grandmother had a stroke last April or May. She was taken to a large hospital in Kingsport, a city of about 55,000.
I used to work for that hospital system. A few months before her stroke, and before I left the organization, my last major project was installing new software for the hospital call center to notify on-call physicians. I specifically remembered testing stroke call at that hospital with an on-call physician and their call center staff.
My grandmother waited ten or twelve hours on a gurney in the ED before being seen. After calling around, it turns out that hospital eliminated stroke coverage between when I tested the system at the end of 2022 and when my grandmother had her stroke.
If you have a stroke in most of extreme southwest VA, you are well over an hour drive, pushing an hour and a half to two hour ride in some cases, from a hospital that can somewhat treat you. That's a "risk" of living remotely.
Oh, and they probably won't get you an ambulance that far out. The hospital system also owns the med-flight service. Cha-ching! You'll be out ~$50k for the med flight, and traditional health insurance doesn't cover the bill.
I can guarantee you there are lots of people around here who buy that piece of rural dream acreage or whatever, and have absolutely no idea about the med flight issue, or even that something common like a stroke cannot really be treated in the immediate area.
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