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I agree on almost everything else you said about NY. The subway can be dirty although it is much cleaner than it used to be and it is clean for a 24 hour running subway in a city where over a million people use it daily. The housing is ridiculous but hardly different from LA. Either way in both places you will live like crap for something you would live upper middle class like in Texas. I do not where you get the food being unhealthy from. McDonald's is from Southern California. Wall Street is making me money so why should I hate it? Gentrification is a nationwide problem in big cities including Los Angeles. Compton has houses selling for half million dollars. Taxes in NY are ridiculous and they are in California too. That is why I am going to Texas. I am not sure if NY still leads in rats but the population of rats went down. I have not seen a rat or cockroach in about a decade. NY has a lot of traffic and a lot of little highways. There are not as much highway space in NY as LA. NY has a lot of little parkways and they almost turn into a funnel, millions of cars trying to merge onto a two or three lane parkway is going to slow things down. All of those used to be NY's major problems and they have shrunk. LA's major problems are still leading the country.
I also thought it would be salf explanatory when I said LA does not know if it is Mexican or American yet. Mexicans are the majority in LA. It is a Mexican city now and it will continue to become more Mexican.
I dont know maybe a lot more people actually go to the beach in LA. Water pollution I don't give for. Water pollution as in Trashier, or water quality? And it doesn't matter which one cause a beach is beach. The water will not harm me.
If you lived outside of these two cities (or their states), and had a choice of either of those for the same job, which would you pick? Oh and don't forget that you have to find a good home to live in.
Does anyone want to take a shot at actually answering the original question? The question was about where you would prefer to WORK and since most adults spend most of their conscious hours inside of an office building, you would think more of the discussion would revolve around the different industries of each city.
That said, working in Los Angeles would probably be less stressful than working in NYC. I only worked in NYC for a summer, but I worked alongside many world-class jerks. I also worked bone-crushing hours...from about 10AM to 1 AM. Despite the long hours at work, I partied more then during any other time in my life. It was straight from the office at midnight to the club, then home by 6AM, and back to the office again by 10. Those were the days.
Since the OP also asked which one I'd prefer to work in if I lived outside the city, I'd probably choose LA. NYC traffic is a beast. At least you don't have to cross any bridges or tunnels in LA.
But if we make it industry-specific, I'd take a fashion design job in NY over LA, a banking job in NY over LA, and an advertising job in NY. I would never be a lawyer in NY. I would do banking (from 2000-2007). If I were a computer programmer, I'd probably choose LA.
No one is really putting LA above NYC, it's the NY boosters that over exaggerate the negatives of LA, and over-hype the positives of NYC. That's how it's been on EVERY NYC vs (Insert City), since C-D's conception. It always starts out with some faux-intellectual singing NYC's praises, while pointing out and condemning LA for being too spread out, sprawly, un-European, fake, too Hollywood, to laid-back(thus reflecting stupidity and laziness in there minds), and to much like middle and southern America(although LA is quite different). They criticize it's auto-centric life-style, and say how diverse it's not, do to it's large Mexican population(which doesn't mean it's less diverse, it just means it has alot of Mexicans along with it's diversity) All this causes Angelenos to jump into defense mode, which may seem as attack mode to the average New Yorker, or east-coaster(alot of the NYC boosters on here aren't from NYC, and are just from the east-coast). Repeat this process a MILLION times, and there you have it.
You have never been to NYC or LA so I don't see how you can make this comparison.
It really depends on what a person wants and what kind of job. I will say for NYC that in a way it's much easier to work there because of the good mass transit. It's also kind of nice that as soon as you step out of your building there is so much going on right there and plenty of stores, restaurants, etc. right there. Everything is very convenient in NYC. I've worked on and off in NYC over the course of the past 15 years, and while my commute (from NJ) is pretty long (realistically up to 1.5 hours each way) it's really rather easy and it's a lot of fun. I love being able to call a friend and meet for a drink after work with no problems, or being able to go from work to a great dinner very easily and then on to whatever other activity I want. The downside is that in NYC you are expected to work, and work hard, and the hours (even when you have some form of executive privilege or flexibility) are often very long. Also, weather can be a pain, especially when it's too cold or too hot (subways in summertime can be hell!) or when you get caught in rain w/ no umbrella.
I've worked in L.A. also - in Cerritos, Glendale, Burbank, Culver City... I love L.A. Work is much less stressful, people aren't as uptight about hours worked - I've been able to take off an afternoon spur of the moment to go sailing with a friend from the office there, I've also been able to get away with long, leisurely lunches (usually outside on a patio, in that beautiful weather)... Doing work for the same companies there as in NY somehow feels more hip there, whereas NY feels more wall-street-esque and business-like, and I prefer the hip feel in L.A. Also, the beautiful weather makes it easy to get outside during lunch or break times, and it's nice to get out of work and be able to count on doing anything outdoors, year-round. Downsides to working in L.A. are commuting by car (which actually was never as bad as many led me to believe it would be - but still not fun) and too often there is a lack of professionalism and/or work ethic which I'd see very rarely in NYC - it's not the norm but there is definitely more of that than in NYC.
Both are exciting cities to live and work in - each one has pros and cons. You can't go wrong with either one. To me it's a tie - I'd probably give the edge to NYC because everything's so convenient and more industries are represented better so there tend to be better job opportunities, but I'd also give an edge to L.A. because it's just such a beautiful place to live with much better weather and a less stressful and more healthy attitude towards work in relation to life.
Does anyone want to take a shot at actually answering the original question? The question was about where you would prefer to WORK and since most adults spend most of their conscious hours inside of an office building, you would think more of the discussion would revolve around the different industries of each city.
That said, working in Los Angeles would probably be less stressful than working in NYC. I only worked in NYC for a summer, but I worked alongside many world-class jerks. I also worked bone-crushing hours...from about 10AM to 1 AM. Despite the long hours at work, I partied more then during any other time in my life. It was straight from the office at midnight to the club, then home by 6AM, and back to the office again by 10. Those were the days.
Since the OP also asked which one I'd prefer to work in if I lived outside the city, I'd probably choose LA. NYC traffic is a beast. At least you don't have to cross any bridges or tunnels in LA.
But if we make it industry-specific, I'd take a fashion design job in NY over LA, a banking job in NY over LA, and an advertising job in NY. I would never be a lawyer in NY. I would do banking (from 2000-2007). If I were a computer programmer, I'd probably choose LA.
You have never been to NYC or LA so I don't see how you can make this comparison.
In case you haven't noticed yet, this is CITY-DATA. It's the NORM to make assumptions about places you've never been to(IE people who've NEVER, EVER, been to Texas going by stereotypes they see in the media). And guess what? I have been to NYC. Are you confused?
It really depends on what a person wants and what kind of job. I will say for NYC that in a way it's much easier to work there because of the good mass transit. It's also kind of nice that as soon as you step out of your building there is so much going on right there and plenty of stores, restaurants, etc. right there. Everything is very convenient in NYC. I've worked on and off in NYC over the course of the past 15 years, and while my commute (from NJ) is pretty long (realistically up to 1.5 hours each way) it's really rather easy and it's a lot of fun. I love being able to call a friend and meet for a drink after work with no problems, or being able to go from work to a great dinner very easily and then on to whatever other activity I want. The downside is that in NYC you are expected to work, and work hard, and the hours (even when you have some form of executive privilege or flexibility) are often very long. Also, weather can be a pain, especially when it's too cold or too hot (subways in summertime can be hell!) or when you get caught in rain w/ no umbrella.
I've worked in L.A. also - in Cerritos, Glendale, Burbank, Culver City... I love L.A. Work is much less stressful, people aren't as uptight about hours worked - I've been able to take off an afternoon spur of the moment to go sailing with a friend from the office there, I've also been able to get away with long, leisurely lunches (usually outside on a patio, in that beautiful weather)... Doing work for the same companies there as in NY somehow feels more hip there, whereas NY feels more wall-street-esque and business-like, and I prefer the hip feel in L.A. Also, the beautiful weather makes it easy to get outside during lunch or break times, and it's nice to get out of work and be able to count on doing anything outdoors, year-round. Downsides to working in L.A. are commuting by car (which actually was never as bad as many led me to believe it would be - but still not fun) and too often there is a lack of professionalism and/or work ethic which I'd see very rarely in NYC - it's not the norm but there is definitely more of that than in NYC.
Both are exciting cities to live and work in - each one has pros and cons. You can't go wrong with either one. To me it's a tie - I'd probably give the edge to NYC because everything's so convenient and more industries are represented better so there tend to be better job opportunities, but I'd also give an edge to L.A. because it's just such a beautiful place to live with much better weather and a less stressful and more healthy attitude towards work in relation to life.
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