DM only 1 0f 3 Cities with these desired qualities

[funksoulbro]

Originally Posted by capitalcityguy

His contrarian list was made up.

All those lists (including yours) are made up. Some magazine publisher needs to make a list to sell copies of a magazine, or for their online click-bait, so some nameless writer with an incomplete list of government census data and/or unverifiable anecdotes starts creating these arbitrary ratings.

Des Moines gets a ton of press for having been on so many lists. The Kardashians have millions of followers. Just because something is in the spotlight all the time, doesn't mean it has any redeeming value. People still die of cancer, get cheated on by a spouse, and hate their jobs in Des Moines. It isn't some magical place where the problems of human civilization have been eradicated. It's just like any other mid-sized American city, which means it's nothing extraordinary.

...Regardless of what your made-up lists might claim.

[capitalcityguy]

There is nothing sexy about Des Moines to provide these entities any reason to choose DM over many, many other places and more importantly, the STATE of Iowa has a smaller population than some larger CITIES....so the audience is very small. If they're looking for attention, they'll go where the warm bodies are.

Your logic doesn't add up.

Stick to comedy.

[funksoulbro]

Originally Posted by capitalcityguy

the STATE of Iowa has a smaller population than some larger CITIES....so the audience is very small. If they're looking for attention, they'll go where the warm bodies are.

Your logic doesn't add up.

The audience they're seeking are all people in the United States who want to read about "The Best City For..." (fill in the blank) and will buy a magazine, or click on a slideshow to see the results. So, your assertion that I'm saying the audience for these polls only exists in Iowa is nothing more than a Straw Man you concocted. People all across the country want to claim they live in the best city. These lists give them something to boast about, provided their city ranks high enough.

It doesn't mean that a "Best City" list has any real merit...especially since people are hardly monolithic beings. Believe it or not, quite a few people couldn't care less about downtown loft apartments and how gay-friendly a city is. That's the kind of halfwitted minutiae only a City-Data poster might care about.

For the 95% of normal Americans who wish to be close to family or friends, they'll live where that happens regardless what some list says.

[capitalcityguy]

Some lists are completely subjective, others are statistically based, and many are a combo so lumping them altogether hurts your argument.

Why so mad?

[funksoulbro]

Originally Posted by capitalcityguy

Some lists are completely subjective, others are statistically based, and many are a combo so lumping them altogether hurts your argument.

Even the statistically-based lists employ a methodology that is arbitrary in nature. Per-capita income is no more a reliable indicator for the livability of city, than the number of cloudy days per year is a reliable indicator of a great climate. In fact, both "livability" and "great climate" are themselves subjective terms which have different meanings to different people. These "Best Cities" lists possess the same worth as the Miss America pageant. They are concocted by people with arbitrary criteria that assigns a score to something that is solely in the eye of the beholder.

I love bike trails. A city with the highest number of bike trail miles per capita means nothing to me if the trails are all flat and boring. I'd prefer a city with a lower number of bike trail miles per capita that has better topography and scenery. Of course, other people might dislike hills and will certainly have a different definition of what constitutes great scenery. Which city is best for bike trails? Who is to say?

Statistical lists based on quantity often overlook the all-important aspect of quality. And, quality is a mostly subjective criterion for which numbers have no reliable correlation.

[BetterCallPaul]

Sure, lists are all arbitrary, and yet multiple lists from different sources come to similar conclusions, which indicates a trend. And right now that trend is very very good for central Iowa. The question is, can the metro continue moving in the right direction?

If the lists in question don't meet your criteria for measuring a city, I'm sure you can find another one that does. There's something for everyone out there these days.