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Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

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Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#181

Post by krautsourced »

bogdanu wrote: post #116
cleansy wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I second this. But definitely try to get a remote SE job there. The pay is laughable compared to for example Berlin. Which is also a great city to work and live in.

I saw some jobs in Berlin that payed around 70K Eur. Assuming it's before taxes, it means that after taxes it's around 3.8k/month; a bit low if you ask me. I know pay is not the only factor, but heck, I make half in my home country, but the living costs are far lower (and I don't even pay rent).

70k is anything but low in Berlin. It is actually really, really high. For reference see here (monthly before tax) https://www.morgenpost.de/bin/bmo-213539703.jpg

With that amount of money one could afford a very sweet place to live easily, and still have plenty of spending money for intellectual pursuits or whatever.

Speaking English is no issue here, at least in the "hip" parts of town.

Would I say it's the best place to live? Probably not (Switzerland would probably rank higher), but one could do a lot worse. And with a decent IT job it's easy living. Dirt cheap compared to Silicon Valley prices.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#182

Post by hugofirth »

tixocloud wrote: post #71

Edinburgh could be a good option. If you look hard enough, it is still relatively affordable (especially compared to the Bay Area) and I’ve found very intellectual people to work with. There seems to be a big focus in the U.K. on collaboration between academic and industry and if you’re into data, Edinburgh is home to a The Data Lab, an innovation centre around data. I moved here from North America and have previous…

I would add that if you want something cheaper than Edinburgh, but in the same neck of the woods, then you should try Newcastle-upon-Tyne. There is the same academia-industry collaboration and a growing number of tech jobs.

The pay is a bit lower than other parts of the UK (for tech), but that is changing and you can always find yourself remote work as well.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#183

Post by oblio »

whitef0x wrote: post #124
msadowski wrote: post #22

If you feel adventurous you can consider moving to Poland. I would recommend Krakow. Most young people will speak English, there are couple of top Universities there (PK and AGH for technical schools, UJ for humanities, medicine and some tech too and UE for economics). The tech scene seems to be constantly growing, with lots of international companies having their offices there. As a senior dev in Poland you can earn…

How bad is it there for sexual/gender minorities (aka gay/trans people). Is it livable if you are visibly transgender?

Probably not. In 80%+ of Eastern Europe you'll get at least stares and I'd venture the "village idiots" will probably have a go at you...

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#184

Post by tixocloud »

benbristow wrote: post #152
tixocloud wrote: post #71

Edinburgh could be a good option. If you look hard enough, it is still relatively affordable (especially compared to the Bay Area) and I’ve found very intellectual people to work with. There seems to be a big focus in the U.K. on collaboration between academic and industry and if you’re into data, Edinburgh is home to a The Data Lab, an innovation centre around data. I moved here from North America and have previous…

Both Edinburgh and Glasgow are pretty good in Scotland/UK. Glasgow's tech scene isn't the biggest but we're a friendly bunch and there's lots going on. https://opentechcalendar.co.uk/ This site is pretty good for seeing all the tech meetups/events in the UK.

Thanks for sharing. Agree on your sentiments that Glaswegians are friendly! Are you based in Glasgow?

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#185

Post by fastbeef »

flavor8 wrote: post #65
msadowski wrote: post #22

If you feel adventurous you can consider moving to Poland. I would recommend Krakow. Most young people will speak English, there are couple of top Universities there (PK and AGH for technical schools, UJ for humanities, medicine and some tech too and UE for economics). The tech scene seems to be constantly growing, with lots of international companies having their offices there. As a senior dev in Poland you can earn…

You'd have to be quite apolitical to consider a move to Poland right now.

Too true. I’ve been eyeing ditching my polish citizenship for a while now.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#186

Post by nevertoolate »

nsomaru wrote: post #141
whitef0x wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How bad is the crime? I've talked to a few who've lived there but they always tell me the crime forced them to move out. Do hijackings at robots still happen often?

The fact that you call a traffic light a "robot" makes me suspect you're a South African or your parents are :) I have never been hijacked, robot or otherwise. The worst that happened to me was getting mugged in a dark alley around 7pm in Cape Town. Rely shouldn't have been walking around that neighbourhood well-dressed. In general I leave my laptop in the trunk and ladies leave their bags there too. The most common…

Most honest comment. Love how it unfolds.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#187

Post by the_clarence »

function_seven wrote: post #179
alt_f4 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Barcelona is not one of the best all-around cities for sure. 1) climate -- not moderate, only good if you enjoy extremely hot summers 2) culture -- obscured by the tourism industry in the city. Pretty much all restaurants try to rip you off, public parks charge entry for certain areas, everything culture-related is aimed and priced for tourists. 3) architecture -- nice, but not really exceptional. buildings really ti…

How would you compare it to Madrid?

Madrid is a thousand times better. You feel the spanish culture everywhere you go. You’re also not suffocating in Barcelona’s tourism.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#188

Post by Insanity »

itsthejb wrote: post #139
bogdanu wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I saw some jobs in Berlin that payed around 70K Eur. Assuming it's before taxes, it means that after taxes it's around 3.8k/month; a bit low if you ask me. I know pay is not the only factor, but heck, I make half in my home country, but the living costs are far lower (and I don't even pay rent).

Are you comparing that salary to US salaries? Because the still relatively low cost of living in Berlin makes that anything but low

And the social benefits should not be ignored either (health care, child support, ..)

That actually seems like a rather good salary indeed, surely from a Belgian point of view.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#189

Post by sonnyblarney »

In North America I would vote Montreal. It's 1/2 price of most American cities and 2x funner and cooler than almost any of them. LA and NYC have tons of cool, but they are expensive and doing fun stuff is generally expensive. Not so Montreal. Mtl has way more going on than even SF ever had back in the day, and it's much bigger than Austin, Boulder/Colorado Springs etc. etc.. During the summer, Montreal has an unbelievable amount of stuff to do. Carnivals, festivals, just jammed back to back, overlapping one another all summer.

More students per capita than anywhere (depending on how you define 'city' because of course Boston is a big one, but Mtl has 5 Unis right down town within a few Km of each other).

And 1/2 of the city is French, and it's like being in another country.

It has an intellectual/creative tradition from French culture, also, it's actually a global leader in AI, and not just one of those cities making pompous statements: UMtl has the largest AI research facility in North America, and $100M in spending announced, and ElementAI has raised hundreds of millions so this is no joke.

But the winters are very cold. And salaries lag. And taxes are high. Healthcare is universal and you will get service ... but it's not as good as in the US when you are covered.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#190

Post by namdnay »

smueller1234 wrote: post #88
fipple wrote: post #68

The answer here is places that are COLD. For any type of city, the one in a colder place is cheaper. Minneapolis might be a good choice, or Chicago if you want a bigger atmosphere. You’ll have to put in elbow grease to create an intellectual milieu but it is there.

That cold-cheap bit is decidedly not applicable to Europe, by the way. Scandinavia is overall among the most expensive places in Europe. I'd imagine Switzerland is more expensive by a bit, but Oslo and Stockholm are brutal as well.

I think it is applicable to Europe, but in a different way: Scandinavia and Switzerland are expensive, but salaries are equally high. Compare that to the French Riviera for example, where house prices are nearly as high as Stockholm, but salaries are much lower. That's the problem with sunshine: it attracts a lot of wealthy retirees and tourists, who distort the local market.
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