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The most livable cities

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271–280 of 300 posts

Re: The most livable cities

#271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how all of the diverse cities of the USA Have you perhaps considered that they're not very diverse? NYC and SF are a bit different yeah, but other than that they're all remarkably similar. Honestly it's a significant factor in why I decided to move back to Europe. It always bothered me when Americans claim that the US states are as diverse as separate countries in e.g. Europe. No, just no. You are blinded by the fa…

Los Angeles is way more diverse, on just about any front, than San Francisco.

LA is also about 500 square miles to SF's 50, isn't it?

Re: The most livable cities

#273
post #3

There should be some in-built bias, such as adding points for just being in the Northern America. Otherwise it's hard to explain how all of the diverse cities of the USA end up being clumped in one place of the scale. That, or not having sufficient dynamic range.

> how all of the diverse cities of the USA Have you perhaps considered that they're not very diverse? NYC and SF are a bit different yeah, but other than that they're all remarkably similar. Honestly it's a significant factor in why I decided to move back to Europe. It always bothered me when Americans claim that the US states are as diverse as separate countries in e.g. Europe. No, just no. You are blinded by the fa…

You're also comparing the biggest cities to each other. If you compared say, Lafayette, LA to Montpelier, VT to Las Cruces, NM, you might draw a different conclusion.

Re: The most livable cities

#274
post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does exist, it's just you completely have to pay out of pocket, and if you opt out of it as a doctor, you cannot take any public healthcare system patients either, which means your limited to a few rich people 'executive health' checkups and such. It's a complete either / or system. 'benefits' that cover the few items not covered by the public system also typically do not cover such non-public doctor visits either…

$200k!! (presumably Canadian Dollars, which works out at ~£126k). Here in the UK a typical GP salary is ~90k, and while we do have trouble retaining doctors that is almost entirely due to working conditions (hospitals and practices are understaffed so medical staff end up overworked). I've only very rarely heard doctors complain that they are underpaid. I can definitely see that rates ought to equalised across differ…

The pay averages around $130-$140k canadian dollars. 90k GBP is about $140k CAD, which is about the same. A specialist makes around +$300k, a surgeon over $500k. Also it's about what the alternatives pay for a doctor. Becoming a specialist isn't that much more work, but pays significantly better. Also you can do equivalent work as a GP doctor working at walk in clinics / urgent care and get paid significantly more in the same city from the same healthcare system than being a traditional family doctor. It's kind of obvious why you don't have any family doctors with that kind of financial incentive system. The ones that do it do it out of inertia or really like being a family doctor for non-financial reasons.

Another special thing about the UK although is the amount of schooling needed to become one and consummate expense and risk seems significantly less. You can enter doctor school after high school and be in school for a significantly less amount of time. If you don't get in, you can move on with your life and go do something else with nothing really spent time wise or financially.

In the US/Canada, you need to get at least %75 of an undergrad, hope you get accepted into a graduate doctor school, which is extremely competitive, and then work you ass off in a very high workload situation, and then you need to do residency where your paid below minimum wage if you do an hours worked calculation, in a system designed by a doctor with a literal cocaine habit before cocaine was made illegal. Your in your 30s when you can start making proper money.

Re: The most livable cities

#275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I enjoy biking and hiking in the woods (not city streets), driving cars and living 20 minutes away from a major city so I can go to shops/bars/parties when I feel like it. I also like gardening and farming, wood and metal working and generally doing all kinds of projects involving metal casting, glass blowing, pottery making etc. I would never be able to do comfortably living in a city. The only downside to car cultu…

> The only downside to car culture is environmental concerns that I really hope electric cars fix. How are they supposed to fix it? In many countries we still burn gas & coal for electricty. The cars need to be produced, which is alot more resource intensive than building better public transports, since a train transports hundreds of individuals at once, and can serve the transportation needs of thousands over the co…

Yes over time. Electric cars and renewable energy in a nutshell.

Re: The most livable cities

#276
post #223

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> Mass shootings are rare Yeah, but... Typical (Median) Annual Death Rate per Million People from Mass Public Shootings (U.S., Canada, and Europe, 2009-2015) United States — 0.058 Albania — 0 Austria — 0 Belgium — 0 Czech Republic — 0 Finland — 0 France — 0 Germany — 0 Italy — 0 Macedonia — 0 Netherlands — 0 Norway — 0 Russia — 0 Serbia — 0 Slovakia — 0 Switzerland — 0 United Kingdom — 0 Using the median analysis, th…

IMO I think the fact that the numbers are so low shows that people should stop giving a shit about death by guns by civilians. I wish humanity put as much focus about the obesity & diabetes crisis, car deaths, slipping in the bathtub, murder by government policy and war than they did about guns. Guns are flashy, but infinitesimal compared to the actual causes of early death. The dirty secret of gun control policies i…

You are right. People care about things that most likely will never kill them while continuing to eat a diet that will very likely result in disease and an early death.

Re: The most livable cities

#277
post #266
post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say they have a point. Brazil, where I've lived most of my life, has had its single payer public Healthcare modeled after the UK, and the private healthcare sector which is supposed to be a "complement" to the "universal" public system, is instead parallel to and competing with it. This competition probably is an erosive force. Public Healthcare absorves the heaviest blows: expensive surgeries, cancer treatment e…

> Public Healthcare absorves the heaviest blows: expensive surgeries, cancer treatment etc are mostly or only done by the single payer public system, while private Healthcare enjoys mostly low severity cases. If there was no private system, the public system would pay for all of that. What you’ve described actually seems like it goes easier on the public system by allowing it to specialize on certain kinds of issues

Except it doesn't; the public system also handles basic stuff like vaccinations, free medicine, first response, "walk-ins" etc. It has to maintain a huge infrastructure to keep those services - Brazil is a huge and extremely diverse country.

The basics are actually the thing it does best; covid vaccination for example went well once the political stuff was handled.

Re: The most livable cities

#278
post #277
post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Public Healthcare absorves the heaviest blows: expensive surgeries, cancer treatment etc are mostly or only done by the single payer public system, while private Healthcare enjoys mostly low severity cases. If there was no private system, the public system would pay for all of that. What you’ve described actually seems like it goes easier on the public system by allowing it to specialize on certain kinds of issues

Except it doesn't; the public system also handles basic stuff like vaccinations, free medicine, first response, "walk-ins" etc. It has to maintain a huge infrastructure to keep those services - Brazil is a huge and extremely diverse country. The basics are actually the thing it does best; covid vaccination for example went well once the political stuff was handled.

> It has to maintain a huge infrastructure to keep those services

It seems like the ceiling here is the amount of investment it would put in to manage 100% of the health needs —- I don’t see how the parallel existence of a private system causes the public system to be larger than it would be if there were no private system

Re: The most livable cities

#279
post #29

As I wrote last year, these liveability index ignores all the best cities in Europe and I suppose in most countries by focusing on the largest cities. I enjoyed living in the US, France, Denmark and Germany, I can't find Boulder, Besançon, Nantes, Helsingor, Münster, etc. These are all smaller cities outside of the big ones and they would all have a score higher than Vienna in this index. I am 100% confident that you…

These lists also often ignore the weather, which makes a huge difference to what most people consider to be "livable". Nordic European winters are horrible, and no amount of amenities can compensate.

Nordic European winters are great for startup builders though :)

Re: The most livable cities

#280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never said that. (What I said is that, after already seeing NYC, SF and Las Vegas, I didn't expect the trip to Seatle to be worth it). Next time, please read more carefully before you start posting pointless comments.

You said: "after seeing NYC, SF and Las Vegas, I passed on an opportunity to go for a week-long business trip to Seattle. Even though I had the time, I imagine Seattle being just *mostly more of the same (an uniform, boring city consisting of XX century architecture built on a grid*" You later changed to "worth it" because you didn't want to admit that these places might not be "more of the same", because they aren't…

> You later changed to "worth it"

I didn't change anything. I think it's clear that I passed on opportunity to go to Seattle because I didn't think it was worth it (why else would I pass on it)?

> I suspect you also realized that if you find yourself "bored" in NYC, the problem is not the city.

Where did I write that I was bored in NYC? I think it's great, but I also think it exhausts the experience of "large, dense American city built mostly in XX century" to the point where seeing another one doesn't add that much. Aren't Americans travelling to places like New Orleans or Nashville precisely because they're not like most ordinary American cities?

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