Now, of course, people move south to enjoy warm temperatures and the luxury of air conditioning. Automobiles are a good example of "beyond individuals' control." You basically need one in most places, and that money you spend every month maintaining one in many cases could easily go towards a good deal on health insurance. Figure if you use a 15 gallon tank of gasoline a week, you're paying around $100-$120 on fuel alone now. Add in car payments, maintenance, insurance, and taxes, and you're talking about a pretty big cost being imposed on you no matter where you live. As for nice placees to live though, that's by and large in the eye of the beholder. Development orthodoxy buttumes that a subdivision house with a driveway and a car to get to some big box stores and to work is ideal. Personally, I find such things similar to living in a middle clbutt ghetto. Though expense is a relative term, I don't know that most inexpensive places can fairly be called slums. There are parts of NYC that are relatively cheap, full of blue collar workers, accessible to public transportation, and perfectly safe --- they may sometimes be poor, but it's probably unfair to call them slums.
|
