The Class in the Middle
Hey bloggers, and this is another one of those postings that happens to be about money, money and more money and the economy, people, classes and ism's. And a friend sent me yet another one of those emails the other day, this time with the title "More reasons to leave NY or be glad you don't live in NY anymore", from the New York Daily News, an article some of which is as follows:
NYC so costly you need to earn six figures to make middle class
More than $2,000 a month for day care. Some of the highest phone bills in the country. Jam-packed, 50-plus-minute commutes to work.
You knew it was tough to live in New York City — but this tough?
A new report shows just how ugly — and expensive — New York City can be, especially for the middle class, squeezed by skyrocketing living costs and stagnant wages.
The study, released Thursday by the Center for an Urban Future, shows that New York City is hands-down the most expensive place to live in the country.
Among the findings:
-
A New Yorker would have to make $123,322 a year to have the same standard of living as someone making $50,000 in Houston.
-
You knew it was expensive to live in Manhattan, but Queens? The report tagged Queens the fifth most expensive urban area in the country.
-
The average monthly rent in New York is $2,801, 53% higher than San Francisco, the second most expensive city in the country.
“Income levels that would enable a very comfortable lifestyle in other locales barely suffice to provide the basics in New York City,” the report concludes.
Other belt-tightening details include:
-
New Yorkers paid about $34 a month for phone service in 2006. In San Francisco, similar service cost $17 a month.
-
Home heating costs have jumped 125% in the past five years and are up 243% since 1998.
-
Full-time day care costs can run up to $25,000 a year for one child, depending on the neighborhood, or about as much as some college tuitions.
-
Meanwhile, wages in the city have remained mostly flat in all boroughs but Manhattan — even during the boom years from 2003 to 2007.
It’s not only money that makes life here hard, researchers said — which might not be news to most New Yorkers.
Take commutes, for example. The report found that many New Yorkers put up with commutes double the national average of 25.5 minutes.
Commuting to Manhattan from St. Albans, Queens, can take 51.7 minutes, while getting there from Canarsie, Brooklyn, can run 50.8 minutes.
Researchers said the combination of skyrocketing costs, stagnant wages and a deteriorating quality of life forced hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers to flee the city for cheaper areas during the boom years from 2002 to 2006.
The report found that more New Yorkers left each year during the boom than left during the dark days of the early 1990s.
And there was another report from the same study in yesterdays Metro New York Newspaper titled "Study: middle class drop". Think tank says cost of living, flat pay behind growing flight from NYC etc; especially during this age of a recession, impending depression where the economy seems as if it wants to go out of business and have one of those everythng must go sales.. Something to the effect that more and more people are leaving New York in excile for cheaper cities, which seems to be just about anywhere outside of New York City. And for some reasn that bible verse comes to mind, "For the love of money is the root of all evil. And while some have coveted after, they have pierced themselved through with many arrows and sorrows', or something like that. And what does this all mean? Have a great class and money day.
Comments