Easy living

[Progmatic]

Ok my turn

Rome, Italy
Spend there one year. Southern Italians must be some of the friendliest people on the planet. Great food, great vine. Nonstop access to entertainment, unbelievable sightseeing (can virtually visit different places every weekend all year around), access to beach in summer. Warm climate made the stay very pleasant. Great social system (doctors, care).
Job opportunity limited, salaries lower and taxes higher. Cost of living relatively high. Traffic horrible and some problems with petty crime.
Overall livability ranking: 7 out of 10


Melbourne, Australia
Spend there 10 years. Melting pot of the nations. Lot of friendly, easy going folks. Great place for bringing up your family. The suburbs quiet and very safe. Lot of things to do for kids, not so much for adults. Easy access to beaches and to mountains (to hike or ski), golf was cheap and readily available. Social system was very good, health, schools etc...Work was readily available, reasonable paid but with the high taxes. Traffic was acceptable.
Weather was similar to North west USA, raining and miserable most of the winter, mild with few extremely hot periods during summer.
Overall livability ranking: 8 out of 10

Dallas, Texas
Spend there 16 years. Suburban life in the middle of prairie. Great place for bringing up your family. Selected suburbs quiet and very safe, the rest better not to go there. Lot of things to do for kids, very limited activities for adults. No access to anything worthwhile but the golf was cheap and readily available. Social system is good if you have a job. Work was readily available, well paid but with relatively low taxes. Cheap cost of living. Traffic was very reasonable. Weather was shocking for 4-5 months during summer. The rest of the year was very reasonable except the period droughts and occasional weather threats.
Overall livability ranking: 6 out of 10


Morris County, New Jersey
I have been here just under 2 years. Country living. Very pretty environment, lot of trees and nature around. At times it feels like being on vacations. Work availability seems to be on rebound, well paid but with relatively high taxes. Expensive cost of living. Convenience (e.g. access to shops, services, movies, restaurants etc...) is challenging. Weather acceptable, like the summer, fall and spring (though Sandy was little bit uncalled for). Winter is disappointing as it was not white as I expected just cold and dreary. Easy access to New York or East Coast places. Traffic is ok but slow on country roads.
Overall livability ranking: 7 out of 10

[hippypants]

Progmatic--seemed you moved around quite a bit, due to a job? I have a cousin living & running a radio station in Queensland, AU, he seems to enjoy it. I wondered how it would be to live outside the USA. I guess it depends on where it is. There are certainly a lot of places I'd like to at least visit, Italy would be one of them.

[Plasmatopia]

Texas nights rock! 85 degrees

That's still too hot! 41 degrees F here this morning in Vermont...feels great.

[hippypants]

Half the US lives in these 146 counties:

http://io9.com/half-of-the-u-s-lives...urs-1258718775

[rcarlberg]

Half the US lives in these 146 counties:

http://io9.com/half-of-the-u-s-lives...urs-1258718775

Fascinating. My county is blue but thank Godzilla it's not in the top 50.

[hippypants]

Yeah, I didn't see any Oregon in the Top 50. My part of Texas won't rate, probably closer to the least densely populated

[NogbadTheBad]

I'm currently sitting in the 7th and that's fine by me

[SteveSly]

Interesting, my county is not in there, but Kent County Michigan (about 45 minutes from me) is. Grand Rapids is the major city in Kent and, has grown a lot over the years, but would not have thought it would be that big a population center. Kind of surprised downtown Detroit is on there since hardly anyone lives in the city itself anymore. The Detroit suburbs are still highly populated though.

Steve Sly