I have a love/hate relationship with NYC (but mostly hate). And I was born and raised here.
It’s Hella Crowded
1. It’s too crowded; feels claustrophobic (this within itself causes problems).
2. Since it’s so crowded, it’s nearly impossible to find housing when you’re poor like me.
3. Since it’s so crowded, public transportation is often packed like cans of sardines.
4. The over-crowdedness of the city makes it difficult and annoying to get around.
5. Competition for jobs is ridiculous. If you have a college degree in even a creative field, good luck finding a job.
6. The streets can be filthy because so many people here litter and apparently, don’t know what a garbage can is regardless of the fact that there’s one of every street corner.
7. It smells like garbage and fish in a lot of parts of the city, particularly by the East River and in commercial/touristy areas.
8. The streets in a lot of places look oily and are often covered in dumpster sludge. There are street cleaning machines that traverse the city to clean the roads but they usually make it worse.
9. The air quality is pretty terrible. Along with the stench of garbage, the pollution causes a lot of kids here to suffer from asthma from an early age.
10. The rivers are filled with trash. The city’s working on cleaning them but you do NOT want to go swimming in these rivers, especially the Hudson.
11. People often smoke where they’re not supposed to. You’ll always find someone smoking right next to a sign where it says “Do NOT Smoke Within 20 Feet Of This Entrance.” Smokers are pretty obnoxious here.
12. It’s also filled with a lot of noise pollution as well; constant construction, police sirens, people blasting music from their cars, honking their horns, people playing music loudly during house parties and never ending night-life, this city does NOT sleep.
13. It has light pollution as well. We can barely see the stars at night and in some neighborhoods, there are bright billboards and lights that shine into residents’ apartments and keep them up at night.
14. Rent for apartments are sky-rocketing. The average apartment costs over $1,300 a month and most buildings expect renters to make 40x that amount in income. A lot of these apartments aren’t even worth the money. They can be as small as a closet. Also, people are renting ROOMS in apartments for that much! If you’re saying to yourself, “Oh, that’s not bad,” consider yourself privileged to not be poor.
15. The cost of public transportation rises almost every year and the service never improves. Currently, a single ride metro-card on a bus or train is $3 and if you pay for additional rides, it’s $2.75 each. Again, if you’re poor or working minimum wage, this adds up and can become unaffordable. You’ll see a lot of people asking for riders to swipe them into a station or jumping turnstiles because they can’t afford the fare.
16. Food is expensive, especially healthy food. We have issues with obesity and diabetes because a lot of people can’t afford to purchase perishable items like fruits and vegetables for themselves and their families so they opt for fast-food. I often opt for fast food over cooking or healthy food as well.
17. The average movie ticket cost $16.50 or higher. Wanna go catch a matinee? Get ready to pay up to $13! When I was in high school (which wasn’t that long ago), I could catch a matinee for $6. The price has sky-rocketed. And don’t even get me started on popcorn and snacks. A small drink or popcorn can cost about $6 or $7.
Our Tax Money Seems Criminally Mismanaged
18. Our expensive and extensive public transportation system is deeply flawed. We are still using trains from the late 90′s and they’re constantly delayed. They’re also constantly making unnecessary cosmetic changes that don’t improve service like installing flat screens in stations to display ads and train times tables and updating the interiors of some trains. What they really need to do is update the signaling system and mitigate litter on the tracks to prevent track fires.
19. Our public housing is crawling with mold, rats and is crumbling from the inside.
20. A lot of the roads here have potholes or are in disrepair.
21. Our subway platforms feel more like caves than public transportation hubs complete with leaky pipes, rats, sewage and garbage.
22. A lot of sidewalks in poor neighborhoods are cracked and missing chunks and people often trip and brake their ankles walking through them.
23. It’s 2018 and there are still too many vacant lots where affordable or public housing should be.
24. There aren’t enough public or affordable housing vacancies to go around so if you’re poor, you’ll probably have to live with your parents if you’re lucky enough to still have them, live in shelter or sleep on the streets and this also includes poor people who are working.
25. Public services like welfare and public housing offices often treat people terribly.
26. We have housing lotteries for poor people which pits poor people against each other for apartments. It doesn’t matter if you’re a poor person and you’re working full-time, you’re NOT guaranteed a place to sleep at night. Often, shelters run out of space for people as well.
Our Government Has Corruption Issues
27. Our police department is very racist and corrupt and has had an issue with quotas that target men of color, particularly black and Hispanic men.
28. Our governor is in bed with realty companies which is one of the main reasons why rents around the city are so expensive. Governor Cuomo claims to care about making sure the poor having housing but he makes us poor people compete for it amongst each other with housing lotteries which our mayor, Bill deBlasio also has a hand in.
29. Riker’s, our bastion of human rights abuses still exists and if you commit a minor crime and have little or poor legal representation, you could spend a long time here. Please Google Kalief Browder.
30. Don’t let anyone tell you that NYC is a progressive city. All or most of our politicians take money from corporate entities and do their bidding at the expense of their citizens (see 25).
31. Although our city is seeking to decriminalize marijuana, it’s not enough to decriminalize it, it has to be legalized and our politicians don’t want to do this. Not only could it add some much needed tax revenue to the city but it could also eliminate a lot of crime, free up space in prisons for actual violent criminals and stop kids from being able to distribute K2 and other dangerous brands of synthetic weed.
We Have A Serious Gentrification Problem
32. It has caused rents to rise to the point where a lot of native born New Yorkers like myself can’t afford to live here anymore.
33. Many (white) gentrifiers to the city are racist and don’t respect the people or the cultures of the city.
34. Gentrifiers often seek to put natives and their business out of business which is not only insulting and infuriating but violently seeks to erase NYC native culture and the people who create it.
35. Gentrifiers seem to detest the cultures of native New Yorkers yet they CHOOSE to live here when they can live anywhere else which is beyond disrespectful. How DARE people move into a community by choice and then complain about the people who live there and how they run their businesses? BTW, I’m allergic to cats too but I would NEVER complain about a cat in a bodega. If I didn’t want to get food from there, there are many other options which, I admit, is the great thing about NYC.
36. Gentrifiers often have more money and resources to learn the skills needed for jobs so they often come out on top when landing high-paying jobs over low-income/poor native New Yorkers who have similar skills and education.
37. Gentrifiers often exploit or parody the issues in the communities they move to or set up businesses in.
38. Gentrifiers always claim to “discover” things that native New Yorkers created and have known about for generations which reeks of colonization.
We Have A HUGE Poverty Issue
39. There are well over 60,000 homeless people in this city, including homeless families and children. In one of the richest cities in America, this is a crime and it shows just how much this city cares about the poor.
40. There aren’t nearly enough full-time living wage paying jobs being created in this city. Even for someone like me who has a college degree, I haven’t been able to find a full-time job for the past 4 years because they either don’t exist or the ones that do are super competitive. So I am forced to work a low-wage part-time job that doesn’t pay nearly enough for me to survive and live on my own.
41. Most New Yorkers haven’t received a raise in 10 years or longer but the cost of living here has been rising every year leaving many people struggling, on the verge of homelessness or homeless.
42. If you don’t have health insurance, the dangerous and unsanitary conditions and the stress of living in the city can cause you to become very ill, be it mentally or physically and it is easy to have accidents. If you fall under any of these unfortunate circumstances, you might be out of job and in a hell of a lot of debt.
43. Poor people are often treated terribly by the authorities while seeking help.
44. Homeless people also fear staying in homeless shelters because of the amount of mentally-ill people residing in them so they opt to sleep on the streets.
45. Many homeless people in the city are homeless because of rent increases, medical bankruptcies and mental illness.
The People Can Be Rude And Even Violent
46. There are CONSTANT physical altercations on the trains and buses.
47. Men are CONSTANTLY molesting woman and little girls on public transportation. And sometimes when other men step in to protect the girl, they get arrested until they can prove that they weren’t committing any crimes.
48. There are so many mentally ill people in this city and although, they are more likely to face violence from other people, you find a lot of them walking around cursing and saying disgusting things to people. I once had a mentally-ill white woman approach me at work and tell me “my daddy told me that people who take things that don’t belong to them are n-----s.” She was so mentally fucked up that she didn’t realize that she was speaking to a black person.
49. Tourists are ESPECIALLY rude. They are always standing in the middle of busy sidewalks obstructing pedestrian traffic with their large maps when they’re lost instead of standing to the side or asking for directions.
50. Often people don’t move for you when you say “excuse me” and they even bump into you and not apologize.
51. Getting around the city can be a nightmare because everyone walks so slow and tries to cut in front of you. I had a grown-ass man tell me the other day “don’t do it” when I was walking toward him because he didn’t want me walking before him. Mind you, I was rushing to get back to work while I was doing deliveries and he was clearly, just out for a stroll. No manners at all.
52. Men often sit with their legs wide open on public transit to stop people from sitting next to them (man-spreading) and women often hog seats with their purses and shopping bags or refuse to take them off and constantly prod you with them.
53. People almost NEVER take their bags off on public transit to make room for people. I ALWAYS take my book-bag off and it pisses me off whenever other straphangers don’t.
54. I’ve seen people smoking in train stations and on public transit when it’s against the law.
55. This is more personal for me but...people, men in particular often get on trains reeking of alcohol or cigarettes and then sit next right next to you when there are plenty of free seats around!
56. Cab drivers are always trying to speed as if they’re going to run someone over, especially when they don’t have the right of way.
57. People often throw parties in a lot of apartment buildings up until 4 or 5 in the morning, blasting music and generally being loud.
58. Parents frequently yell at, hit or chastise their kids in public, demonstrating that they have no control over their children and no courtesy for those around them, though I’m sure this happens in other cities as well. I once heard the guy upstairs yelling at his child in the hallway demanding that his son not embarrass him in front of his mother or else he was going to beat him and I often hear this same child crying and screaming which made me and my girlfriend want to call the police a few times.
59. Domestic violence is a big issue. There are mens ‘and women’s shelters all over the city. Many people living in these shelters and in public housing are victims of domestic violence. My mother was a victim of domestic violence as well. I also witnessed a man beating his girlfriend in public and when I attempted to call the police, he came after me. Such a big manly man...Not to worry, though, that coward didn’t hurt me.
Despite How Liberal It Is, It’s Not Always Welcoming To Everyone
60. After 9/11, people stopped Muslims from creating a Mosque, a place of worship and peace near Ground Zero because Islamophobia. Whenever a right-wing Christian or Catholic terrorist commits a terrorist attack, no one bars anyone from building a Christian or Catholic place of worship in the are near the attack. Thank about that.
61. Many transgender women, especially those of color, are beaten and murdered here, in the city where the Stone Wall riots and LGBTQ rights movements occurred.
62. The NYPD implemented stop-and-frisk, a policy that specifically targets black and brown men in an attempt to find weapons and drugs on these men and incarcerate them to fill quotas.
63. Homophobia here is still a big issue.
64. Even in gay “safe spaces,” like The Village or Chelsea, gay people are still at risk of being murdered.
65. Marginalized groups of people often go after other marginalized people.
66. A lot of businesses in the city do racist things like this and homophobic things like that.
It’s A Playground For Rich People
67. A lot of apartments here are mostly vacant because they’re designated for wealthy foreign nationals who do business here.
68. Broadway tickets can cost over a thousand dollars, even plays with a majority minority cast, coughHamiltoncough which is created for marginalized people to star in. So poor people of color can’t afford to go see them. Makes me think that Broadway plays are experiences only to be enjoyed by the rich and wealthy.
69. Hotels in even the poorest of neighborhoods can cost up to $100 a night. I know this because when my family was evicted, that’s how much my girlfriend and I were charged to stay in a hotel for a night. You’ll see a lot of poor young people backpacking in the city and staying in cheap hostels or sleeping on the sidewalks because they can’t afford to stay in a hotel.
70. Wanna expose your kids to the arts by taking them to see a ballet or a performance at Lincoln Center? Get prepared to pay hundreds of dollars for tickets! Best stick to pay-what-you-wish museums and community theaters which are free and cheap.
71. If you’re poor or make a low-income and you want to live in a nice neighborhood that’s safe for you and family, good luck moving into one with the income requirements. If you want to live in a nice and clean neighborhood in this city, you need to be making at least $40K or $60K and with the stagnant wages in the city, most working-class people just don’t make that much money. So getting to live in a safe neighborhood that the city actually cares to take care of is only for the middle-class and upward. Real estate owners MAKE it so that poor people can’t live in certain neighborhoods through zoning.
Might As Well Call New York City “Scam City”
72. Scams abound for almost every service in this city from driver’s ed classes to apartments. People post fake listings for apartments, renters scam people out of their deposit money (this happened to me and my girlfriend) and people make you pay sky-high prices for shoe-box apartments.
73. You know those name brand knock-off purses tourists buy on Canal St.? They’re made in sweatshops around the city. That’s right, you’re not getting a great deal on an a luxury brand item, you’re getting a cheaply produced item made by women who work for slave wages.
74. A lot of cab services in NYC overcharge for fare. I once asked how much a cab service would charge for a ride from my place in the South Bronx to LaGuardia Airport and they told me $50. I knew that was a scam because I could take a cab from my place to lower Manhattan for $30, which is a much longer ride.
75. If you’re a college grad with a lot of debt in this city, fake student loan forgiveness programs will call you relentlessly to scam you out of your personal information and money to sign up for their programs. I don’t know if this happens in other cities but it does here.
76. People in touristy locations in the city are constantly trying to sell you things, even things that are free like rides on the Staten Island Ferry.
77. If you ride a bike here, make sure to buy a really good lock for it because bike theft is rampant. I know this from experience. My mistake was buying a cheaper lighter lock that someone obviously easily broke.
78. Panhandlers always hang around in subway stations often with dogs and babies begging for money but a lot of these people are scam artists. One panhandler who owns a dog makes up to $200 an hour! That money could go to actual poor people.
79. A lot of people selling candy on trains for their “youth basketball team” are really just selling candy to line their own pockets (which isn’t wrong...I mean, it’s technically illegal but not policed. But if a broke kid wants to sell candy on the trains to avoid stealing, they should be honest about it). I’ve spent 7 years working for non-profit youth programs. They never ask their kids to sell M&Ms and Welchers Fruit Snacks on the train to raise money for their programs. Youth programs often get their money from private donors or tax money.
80. People from Con-Edison are constantly calling people to scam them into so-called “free energy for a month” in exchange for sensitive personal information. Although I’m not the head of my household, (and Con-Edison should know who is) I would frequently get these calls. I don’t even know how they got my number.
81. A lot of posts online for roommates are scams (like the one my girlfriend and I fell for) they’ll take your security deposit, tell you rent is up to $1,300 (which doesn’t include utilities) and that there are other fees not mentioned in their ads. A ROOM in an apartment should not cost $1,300 PLUS additional fees. That’s the cost of renting an actual apartment.
It’s Not As Nearly As Glamorous As It Looks In Ads And On TV
82. There are rodents and roaches everywhere; In public parks, on Wall St. (I mean both the people and the animals) and in a lot of buildings. A lot of bodegas have cats to combat rodents. Remember Pizza Rat? Yeah, it’s so comical how disgusting this city is!
83. A lot of public art in the city has backwards messages behind them. The Charging Bull on Wall Street is a symbol of reckless greed. And the Fearless Girl is a symbol of women on Wall Street and has virtually nothing to do with actual feminism. I wrote a blog about it. I have a bachelor’s degree in art so I’m qualified to weigh in on this.
84. The city can get pretty disgusting and stagnant during drastic weather conditions. We experience heat waves that bring mosquitos, spiders and roaches and blizzards that kill people, hurricanes that leave people homeless and destroy property and whenever there’s a snow storm, the city all about shuts down.
85. Ever here the phrase “if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere?” Yeah, well that phrase only works so well for NYC because it’s so difficult to survive here.
86. You might think it might be glamorous to work in NYC but a lot of businesses are anti-union and don’t pay their employees a living wage. You’ll often find these giant inflatable rats around this city that draw attention to these businesses. Some of your favorite clothing stores might have this giant rat outside of them often.
87. Times Square used to be a red light district. That’s right; the tourist trap you take your family to with the Disney store and the people dressed like cartoon characters...this used to be a hub for live sex shows and porn!
88. The daily rush of the city causes people to become very jaded and impatient which causes rudeness.
89. Most neighborhoods in the city used to be immigrant communities but most of the immigrants in these communities were pushed out or changed due to gentrification and red-lining.
90. There are highways in the city (The Cross Bronx Expressway in particular) that displaced a lot of people during their construction.
91. Men often urinate on the trains and in public.
92. Many dog owners refuse to curb their dogs and the city doesn't enforce the law well enough so when you're walking around the city, watch where you step or you'll have a really shitty time!
93. A lot of our trains and buses are filthy due to littering and also still have some graffiti on the insides (not like the 80's but it's still there!).
94. Women, be careful which night clubs you go to because the men there might try to sexually assault you. One of my roommates in college had to invite her gay best friend with her to one club because the last time she went without male supervision, a man tried to grind on her without her permission.
95. Men, watch out who you hang out with and who you're around because if you are around the wrong person/people, you could get murdered or assaulted in drive-by’s. This applies to most cities but assault and murder should take the glamour out of NYC for anyone who lives or tries to come here.
96. Rush-hour here is the worst. Public transit and street traffic stall for hours in the mornings and evenings. Tip from a native New Yorker: Do NOT get on a crowded train or bus while you're going home; wait for a less crowded one. Patience makes the city move faster.
97. It's not always safe to go out late at night alone regardless of your gender.
98. While you're on 5th Ave ogling the massive glitzy, sparkly luxury brand flagship stores, try not to think about how many sweatshops abroad produce all those handbags and clothes.
99. It's not corporate America that keeps the New York City skyline so bright, it's mostly underpaid low-wage workers who pay more in taxes than CEOs. I’m looking at you, Jeff Bezos!
