By Gamal Hennessy
Dating in New York is a contact sport. The ones who succeed have confidence, determination, charm, wits and the ability to improvise. We need to find a way to pay for the costs of dating. We need a way to live in the city on one income. Forbes has released its annual list of best cities for singles and New York has barely cracked the top ten. Has the high cost of living made New York an inhospitable dating environment?
The Forbes Best List for Singles compares U.S. cities across seven different categories including culture, nightlife, number of singles and cost of living. While New York City is ranked #1 for nightlife, beating out L.A., Las Vegas and Miami for the top spot, it ranked dead last when cost of living alone was taken into account. So the person dating in New York is cut by a double edge sword. We can do anything we want at night, but we have to find a way to pay for our days and our nights.
The basic problem with lists of this type is that they measure quantity as opposed to quality. It’s fine to count the number of single people or the number of bars in certain cities and rank them based on density, but it doesn’t really take quality or variety into account. Does each city have the same range of nationalities, education levels and backgrounds? Is a bar in Charlotte and a bar in Vegas the same just because they both serve beer? Is the experience the same when you can walk to a bar in one city instead of driving for 20 minutes in another? If you think about single life by only tracking the numbers, you might be missing something.
Even taking that potential flaw into account, these findings are in line with personal experience. New Yorkers have always had to find coping strategies to balance high prices with opportunity and we have specific tactics when it comes to nightlife. But in the current market, even the most resourceful among us might be tested. In addition to job conditions in some sectors and higher prices across the board, now we have to compete with an influx of foreign clubbers who have a lot more disposable cash. For some, the burden of New York prices and the emotional impact it can have on dating lead them to the conclusion that dating is easier and more natural in other cities.
But when New York throws us a curve (which is almost every day) New Yorkers don’t leave the city. We turn the challenge into an advantage. We’ve always used roommates, and commuting to our nightlife from outside the city to offset the cost of New York rent. Almost all of us have some kind of hustle to get more money or at least get more of the things we want. And instead of losing the ability to date, we can find new dating ideas that are less dependent on our income. Dating in New York is a contact sport that requires wits and improvisation, but just living in New York proves that you have those qualities.
Have fun.
Gamal
Dating in New York is a contact sport. The ones who succeed have confidence, determination, charm, wits and the ability to improvise. We need to find a way to pay for the costs of dating. We need a way to live in the city on one income. Forbes has released its annual list of best cities for singles and New York has barely cracked the top ten. Has the high cost of living made New York an inhospitable dating environment?
The Forbes Best List for Singles compares U.S. cities across seven different categories including culture, nightlife, number of singles and cost of living. While New York City is ranked #1 for nightlife, beating out L.A., Las Vegas and Miami for the top spot, it ranked dead last when cost of living alone was taken into account. So the person dating in New York is cut by a double edge sword. We can do anything we want at night, but we have to find a way to pay for our days and our nights.
The basic problem with lists of this type is that they measure quantity as opposed to quality. It’s fine to count the number of single people or the number of bars in certain cities and rank them based on density, but it doesn’t really take quality or variety into account. Does each city have the same range of nationalities, education levels and backgrounds? Is a bar in Charlotte and a bar in Vegas the same just because they both serve beer? Is the experience the same when you can walk to a bar in one city instead of driving for 20 minutes in another? If you think about single life by only tracking the numbers, you might be missing something.
Even taking that potential flaw into account, these findings are in line with personal experience. New Yorkers have always had to find coping strategies to balance high prices with opportunity and we have specific tactics when it comes to nightlife. But in the current market, even the most resourceful among us might be tested. In addition to job conditions in some sectors and higher prices across the board, now we have to compete with an influx of foreign clubbers who have a lot more disposable cash. For some, the burden of New York prices and the emotional impact it can have on dating lead them to the conclusion that dating is easier and more natural in other cities.
But when New York throws us a curve (which is almost every day) New Yorkers don’t leave the city. We turn the challenge into an advantage. We’ve always used roommates, and commuting to our nightlife from outside the city to offset the cost of New York rent. Almost all of us have some kind of hustle to get more money or at least get more of the things we want. And instead of losing the ability to date, we can find new dating ideas that are less dependent on our income. Dating in New York is a contact sport that requires wits and improvisation, but just living in New York proves that you have those qualities.
Have fun.
Gamal
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