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What's like to work in these Cities/Areas in the USA?

MorphingDragon

MorphingDragon

macrumors 603
Original poster
Mar 27, 2009
5,159
6
The World Inbetween
I've been looking for software engineering jobs in the USA and noticed that most places available to overseas applicants seem to fall into a handful of areas. I'm just wondering what it's actually like to live and work in these areas? I've been to some as part of a holiday but that doesn't really give a proper impression.

The places I'm wondering about are:
Chicago, IL
Silicon Valley
Westford/Lowell/This General Area, MA
Seattle, WA
Raleigh, NC
Manhattan, NY (All I know is that its reaaaally expensive to live here. )

I'm not too worried about the sizes of the cities, coming from NZ any city will be a massive change from even just Auckland.
 
I am surprised you didn't list Los Angeles?

Manhattan is going to be very expensive to live in, however if you can live outside of it and always take the train. The public system that is in NY is outstanding. So there is no need for a car or car insurance etc.
 
Don't forget to look a little north to Canada too. Ottawa is also a high-tech city, as it Waterloo. Both in Ontario. Calgary is a boom city right now with oil money, and Toronto is not doing badly at all. While I have a huge soft spot for Vancouver (one of the most livable cities in the world) you are coming from a place not too different than the BC west coast, so not much of a change. If you are in Ontario most of the US cities on the east coast are close by.
 
MorphingDragon said:
I've been looking for software engineering jobs in the USA and noticed that most places available to overseas applicants seem to fall into a handful of areas. I'm just wondering what it's actually like to live and work in these areas? I've been to some as part of a holiday but that doesn't really give a proper impression.

The places I'm wondering about are:
Chicago, IL
Silicon Valley
Westford/Lowell/This General Area, MA
Seattle, WA
Raleigh, NC
Manhattan, NY (All I know is that its reaaaally expensive to live here. )

I'm not too worried about the sizes of the cities, coming from NZ any city will be a massive change from even just Auckland.
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Chicago is an absolute blast to live in (city proper, anyway). It is known somewhat for violence, but the violence is localized in areas I wouldn't suggest you live. The north side is fantastic.

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rhett7660 said:
Manhattan is going to be very expensive to live in, however if you can live outside of it and always take the train. The public system that is in NY is outstanding. So there is no need for a car or car insurance etc.
Click to expand...

Same for Chicago. However, it depends where you intend on working. If you work in the city and live in the city, Chicago would be amazing, but if you work in the suburbs and want to live in the city, Chicago is quite a chore.
 
If I were you I'd take a look at a city-data.com forums. They have forum sections specific to all of these cities and you can do some major research there.

I've lived relatively near Westford/Lowell areas in MA. Both of these are a complete hell hole, especially Lowell. They're about an hour drive from Boston and I never ever want to live in that area again. If you have to live in MA try Waltham. It's in the center of everything - not far away from Boston proper, right on the I-95 tech corridor and most I-495 jobs are a drive away. Some of its parts are relatively inexpensive too. I have a bunch of friends that lived or still live there and if I was to ever move to that God-forsaken state (I hate MA with a passion) I'd pick either Waltham, Watertown (that's right next to it) or Somerville (whole 'nother story).

As for Silicon Valley - good place to be at but extremely expensive. Certain parts make Manhattan look tame, especially Palo Alto and parts of San Francisco proper.
 
MorphingDragon said:
I've been looking for software engineering jobs in the USA and noticed that most places available to overseas applicants seem to fall into a handful of areas. I'm just wondering what it's actually like to live and work in these areas? I've been to some as part of a holiday but that doesn't really give a proper impression.

The places I'm wondering about are:
Chicago, IL
Silicon Valley
Westford/Lowell/This General Area, MA
Seattle, WA
Raleigh, NC
Manhattan, NY (All I know is that its reaaaally expensive to live here. )

I'm not too worried about the sizes of the cities, coming from NZ any city will be a massive change from even just Auckland.
Click to expand...

I live within an hour from NYC, and used to work down in Manhattan, NYC is a total blast to live in, tons of culture, great food, the people are rather nice, and housing is cheap if your willing to take the train for a little bit every day. However living IN downtown NYC is totally insane expensive, but worth it. I actually plan on eventually getting a 2nd place close to the city, would save me lots of traffic every time I have to go down to NYC.

As far as Chicago goes, Chicago is the same way. I've never lived in it for more than a few months at a time, but its just like NYC, expensive to live in. But totally worth it.
 
jdechko said:
Hope you don't mind rainy days. ;)
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It rains less in Seattle than a lot of other cities actually. Summers there are beautiful..

Traffic is bad. The COL is high but so is the pay. It's a great city. I grew up there.

Very liberal city so if you're of the staunch conservative line it might not be a great place to live and work.
 
MorphingDragon said:
Manhattan, NY (All I know is that its reaaaally expensive to live here. )
Click to expand...

You would be better off living in the west parts of Queens and Brooklyn. I live in the west part of Queens and it's only a 10 to 20 minute drive to Midtown and Lower Manhattan. Takes me the same time to drive to most of west parts of Brooklyn. Tons of people are relocating from Manhattan into west Brooklyn and west Queens. Basically anywhere that's not too far from the east river. By Subway(train) travel would be around 30min to get to Midtown and Lower Manhattan. If you live right off the river the ride would be even shorter, but places right off the river are just as expensive as Manhattan. Sometimes even more cause of the views.

Personally, I could never live in Manhattan. It's just too damn busy, bright, and full of taxis 24/7. Great place to shop, go out with friends, on a date, and etc: but it's too non stop for my taste.

Weather is unpredictable in NYC. You can have a mild winter (40s and up) one year, then the next year have a freezing blizzard prone winter. Same thing with summer, one year it might rain the majority of the summer, the next year it might barely rain at all.
 
mobilehaathi said:
Drive?


DRIVE?!?!


:eek:


Why would you do that to yourself?:p
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Ride the Subways for a couple of months, then ask me that. :p

If I lived in Manhattan, I would probably just keep my motorbike and sell my car. Maybe just rent a car when I need. But for all the other boros, driving beats any public transportation.
 
LIVEFRMNYC said:
I only took the BART several times so I really can't judge it much. But it did seem much cleaner than NY subways. It also depends what lines you take on both.
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Feces, urine, lice...

Anyway, ummm, to the OP, out here you'll find earthquakes, merriment, utterly bat **** insane cost of living, superlative weather, stunning landscapes, exquisite wine, food, produce, coffee, traffic.
 
Raleigh is probably the most affordable area to live in from that list. Also the smallest. Metro area is around 1.5 million I believe.
 
MorphingDragon said:
Not a lot of places listing in LA that don't already require you to have a visa.

It's a pain in most places. I can't work for Intel/AMD as they already want you to have a visa for the US.
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Good. You want to keep some of your money. That won't happen in LA. I love Raleigh. It's like little Austin.
 
Peace said:
It rains less in Seattle than a lot of other cities actually. Summers there are beautiful..
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How about "Hope you don't mind cloudy days" instead? ;)

Seattle is in the top 5 rainiest U.S. cities by number of precipitation days, and it gets the least amount of annual sunlight of all major cities in the lower-48 states.
Click to expand...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle

Granted, summers are beautiful, as they are in Vancouver, BC.
 
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