$20K a week? that is $1MM a year. so saving $150K in taxes a year doesnt make a difference to you? if you are an independent trader, being based in NYC doesnt really add much value. all you need is a computer and an internet connection, which you can find anywhere in the USA. and the decrease in latency since you are geographically closer to the NYSE isnt much a difference either. if you are working for a wall street company, obviously it pays to live in NYC but i thought we were talking about working in NYC in regards to prop trading.
You are quiet correct. If you are going to trade, you cold probably do it fom a prison cell. However, most people trade to make money. If I could pull $ 1 million a year from this game, I would definitively want to stay in a place where money buys almost everything and where there are people with serious $$$$. Wouldn't it be nice to really live it up, and if ,wouldn't NYC be the place to do it in? Why would I want to be in a place where I always sweat and need to use AC just to breathe? Where the closest opera, serious museum, interesting architecture, and dare I say it, smart, interesting people are hundreds of miles away? Then again if you are the type of person who eats potato chips, watches every football game on tv and enjoys hunting, then NYC is perhaps not the best place to be. I was always under the impression that having money would allow me to enjoy the finer things in life, well gues what, what most sophisticated people consider finer is not located in Florida, or Oklahoma or Arizona and as a person who had visited 48 states of good old USA, I think I know what I am saying.
I lived a year in NY in the early 90's. I budgeted myself on my salary (100k) and saved my bonus. Even then a hundo didn't go too far. Granted I ate out every meal (not always extravagant and not always on my dime) but the CRUSHING blow in NYC is taxes. I seem to recall that my net pay was around half of gross. Too fuckin' outrageous. In some ways though NY can be livable. I had the luxury of staying in NJ and CT with friends while I leisurely apartment hunted until I picked off a chick who was a desperate subletter. I wound up with a nice 1bd in a small building on 63rd across from the Post House. I rode the Lex to and from Wall St, ate a falafel off a cart for lunch and often dinner was two slices at Ray's. Total eating and commuting cost on a day like that might only be $10. The $8 Heini's made up for it though......
While I agree that the population of NYC is more sophisticated in toto than any other American city, I'm far less judgmental than you. I'm cognizant that of the "urbane" talk show hosts who've called NYC home during parts of their career, all were from hicksville and I don't mean as in Long Island. Carson and Cavett from Nebraska, Letterman from Indiana, Phil Donahue from Dayton. Same with those trench coat clad anchormen. Dan Rather from the swamps of Texas, Brokaw out of the Dakotas and Jennings, a high school drop out from Canada. I could go on and on. Warhol and Namath are from western Pennsylvania for God's sake. Meanwhile Queen's bred Vito is king of his boiler room. It's a BIG mistake to assume the uppity chick in SOHO is smarter than the mechanic in Birmingham. She probably isn't. And at the end of a day she probably lives a shittier life. To me America is all about driving, bbq'd steaks and watching Farve on a plasma not crowded subways, small expensive apartments and the whims of Al Sharpton and Elliot Spitzer. Perhaps because I grew up in a hi-rise in Chicago but the whole city thing can get old. Or maybe it's just me getting old.....
God is in the details. You can pigeonhole any part of the country just about anyway you like, but leading a satisfying life comes down to the little pleasures that just grow as a part of you. The ultimate upshot to the city is that there is something for just about everyone, everyday -- even Times Square for visiting rednecks Variety is king, for example, the food. Can't forget the food. Nowhere else on the planet can you find every cuisine on earth on a single subway line.
All the people you have mentioned ended up in .... NYC not South Florida. All those people made it big in NYC. All of them work or had worked in NYC and while they came from small towns across the US, they all ended up here in NYC not in Southern Florida. If I had money and I mean serious money, the only place whee I could have a dinner and a cigar with the fellows you mentioned would be in..... again NYC. I consider them all icons of American culture and I think you have illustrated my point about NYC quiet clearly. As for average chick being on the same level as a mechanic in Alabama. Well, at least she's got full set of teeth and speak English that is alot closer to proper British English. Seriously, could I really get to know somebody from Mongolia, an Indian artist, A loaded Jewish guy who is into wife swapping (don't ask how I found out), and a genuine sadomasochist (His girlfriend who resembled more of a slave to me was wearing a collar with a thick lock that only he had a key to ) in the same evening in Alabama or Florida?????? What you love about America I find uninspiring, however that what makes this place great. You like cheese and football, I like cheese and wine. Different strokes for different folks. Life is not what you have but what kind of company you keep. I prefer smelly subway full of individuals over a sterile robot like mentality of Florida.
you need the AC to breathe in NYC. in fact, i think it gets hotter in NYC than in most southern cities due to the congestion of people and skyscrapers. i hardly see how living on beachfront property in miami is considered unsophisticated. if you are making $1MM a year, that $150K in tax savings is more than enough to take dozens of trips to NYC a year to see the opera. if you like museums and musicals over sail boats and scuba diving to the extent that you'd be willing to pay $150K to access that everyday, i guess NYC is the place to be. if taxes weren't a concern, san fran is a great place to live too. so you visited 48 states but how long have you lived in NYC?