a neighborhood … where you’ll be relatively high on the social ladder.
That seems to be the reverse of what the research you cited indicates (rich people in rich neighbourhoors of poor counties in America are happy). Don’t you want to be in a rich neighbourhood (so you’re surrounded by nice things and reminders of your high status) in a poorer region (so you have something worse to compare against) of a rich country (for all the infrastructural benefits that brings)?
I’ve changed the word “neighborhood” to “area” here, but this was actually the point I was least certain about. A lot of the theory and some studies I see mentioned but can’t find do tend to suggest neighborhood, but the Firebaugh study, which is the best I could find an abstract for says not neighborhood but region.
I don’t know to what degree that contradicts the earlier results, and since I can’t even find full text for Firebaugh, I’m not sure whether it means anything more profound than “try to avoid a house in the middle of a loud dirty ghetto, because you wouldn’t like that.”
I’m also wary of this whole area because of the controversy around the Easterlin Paradox
Rationalists can probably to an extent choose not to suffer from envy (just because they’re more likely to understand that the effect exists and is a bad thing), whereas they can’t choose not to suffer from infrastructural detriments. That argues in favor of rich neighborhoods. (This is one of many examples where it’s tempting to overestimate science because it’s tempting to underestimate the number of different ways in which the question the science asks differs from the question you want to know the answer to.)
That seems to be the reverse of what the research you cited indicates (rich people in rich neighbourhoors of poor counties in America are happy). Don’t you want to be in a rich neighbourhood (so you’re surrounded by nice things and reminders of your high status) in a poorer region (so you have something worse to compare against) of a rich country (for all the infrastructural benefits that brings)?
I wonder if college towns are ideal, e.g. somewhere nice in the Knowledge Corridor.
Good for mental stimulation. And probably a nice hospital for later usage.
I’ve changed the word “neighborhood” to “area” here, but this was actually the point I was least certain about. A lot of the theory and some studies I see mentioned but can’t find do tend to suggest neighborhood, but the Firebaugh study, which is the best I could find an abstract for says not neighborhood but region.
I don’t know to what degree that contradicts the earlier results, and since I can’t even find full text for Firebaugh, I’m not sure whether it means anything more profound than “try to avoid a house in the middle of a loud dirty ghetto, because you wouldn’t like that.”
I’m also wary of this whole area because of the controversy around the Easterlin Paradox
Rationalists can probably to an extent choose not to suffer from envy (just because they’re more likely to understand that the effect exists and is a bad thing), whereas they can’t choose not to suffer from infrastructural detriments. That argues in favor of rich neighborhoods. (This is one of many examples where it’s tempting to overestimate science because it’s tempting to underestimate the number of different ways in which the question the science asks differs from the question you want to know the answer to.)