That's not nice. Please don't do regional dissing here.

It's a legitimate argument dang, just not expressed in the best way. The Canadian praries (AB, SK, MB) are rough. The crime rate and suicide rate is much higher than other provinces, especially Ontario, and there is very little to do. It's cheap because people don't want to live there.

What? The Calgary-Edmonton corridor has the highest salaries in Canada and over 1M people in each city.

I didn't mention the marginally higher average wage (across all industries, not specifically IT, which does not average higher) or population of Calgary. For reference the Toronto metro area has a population of 6.4 million with the Calgary metro area having 1.3. If we're talking about the praries as a whole which the parent was, that also includes Winnipeg and Regina.

You said:

The Canadian praries (AB, SK, MB) are rough. It's cheap because people don't want to live there.

I don't see how that contradicts anything else I've said. The average wage in Nunavut is higher than Toronto, does that make it a better place to live?

Saying "people don't want to live there" while at the same time admitting more than 2M people live in a high income area seems to be contradictory, no?

I said 1.3m in the metro area, which includes the population of Calgary. A high average salary doesn't necessarily make the whole of Calgary a high income area either. The average hourly rate of low population places can be easily influenced by outliers, like in the case of Nunavut and several cities in Alberta, contractors doing seasonal work in dangerous trades.

Doesn't Dan, like, hail from Alberta?

I worked for a couple months in Calgary and really liked it.

Who's Dan?

I probably seem like I really hate Calgary but I don't... I was talking about the praries at large and Calgary is just one city.

I mean they made a knock-off CN Tower out of spite but I won't hold it against them... :P

In my growing-up-in-the-prairie attitude, dislike of prairie life, particularly if there are mountains visible off to the west, may reflect a short attention span and chronic cultural overstimulation.

'dang, the moderator on this thread.

Central Illinois is a big, flat, boring, methamphetamized prairie too, but I'd still rather live in Chicago than on either coast. Most places you could think of wanting to live are surrounded by boring places.

Are they? Would have assumed SF. Didn't think YCombinator had any presence in Canada. I thought dang was a shared account used by multiple moderators as well.

No, 'dang is Dan Gackle. There are two public moderators, 'dang and 'sctb (Scott "Certificate Transparency" Bell).

Oh cool. Dan is seriously committed, he's almost omnipotent lol.

No, he just transcends spacetime like the prairies whence he hails.

The praries are cold, flat, and devoid of any cities of interest (in the sense that people visit to see the cities).

People do live in cities in alberta, but the cities are mostly car oriented. If you want to live in a walkable area you're mostly out of luck in the part of Canada between Toronto and Vancouver.

There are reasons people really enjoy being in the praries of course, but it really is a serious lifestyle choice you have to make.