I agree. I lived in the Toronto area for about 10 years. I visit regularly still because I have a lot of family there. I would consider moving back too but these fluff pieces as you say do not help. The first thing that is needed for more people who live there to admit there are problems, specifically with low wages (and relatively high taxes too applied at lower levels), I cannot get my friends or family to even realize that because they are still quoting 1990s UN studies about Toronto being the number 1 city in the world to live or something like that, being critical isn't always being negative, if you love a place there should be a desire to improve it, not ignore issues.