How is the city of Philadelphia?

Question

What is the cost of living? How do universities rank as far as tuition for out of state students? What are the job opportunities for a grad student(psych major)? How is public transportation? How is crime? How is the night life? Is it as fast as New York City? If not how fast compared to NYC?

Answer 1

Philly isn't for everyone, it in no way compares to NYC, LA or Chicago, but it is considerably cheaper....a decent 1bedroom place in a good neighborhood should cost around 600-1k a month, but wages are depressed as well.

Temple University is the only state school in Philly, and tuition is around 8k a semester for out of staters, all the others (UPenn, Drexel, St. Josephs, UPhila, LaSalle) are private.

I'd say that the city's high wage tax has limited job growth in the city limits, but there should be plenty of opportunities (even if you have to commute to the 'burbs) for a psych grad student, but keep in mind, the city is still losing people....As for crime, I believe they had a record amount of shootings last year.

Public transport isn't bad if you take busses, but the subway system needs at least 2 more lines to really serve the city effectively. You'll most likely want to have a car unless you like taking a cab to the nearest grocery store. There's a good deal of places to go out at night, all clustered in a few areas like Olde City, but it's nothing compared to NYC. A lot of the restaurants and clubs try to emulate NYC, but never can match the scale or essence.

Philly is definately slower paced then NYC. It's a lot more blue collar too, god forbid you're not a fan of the Philly teams....A lot of people in Philly claim it's the best place in the world and hype up a few local icons like cheestakes and the eagles to the point of irritation, but they're grasping at straws. The city really doesn't have that much to offer when compared to NYC.

Answer 2

Being born, raised, educated, and work in the City of Philadelphia, I am going to say I am an expert! The City is slower paced than New York (but what isn't in comparison). We are two hours from NY, DC, parts of Jersey. Tuition for out-of-state students is a little higher, but comparable to most urban areas. The transportation system is one of the best in the Nation. Price wise it's a little expensive, but our subway system is clean and travels the length of the City via Broad Street. If the subway does not meet your needs, the bus and rail systems touch all the other areas of the City and beyond. There are several hospitals in the area that have jobs for a graduating grad student. The City sales tax is 7%, everywhere else in PA it's 6%. The cost of living is average to moderate compared to other urban areas. Of course if you live in Center City Philadelphia, you will pay a little more. The night life is great, but almost everything closes down around 3am. Unfortunately, the crime is out of control right now and I don't see it improving anytime soon. Outside of that, Philly has Chicago beat by a long shot!! It's a great city!

Answer 3

Cost of living: My 2-bedroom places have cost between $12-1500/month, so about $6-750 a person. One bedroom spots may start around there ($600-750) depending on the neighborhood, i.e., you may find a studio for that in University City, but nothing remotely close in Rittenhouse for that price.

Tuition...I don't know about the ranks, but check out the Princeton Review. I know at Drexel, for night classes, I'm paying about $300 a credit, which is much cheaper than the normal tuition.

Job opportunities....I'd assume they'd be great. I know in general, the just-out-of-college unemployment rate is like 2%, but all 3 major colleges within close range of Center City are merged with Hospitals somehow. UPenn has UPenn, Temple has Temple and Drexel has Hahnemann.

Public transportation is alright once you know the routes I think. I'm not a bus traveller, but I've heard that can be a PITA around here. The trains are pretty easy to figure out though, and you can pretty much get anywhere in the country from 30th Street Station...NYC, A.C., the Airport, Washington, Delaware, etc. Cabs are fairly reasonable too, but can be tough to get a hold of in most neighborhoods after 1 or 2am.

The murder rate in Philly is on record pace unfortunately...over one per day right now I think. It's kind of confined to certain areas, but, this being a city and all, it can be anywhere at anytime. There also seems to be a rash of teenage punks running around and thumping and/or robbing students up in University City by Penn and Drexel. For the most part, if you use common sense, you'll be fine though.

The night life is real good in my opinion. You can hit any kind of spot, from a grungey dive bar, to a hipster hangout, to a sports bar, to a posh lounge to some of the best dining in the country. Check out the resolved questions in this section of Yahoo Answer...there've been a lot of questions about City nightlife.

And as far as speed goes, I'm not 100% sure because I don't get to NYC a lot, but from the times that I have, I can say that Philly is a hair "slower", but more friendly than NYC. There'll be times when you doubt that, but Philly just seems a lot warmer to me.

Answer 4

Drexel, Saint Joe's (technically, not Center City), Temple, University of Pennsylvania, LaSalle.

Answer 5

Too many questions! Well, try the yahoo search engine to find out about PHILADELPHIA. It's probably not too bad there.

Answer 6

You made me dizzy..thanks

Answer 7

comes in CLOSE 2ND

Answer 8

i dunno, it's OK i guess.