While Atlanta might be the No. 1 city in the U.S. for new college graduates, residents just a couple of years younger may not be so lucky.
A report by SmartAsset on the best and worst college towns to live in ranked Atlanta as the worst overall of the 75 towns included in the study.
The report used five factors to make its decision: discretionary income, number of arts, entertainment and recreation establishments per 100,000 people, unemployment rate, number of violent crimes per 100,000 people and number of property crimes per 100,000 people.
Atlanta’s property crime rate of 6,533 per 100,000 residents (ranked 69th of the 75), violent crime rate of 1,379 per 100,000 residents (67th) and 7.6 percent unemployment rate (62nd) caused it to fall to the bottom of the ranking.
The report listed Atlanta as one of the worst cities for discretionary income — average yearly income for the city minus the average yearly rent for two bedrooms in the city — but luckily, (or not) it also says there isn’t much for residents to spend their money on anyway.
The discretionary income of $28,296 (44th) is almost as dismal as the reported number of arts, entertainment and recreation establishments per 100,000 people: 32 (60th).
The rest of the bottom 10 is comprised (in order from worst to slight less so) of Lafayette, Ind., Buffalo, N.Y.,Tallahassee, Cleveland, Lansing, Mich., St. Louis, Indianapolis, Binghamton, N.Y., and Cincinnati.
Boulder, Colo., home of the University of Colorado, topped the list at No. 1. Boulder boasts the second most arts, leisure and entertainment establishments per capita of the cities studied and an average discretionary income of $37,168.
The No. 2 to No. 10 cities on the list are Fargo, N.D., Madison, Wisc., Ann Arbor, Mich., Charlottesville, Va., Portland, Maine, Ames, Iowa, Logan, Utah, Corvallis, Ore., and Fort Collins, Colo, respectively.
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