Yep. People from large coastal cities see nothing wrong with openly mocking Kansas when they're talking to me. I ask them about the public restroom situation where they live, and I tell them they're living in a primitive area if they don't even have easy access to public restrooms. For some reason they think I'm joking. They're just so used to putting up with that and other things that make life miserable that they don't know what life is like in the more advanced parts of the country.
While there are trade offs in every place one chooses to live, and can relate to the eye rolling elitism of folks who’ve never visited most of America as a person who grew up in Tennessee. I think you overplay your hand referring to a state in the bottom third of GDP and growth rate with slightly above median GDP per capita as an advanced part of the country.
Free public restrooms and other facilities. No homeless. No pollution, clean air and skies. Massive food self sufficiency. I'm not a Kansas fan exactly but I wouldn't balk at calling it advanced in terms of quality of life.
There are literally thousands of homeless people in Kansas. Maybe "food self sufficiency" refers to farming, but nearly ten percent of the state is on food stamps, and more than ten percent lives below the poverty line. And there is nowhere "no pollution" is less true than in agriculture belts: https://www.kcur.org/news/2022-03-29/as-fertilizer-pollutes-...
I believe that your quality of life is great. I also believe that is not universally true for Kansans -- and I think that these issues exist across America, and pretending you can just move to avoid them is a little childish.
