A Better Place to Live: Harrisburg, Pennsylvania or Philadelphia, Pennsylvania?
By: ______

In the state of Pennsylvania, there are two major cities, Harrisburg and Philadelphia. Both cities attract thousands of tourists each year. With population levels over 49,000, it’s a no brainer that people love to live in these cities. Even though Harrisburg and Philadelphia are both wonderful cities to live in, employment, education, crime rates, and costs of living separate the two.

Harrisburg is the ninth largest city in Pennsylvania, and there are plenty of employment opportunities available. Harrisburg provides more than 45,000 business offering employment to residents in the area. The city has the typical businesses we see in other US cities but offers more including companies like Tyco, IBM, Hersey Foods, and Harsco Corporation. With big businesses like these, many jobs are available to the residents in the area. With Harrisburg as the capitol of Pennsylvania, it is home to many government buildings. The city offers more than 20,000 jobs to qualified government employees. So whether you’ve got a college degree or not, your chance of gaining employment in the city of Harrisburg is high.

With Philadelphia being the largest city in Pennsylvania and the second largest city on the east coast, it also offers plenty of employment. With a size of over 142 Square miles, Philadelphia provides more than 119,000 businesses offering employment opportunities. That is more than double the businesses available in Harrisburg. Philadelphia also has the typical businesses we would see in other US cities. The largest employers in the area include Wal-Mart, Comcast, Wawa, and UPS. There are also plenty of government jobs available to those in the area as well. While Philadelphia may not be the capitol of Pennsylvania, its huge size allows the city to have many businesses with jobs to makes up for it. Even though Harrisburg is the capital of Pennsylvania, that doesn’t mean the city is free of crime. Ranging from murder to DUI, 66 out of 1,000 people are involved in some type of crime. As of 2012, Harrisburg was rated number 30 on the top 100 most dangerous places to live. The majority of crimes that take place in the city are property crimes. Property crimes are so frequent that statistics say, 1 in 19 people are victims in property crime. Motor vehicle thefts are also at a high rate in the city. Reports indicate that 1 in 199 people get their vehicle stolen. These numbers may not sound like much but, this means out of the 49,000 in population, 246 people have their vehicles stolen. The city may be the capitol, but it’s still vulnerable to crime.

With a 9 on the crime index, and being ranked 50 out of the top 100 most dangerous places to live, Philadelphia has an alarming crime rate. Slightly lower than Harrisburg, Philadelphia’s violent crime rate is 56 out of every 1,000 people. From the small towns to the big city, a person’s chance of being raped, murdered, robbed, or assaulted with or without a deadly weapon is 1 in 84. The FBI Considers Philadelphia to be one of the most violent cities in the United States. There are many property crimes in the city as well. Property crimes aren’t as bad as Harrisburg because your chances of being a victim is 1 in 26. Motor vehicle thefts are at a high rate in Philadelphia as well. The chance of having your vehicle stolen here are 1 in 206. The numbers seem slightly lower but, if you consider its population of over 1.5 million, the numbers are astonishing. 84,000 people are victims of violent crimes, over 17,000 people have a chance of being assaulted, and over 57,000 people run the risk of having their vehicle stolen. The city of Philadelphia can be very dangerous to live in.

From Pre-school to College, Harrisburg has plenty of opportunity for people to earn an education. With 12 different school districts, the availability for a child to get the education needed is through