There are lots of employment opportunities in Dallas, for professionals, trades, service, hospitality, finance, manufacturing and everything in between. Salaries are good and while housing is not the bargain it used to be, it remains better than many other places. DFW also has all the amenities you would expect from a major city: pro sports, college sports (esp. with SMU and TCU now in major conferences), museums, concerts, arts and culture, etc. It also has lots of varied communities within it, from old-stock semi dense housing (thought not as much as older cities) to affordable suburban tract housing and everything in between. And the weather is really nice lots of the year.

The problem with Dallas is ALL big cities have those same things. So while we all might like some or all of the above things, they can be had in equal or better measure at any other city of comparable size. And many other major cities have more "world class" amenities in that regard compared to DFW.

What Dallas lacks that many other large cities have is attractive topography for outdoor living. There are no natural lakes, only reservoirs. There is not a large navigable river. There is obviously no ocean nearby. There are no mountains nearby. There are no real hills, forests or anything like that NEARBY.

Yes, you have the piney woods in East Texas, the Hill Country in central/south Texas, and beautiful hills and lakes in the Ozarks/SE Oklahoma/NW Arkansas. But all those things are 4+ hours away by car and can't easily be gotten to otherwise. Yes, Galveston and the Bolivar Peninsula on the Gulf of Mexico are reachable in about 5 hours by car, but that's still a haul unless you have at least a 3 day weekend. Mountains? Ten hour+ drive to New Mexico or fly.

Also the public transit/traffic situation is bad and unlikely to get better.

And the winters still suck a lot of the time and the summers can be unbearable for long stretches.

Compare that situation to: Seattle, Salt Lake City, Charlotte/Raleigh, Atlanta, New York Chicago, Philadelphia, etc. Even cities like Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Minneapolis, Miami, Phoenix, LA, etc. and you can see why so many people dislike DFW, even if they live here. Even Houston is at least closer to the ocean and has easier access to international travel to the Caribbean, Central America, etc.

So yes, there's plenty to like about Dallas. But whatever you like here, you can probably get it more and better somewhere else.

And there's lots to dislike.

So, ultimately, it's a place to live. You make the most of it, and because of its sheer size, you do get all the "big city" things that you can't get in terms of culture and amenities when compared to places like Oklahoma City, Wichita, Omaha, etc.

But compared to other cities its size, DFW lacks a LOT.

So why is it so big? Because companies came here because it was easy, cheap, unregulated place to do business. They brought employees and it fed on itself.

And for most people, once you are somewhere, you put down roots or your job or profession, family, etc. otherwise makes it very difficult to leave, even if you want to. So you stay and you make the most of it, and it could be a lot worse! Yay!