If Los Angeles has you down, we wouldn't blame you.

The big city can be mean, and it takes some getting used to. But many will never get used to the least affordable rents in America and a cost of living that's got average folks living paycheck to paycheck.

As Hollywood millionaires enjoy the good life (thanks, in part, to your taxes), you might wonder if you're ever going to make it here. You're not alone.

The global consulting firm Mercer looked at quality of life, including economics, culture, medical care, education, recreation and weather, to come up with its recently published global Quality of Living Rankings.

Los Angeles came in 49th place.

It's not that bad, given that the list includes 230 cities around the world. But it's low for our neck of the woods.

“Quality of living remains high in North America, where Canadian cities dominate the top of the list,” Mercer says in a statement.

Vancouver is the best place to live in North America, the firm found. It ranked fifth in the world on the list. Vienna was No. 1 worldwide, Mercer found. The top performer in the United States was San Francisco (28th overall).

Meanwhile, U.S. News & World Report just published its own Best Places to Live list for the United States.

Los Angeles ranked 83rd out of the 100 largest American towns. It's a city of dreams, the publication acknowledges, but it's also a city of traffic.

“Although the City of Angels is characterized as both a glamorous show business town and a traffic-gnarled metropolis, the truth about America's second-largest city is that it's simultaneously both and neither,” U.S. News states.

By the way, if you want to live well stateside, Denver is No. 1, the publication says. Indeed, we hear the weed is good there.

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