It's not bad :)

The grass is always greener on the other side, but I'll try to be less biased:

- It's reasonably safe and orderly by South American standards (1)

- Some things are much cheaper, like anything labor-related (like housemaids) (2), or meat (we're the biggest per capita meat consumers in the world, as there are 5 cows per inhabitant)

- Healthcare is in a socialist style (actually Mutualism) (3), and while it's always "on the brink of collapse", it works,

- People are reasonably educated, you'll find enough English-speakers if you come here :) , quite an important "hacker"/IT population (small in numbers, but big relative to the overall 3.000.000 inhabitants).

- OTOH, there's a big marginalized community (similar to the "favelas" in Brazil) that make about 10% of the population, but are the fastest-growing segment. So far, the most striking for an American will be seeing horse-drawn carriages full of litter, with poor children darting to collect the garbage bags of the middle class (needless to say, avoid them or they will relieve them of your wallet or cell phone as well), and beggars at quite a few street lights, or begging on the buses.

- There's a mix of almost-cutting edge (countrywide 3G cell phone and internet access) with old-tech (all the paper-based bureaucracy for example)

- Climate is quite moderate, although it's humid - some people, especially from middle Europe or Canada, think they won't experience the cold or heat. They're wrong. Humid cold and heat are way worse than their dry equivalents. Also, housing is not built to minimize the weather (no double or triple pane windows, bad insulation, bad or no heating in most houses)

There are nice vacation spots if you like beaches, though the water is colder and less clear than in Brazil and way less so than in the Caribbean :) (sand is among the best in the world, though)

- Several first world niceties like modern cars or electronics are out of reach for the masses, because the government likes to tax them out of reach. For smaller electronics, it's cheaper to fly to the US and smuggle them back than to buy them in a store. For larger stuff (say, a LCD TV) you're out of luck. Also, several easy credit options available in the US are not available here.

- Housing in the nicer parts of Montevideo is expensive (on par with some of the not-as-nice parts of American or Canadian cities), as the housing bubble hasn't exploded yet, and credit is not as easily available.

(1) it reminds me of a National Geographic story about the Baltic countries. If you arrived at them from Russia, they seem 1st world and orderly. But if you came to them from Europe, they seem disorderly and third-worldish :P

(2) there are several legal pitfalls, as there are quite cumbersome legal regulations. Most people live in a "grey" economy, complying with most regulations but underreporting or not complying with others (it's quite usual to underreport salaries to the tax collectors)

(3) The best explanation I could come up with after some Googling is:
http://www.hmg.gov.uk/media/60217/mutuals.pdf
"Mutual organisations do not have external shareholders - they are controlled by their members. Members may be users of the mutual, employees, other stakeholders or a combination of these Mutual organisations are either owned by and run in the interests of existing members, as is the case in building societies, cooperatives and friendly societies, or, as in many public services, owned on behalf of the wider community and run in the interests of the wider community"