Two offers:
R1 teaching only long term non-tt 3/3, grad students, great city, medium cost of living, good course selection, 49K, no salary increase expected
CC tenure track 4/4 (because of large class credit), marginal city, low cost of living, same courses for eternity, 65K, salary increases can lead to 106K
Both same travel time from home. CC is driving, R1 is flying.
What would you do?
It's a TT at a CC. Most of them have 5/5 loads. This one doesn't because they view a course as 50 students and the position teaches one large course. So its a 5/5 with a course reduction for course size. The R1 also has large courses with no reduction and more preps.
But the R1 is in a real city. People know the name of this school. I'd have graduate students.
That's a really tough choice. I was tt at a CC and moved to a pretty sweet LAC, so it can be done, if you keep publishing and otherwise building that CV.
A tt job should beat a lectureship, but ... most CCs are more like high schools than like universities. At my CC the administrative micromanaging was over the top, academic freedom was much less, and they treat faculty more like easily replaceable hourly employees than highly-qualified professionals. I am so glad to be out of there. I personally would much rather be a permanent lecturer at a real uni.
"I'd have graduate students." Even if this R1 has some good graduate students, the good ones won't work with you as a non-TT person. The mediocre/bad ones will be a drain.
You will be treated as a 2nd-class citizen at the R1. That may be fine with you, but you should know that going in.
Once you have your CC preps on lockdown, you can begin the process of trying to jump to an R2 and from therr maybe an R1. Which of course is a long process and not guaranteed. But you have CC tenure to fall back on.
Or you can go to the R1, work like a demon to produce despite teaching a 3/3 and hope the fact you have R1 letterhead lets you stay closer to the top. You likely have less course stability, since TT professors can steal your stuff. If you fail, it is the life of an adjunct for you and possibly crashing out of academia entirely.
Take the CC and if you fail to move up or find it too much effort, just enjoy the salary and all the travel and such that salary coupled with the low local COLA will allow you.
CC are dreadful placements. That said, being a lecturer at an R1 with the burden of (mediocre) grads and low pay is not great either. I think you want to look into the other matters, like where you prefer to live, and the distance from family of each locale, etc. I am about to get stuck with tenure at a regional 4/4 in a rural area that I tried to escape. They hired me with no pubs. I humped it while on the t-t to get at least one sole authored pub per year. I was record-successful, but I failed to place. So, here I am, more long term than I ever thought. I tell you my story for this reason: Don't assume that you can publish your way into something better. Assume that this job may be permanent or semi-permanent. The bottom has dropped out of the academic market, I think for good.