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Do you think Toronto has an artificially low housing inventory? With the hundreds of 40 story condo towers popping up? So how do you make the decentralization

Do you think Toronto has an artificially low housing inventory? With the hundreds of 40 story condo towers popping up? So how do you make the decentralization of jobs more appealing to employers? Say I own a tech business how do you convince me to move my company to Barrie for example? I now have the difficulty of finding local talent or convincing talent to relocate to me or deal with a very long commute. Where is the benefit for me? Network effects are real. Besides this Toronto already essentially has a number of business cores that are distributed. You have the financial district, Young/Eg, Sauga, Markham, Vaughn and those are just the biggest ones. None of that reduces demand for the core though because it is the most appealing place to live for most young people.

TheAdamAndChe 10y ago
> So how do you make the decentralization of jobs more appealing to employers? That's the tough thing. The only solution I can think of, protectionism, will be very rough on employers. The lower and middle classes would thrive, but corporations that previously had massive profit margins would see those almost disappear, especially after unions form again. Obviously this would be very expensive, but I really fear that if we don't do something, our country will end up politically and socially unstable. A country with millions of minimum wage workers and a handful of rich-only cities is bound to have troubles. As far as Toronto's housing inventory goes, I don't know enough about Toronto to comment.
- sanswork 10y ago
  What do you mean when you say protectionism? Like what concrete actions would you take?
  - TheAdamAndChe 10y ago
    Global trade has benefits beyond cheap labor. Resource distribution between nations is not even. Because of that, I'd stop all or most trade with countries who don't have labor and environmental protection laws similar to our own, but still allow trade with countries with similar economies. That would allow the resource flow needed to give a balanced economy, but still bring manufacturing back. Over time, demand for lower class labor would raise, leading to higher wages and quality of life for most people. That's the hope anyway. If you see any blaring flaws beyond the fact that multinational corporations would suffer, please let me know.
    - sanswork 10y ago
      So you stop international trade but why wouldn't the manufacturing just build up on the edges of the cities? Why do you think that would distribute naturally throughout the country? The cities have a built in and stable workforce. Unless there is a natural resource that needs to be extracted from the area I'm just not seeing it. Besides with the increase in automation the types of workers factories will need in the future will be high tech as well.
      - TheAdamAndChe 10y ago
        Good question. I don't know. I'll have to look into what caused work to go to rural towns in the first place. Thank you for this post. This is exactly the kind of reply I was hoping to get.
        sanswork 10y ago
        Farming and natural resources generally. Where there was a mine to open or lumber to chop a town would spring up. Otherwise you'd typically get small towns springing up in the middle of farming areas. But back then a family might have 100 or 200 acres so you'd get a lot of people in a fairly small area. Now with modern tech farms can be 10 times that and corporations probably own most of them so they don't each have their own family. Thank you as well. It was a good one for thinking about stuff even if we disagree on the basic idea. :)
        TheAdamAndChe 10y ago
        I found this a couple of days after our discussion. I found it interesting and thought you would too. http://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/novdec-2015/bloom-and-bust/ http://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/novdec-2015/bloom-and-...

TheAdamAndChe 10y ago

> So how do you make the decentralization of jobs more appealing to employers? That's the tough thing. The only solution I can think of, protectionism, will be very rough on employers. The lower and middle classes would thrive, but corporations that previously had massive profit margins would see those almost disappear, especially after unions form again. Obviously this would be very expensive, but I really fear that if we don't do something, our country will end up politically and socially unstable. A country with millions of minimum wage workers and a handful of rich-only cities is bound to have troubles. As far as Toronto's housing inventory goes, I don't know enough about Toronto to comment.

sanswork 10y ago
What do you mean when you say protectionism? Like what concrete actions would you take?
- TheAdamAndChe 10y ago
  Global trade has benefits beyond cheap labor. Resource distribution between nations is not even. Because of that, I'd stop all or most trade with countries who don't have labor and environmental protection laws similar to our own, but still allow trade with countries with similar economies. That would allow the resource flow needed to give a balanced economy, but still bring manufacturing back. Over time, demand for lower class labor would raise, leading to higher wages and quality of life for most people. That's the hope anyway. If you see any blaring flaws beyond the fact that multinational corporations would suffer, please let me know.
  - sanswork 10y ago
    So you stop international trade but why wouldn't the manufacturing just build up on the edges of the cities? Why do you think that would distribute naturally throughout the country? The cities have a built in and stable workforce. Unless there is a natural resource that needs to be extracted from the area I'm just not seeing it. Besides with the increase in automation the types of workers factories will need in the future will be high tech as well.
    - TheAdamAndChe 10y ago
      Good question. I don't know. I'll have to look into what caused work to go to rural towns in the first place. Thank you for this post. This is exactly the kind of reply I was hoping to get.
      - sanswork 10y ago
        Farming and natural resources generally. Where there was a mine to open or lumber to chop a town would spring up. Otherwise you'd typically get small towns springing up in the middle of farming areas. But back then a family might have 100 or 200 acres so you'd get a lot of people in a fairly small area. Now with modern tech farms can be 10 times that and corporations probably own most of them so they don't each have their own family. Thank you as well. It was a good one for thinking about stuff even if we disagree on the basic idea. :)
        TheAdamAndChe 10y ago
        I found this a couple of days after our discussion. I found it interesting and thought you would too. http://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/novdec-2015/bloom-and-bust/ http://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/novdec-2015/bloom-and-...