4 ms·

Saving the heartland: Place-based policies in 21st Century America

32 points by Dowwie 9y ago

jmgao 9y ago
https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/3_austinetal.pdf https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/3_austi... for the actual paper
- pm90 9y ago
  Fair warning: its 98 pages (!) long. It looks interesting though.
youdontknowtho 9y ago
I don't personally think that Brookings is a non-partisan actor. Maybe they were at some point. I'm really distrustful of their research and the people involved. If it weren't presented as non-partisan, then I wouldn't feel the need to comment. I would just ignore it, like I ignore most center or right wing economics. (I know! What happened to the free exchange of ideas, right?) As to the point of the article, I think my critique is just a general critique of marginal technocratic adjustments to taxes and means tested programs. I support universal programs and redistribution.
- forapurpose 9y ago
  > I don't personally think that Brookings is a non-partisan actor. "I don't think youdontknowtho is a non-partisan actor." What makes that more meaningful than just a string of UTF-8 encodings? What is the partisan bias that's being asserted? Much more interestingly and importantly, what basis is there for it?
  - youdontknowtho 9y ago
    You are correct. I'm not non-partisan. Brookings is a think tank that provides intellectual cover for the capital-owning class. Just because it isn't paleo-conservative doesn't mean that it isn't a right wing group.
ryandrake 9y ago
> The enormous social costs of non-employment suggests that fighting long-term joblessness is more important than fighting income inequality. Isn’t joblessness a second order problem? What is the root cause? One’s ability to survive (basic necessities-wise) is limited by their ability to get and keep a job. Uncouple these two, via Basic Incone or something like it, and joblessness in and of itself is no longer a problem. Tough to do politically, since the prevailing Puritanical world view sees a living as something that must be earned.
- AnimalMuppet 9y ago
  Tough to do economically, since it takes a staggering amount of money to provide a Basic Income that's enough to actually survive on.
- bsbechtel 9y ago
  For many, in particular among those who aren't self-motivated, having a job provides much more than just a paycheck. For one's mental health, knowing you are contributing something back to society provides an enormous boost to your sense of self-worth, regardless of how big the paycheck is at the end of the day.
  - nategri 9y ago
    > contributing something back to society It is really challenging to contextualize a lot of service industry jobs this way.
    - bsbechtel 9y ago
      There are a lot of service industry workers workers who would disagree with you, and view your comment as smug elitism.
- frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
  >Uncouple these two, via Basic Income or something like it, and joblessness in and of itself is no longer a problem. I don't think that's entirely true and I think equating contrary views with Puritanism is a cheap way to make it seem so. Lots of people do take pride in their work, when we look at people who have lost their jobs in industries which aren't going to return there's not just the loss of income there's the loss of usefulness. There is a value to people in having a skill which you're good at, having a community (the workplace) which places some level of authority or trust in you to execute that task and then the ability to actually go and do that skill to recertify that trust/authority. Steel workers in Pennsylvania aren't just looking at a smaller paycheck for the rest of their lives, they're faced with potentially never being good enough at a useful task to ever get that sort of trust again and that itself can be corrosive to the human spirit.
forapurpose 9y ago
Compare the romantic concepts attached to rural poor, "heartland" we should "save", compared to the urban poor (I won't bother to list the terms). And note that for the urban poor, the solution is to erase them or get them out of sight, via gentrification, zoning, and other means. I know that's not universally true and there are programs to help the urban poor, but it's hard to think of anyone romanticizing them.
- closeparen 9y ago
  At the extreme ends, anti-gentrification activism romanticizes concentrated poverty and class segregation.

32 points by Dowwie 9y ago

https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/3_austinetal.pdf https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/3_austi... for the actual paper

pm90 9y ago
Fair warning: its 98 pages (!) long. It looks interesting though.

youdontknowtho 9y ago

I don't personally think that Brookings is a non-partisan actor. Maybe they were at some point. I'm really distrustful of their research and the people involved. If it weren't presented as non-partisan, then I wouldn't feel the need to comment. I would just ignore it, like I ignore most center or right wing economics. (I know! What happened to the free exchange of ideas, right?) As to the point of the article, I think my critique is just a general critique of marginal technocratic adjustments to taxes and means tested programs. I support universal programs and redistribution.

forapurpose 9y ago
> I don't personally think that Brookings is a non-partisan actor. "I don't think youdontknowtho is a non-partisan actor." What makes that more meaningful than just a string of UTF-8 encodings? What is the partisan bias that's being asserted? Much more interestingly and importantly, what basis is there for it?
- youdontknowtho 9y ago
  You are correct. I'm not non-partisan. Brookings is a think tank that provides intellectual cover for the capital-owning class. Just because it isn't paleo-conservative doesn't mean that it isn't a right wing group.

ryandrake 9y ago

> The enormous social costs of non-employment suggests that fighting long-term joblessness is more important than fighting income inequality. Isn’t joblessness a second order problem? What is the root cause? One’s ability to survive (basic necessities-wise) is limited by their ability to get and keep a job. Uncouple these two, via Basic Incone or something like it, and joblessness in and of itself is no longer a problem. Tough to do politically, since the prevailing Puritanical world view sees a living as something that must be earned.

AnimalMuppet 9y ago
Tough to do economically, since it takes a staggering amount of money to provide a Basic Income that's enough to actually survive on.
bsbechtel 9y ago
For many, in particular among those who aren't self-motivated, having a job provides much more than just a paycheck. For one's mental health, knowing you are contributing something back to society provides an enormous boost to your sense of self-worth, regardless of how big the paycheck is at the end of the day.
- nategri 9y ago
  > contributing something back to society It is really challenging to contextualize a lot of service industry jobs this way.
  - bsbechtel 9y ago
    There are a lot of service industry workers workers who would disagree with you, and view your comment as smug elitism.
frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
>Uncouple these two, via Basic Income or something like it, and joblessness in and of itself is no longer a problem. I don't think that's entirely true and I think equating contrary views with Puritanism is a cheap way to make it seem so. Lots of people do take pride in their work, when we look at people who have lost their jobs in industries which aren't going to return there's not just the loss of income there's the loss of usefulness. There is a value to people in having a skill which you're good at, having a community (the workplace) which places some level of authority or trust in you to execute that task and then the ability to actually go and do that skill to recertify that trust/authority. Steel workers in Pennsylvania aren't just looking at a smaller paycheck for the rest of their lives, they're faced with potentially never being good enough at a useful task to ever get that sort of trust again and that itself can be corrosive to the human spirit.

forapurpose 9y ago

Compare the romantic concepts attached to rural poor, "heartland" we should "save", compared to the urban poor (I won't bother to list the terms). And note that for the urban poor, the solution is to erase them or get them out of sight, via gentrification, zoning, and other means. I know that's not universally true and there are programs to help the urban poor, but it's hard to think of anyone romanticizing them.

closeparen 9y ago
At the extreme ends, anti-gentrification activism romanticizes concentrated poverty and class segregation.