4 ms·

And 2/3rds of the US population lives in 3.5% of the land area, what do you expect? The correction here is not to spread things out again but to adapt to the c

by brm 7y ago

And 2/3rds of the US population lives in 3.5% of the land area, what do you expect? The correction here is not to spread things out again but to adapt to the concentration.

claudeganon 7y ago
Sounds like a recipe for right-wing populism in a federal system like the US, where less populous areas are having the terms of their local economies dictated by unchecked market concentration of players in urban centers. You’re not going to convince rural America that their rents should be driven up because an east coast private equity firm needs greater returns or that Amazon warehouse work is a good job because it enables high-paid tech salaries in Seattle. It’s a problem that has to be addressed because of the particularities of our politics and economy.
- lotsofpulp 7y ago
  Then they will be welcome to not receive subsidies from the urban areas either. It is an adjustment that needs to happen. For work that must be done in rural areas, compensation needs to be greatly increased to offset the lack of conveniences.
  - claudeganon 7y ago
    These are fine sentiments, but wages have been stagnant for most low-paid workers for some time, and over half of the US falls into that category. They’re certainly not meaningfully rising in relation to the costs of housing and healthcare. The “lack of conveniences” you describe include things like access to grocery stores and medical care. The subsidies they receive from urban centers aren’t translating to material improvement for the vast majority of them, so you still have to square the circle of American geography, politics, and wealth concentration in its economy.
    - lotsofpulp 7y ago
      The wages are stagnant because the demand for labor is not sufficiently high. So either the supply of labor needs to go down (which it is slowly as population is decreasing in rural areas), or the demand for labor needs to go up. There is no other long term solution. One can argue for subsidies to ease the transition, but a permanent subsidy situation is not ideal.
  - trcarney 7y ago
    I don't think you realize how cheap rural areas are. For instance, I grew up in a small town in Missouri and you can buy a house there for less than $20,000[0]. It needs a lot of work but still. Compensation does need to be greatly increased in these areas, people just need to stop trying to compare two radically different areas. Each area should only be compared to its older self. If the area is constantly making more money per person year over year, the peoples lives there will get better and better. [0]https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/724-Fisk-Ave-Moberly-MO-65270/231533240_zpid/ https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/724-Fisk-Ave-Moberly-MO-6...
- pc86 7y ago
  Why would the rents in rural Montana increase due to COL in Seattle? They're separate markets. If you're within a commutable distance, they're not. Remote work skews this a little bit, but until it's widespread it's not a measurable impact on real estate prices or broader COL.
  - claudeganon 7y ago
    Because Capital seeking ever greater returns knows no geographic boundaries nor is it especially considerate of the local viability of its arrangements. Just look at what Buffet-owned Clayton Homes is doing with trailer park mortgages in rural areas: https://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/the-mobile-home-trap-how-a-warren-buffett-empire-preys-on-the-poor/ https://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/the-mobile... Or how private equity has been buying up real estate in the rust belt.
    - lotsofpulp 7y ago
      Rents don’t increase because capital seeks returns. Rents increase because of shifts in the supply and demand curves.
      - claudeganon 7y ago
        Perhaps in an economics textbook, but in reality: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/701697 https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/701697
        lotsofpulp 7y ago
        I don’t see what that has to do with my point. If poor people had more supply to choose from, they would be able to shop around and pay less.
      - lonelappde 7y ago
        You wrote the same thing two ways, like "F is not ma; KE is mv^2/2"
- bryanrasmussen 7y ago
  When you say unchecked market concentration it sounds like you want some sort of governmental solution to check that market concentration - what's the proposal.
simmons 7y ago
Yes, a lot of these sorts of measurements tend to just be population heat maps. Going down the list of most populous metro areas in the U.S. [1] or the most populous counties [2], all the top places are represented in the list. Although there are a few outliers at the edges (e.g. Charlotte, NC seems to punch above its weight). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_metropolitan_statistical_areas#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_metropolitan_statistic... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_most_populous_counties_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_most_populous_coun...
- ghaff 7y ago
  Lowe's, Duke Energy... I'd probably have expected Wake County in that general area but that's something of a bias because of tech--and because it's the capital. As the article notes, this isn't purely explained by population--but a lot of it is. It's maybe also worth noting that, for a lot of those metros, a decent chunk of the working population lives far enough outside of the metro area to be in another county. (Some businesses are too of course but probably less than the number of people.)
  - blaser-waffle 7y ago
    I work for an office in the RDU aka the Research Triangle. We're mostly or entirely remote. Lots of long commutes for the people who are obligated to come in. Big names and decent salaries for the COL, though.
  - non-entity 7y ago
    Charlotte is also like the 2nd or 3rd largest banking center in the country
- mcphage 7y ago
  They do display that comparison—that the counties they identify represent 32% of the GDP, but only 22% of the population. Still, they also show that it's been pretty constant, so I don't know if it's a meaningful grouping.
workthrowaway 7y ago
> And 2/3rds of the US population lives in 3.5% of the land area oh wow! really?! very interesting
brookhaven_dude 7y ago
You may have confused cause and effect here.
PhasmaFelis 7y ago
> And 2/3rds of the US population lives in 3.5% of the land area, what do you expect? Per the article, it's more than just that, unsurprisingly. "A large population and workforce is only part of the story. Last year, these counties represented $1.3 trillion more of nationwide GDP than the share of workers alone would account for. Looking at population, their combined share of GDP rose even as their share of overall population fell. The difference may stem from other aspects of a city, such as clusters of activity or networks, that improve productivity."

by brm 7y ago

And 2/3rds of the US population lives in 3.5% of the land area, what do you expect? The correction here is not to spread things out again but to adapt to the concentration.

claudeganon 7y ago

Sounds like a recipe for right-wing populism in a federal system like the US, where less populous areas are having the terms of their local economies dictated by unchecked market concentration of players in urban centers. You’re not going to convince rural America that their rents should be driven up because an east coast private equity firm needs greater returns or that Amazon warehouse work is a good job because it enables high-paid tech salaries in Seattle. It’s a problem that has to be addressed because of the particularities of our politics and economy.

lotsofpulp 7y ago
Then they will be welcome to not receive subsidies from the urban areas either. It is an adjustment that needs to happen. For work that must be done in rural areas, compensation needs to be greatly increased to offset the lack of conveniences.
- claudeganon 7y ago
  These are fine sentiments, but wages have been stagnant for most low-paid workers for some time, and over half of the US falls into that category. They’re certainly not meaningfully rising in relation to the costs of housing and healthcare. The “lack of conveniences” you describe include things like access to grocery stores and medical care. The subsidies they receive from urban centers aren’t translating to material improvement for the vast majority of them, so you still have to square the circle of American geography, politics, and wealth concentration in its economy.
  - lotsofpulp 7y ago
    The wages are stagnant because the demand for labor is not sufficiently high. So either the supply of labor needs to go down (which it is slowly as population is decreasing in rural areas), or the demand for labor needs to go up. There is no other long term solution. One can argue for subsidies to ease the transition, but a permanent subsidy situation is not ideal.
- trcarney 7y ago
  I don't think you realize how cheap rural areas are. For instance, I grew up in a small town in Missouri and you can buy a house there for less than $20,000[0]. It needs a lot of work but still. Compensation does need to be greatly increased in these areas, people just need to stop trying to compare two radically different areas. Each area should only be compared to its older self. If the area is constantly making more money per person year over year, the peoples lives there will get better and better. [0]https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/724-Fisk-Ave-Moberly-MO-65270/231533240_zpid/ https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/724-Fisk-Ave-Moberly-MO-6...
pc86 7y ago
Why would the rents in rural Montana increase due to COL in Seattle? They're separate markets. If you're within a commutable distance, they're not. Remote work skews this a little bit, but until it's widespread it's not a measurable impact on real estate prices or broader COL.
- claudeganon 7y ago
  Because Capital seeking ever greater returns knows no geographic boundaries nor is it especially considerate of the local viability of its arrangements. Just look at what Buffet-owned Clayton Homes is doing with trailer park mortgages in rural areas: https://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/the-mobile-home-trap-how-a-warren-buffett-empire-preys-on-the-poor/ https://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/the-mobile... Or how private equity has been buying up real estate in the rust belt.
  - lotsofpulp 7y ago
    Rents don’t increase because capital seeks returns. Rents increase because of shifts in the supply and demand curves.
    - claudeganon 7y ago
      Perhaps in an economics textbook, but in reality: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/701697 https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/701697
      - lotsofpulp 7y ago
        I don’t see what that has to do with my point. If poor people had more supply to choose from, they would be able to shop around and pay less.
    - lonelappde 7y ago
      You wrote the same thing two ways, like "F is not ma; KE is mv^2/2"
bryanrasmussen 7y ago
When you say unchecked market concentration it sounds like you want some sort of governmental solution to check that market concentration - what's the proposal.

simmons 7y ago

Yes, a lot of these sorts of measurements tend to just be population heat maps. Going down the list of most populous metro areas in the U.S. [1] or the most populous counties [2], all the top places are represented in the list. Although there are a few outliers at the edges (e.g. Charlotte, NC seems to punch above its weight). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_metropolitan_statistical_areas#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_metropolitan_statistic... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_most_populous_counties_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_most_populous_coun...

ghaff 7y ago
Lowe's, Duke Energy... I'd probably have expected Wake County in that general area but that's something of a bias because of tech--and because it's the capital. As the article notes, this isn't purely explained by population--but a lot of it is. It's maybe also worth noting that, for a lot of those metros, a decent chunk of the working population lives far enough outside of the metro area to be in another county. (Some businesses are too of course but probably less than the number of people.)
- blaser-waffle 7y ago
  I work for an office in the RDU aka the Research Triangle. We're mostly or entirely remote. Lots of long commutes for the people who are obligated to come in. Big names and decent salaries for the COL, though.
- non-entity 7y ago
  Charlotte is also like the 2nd or 3rd largest banking center in the country
mcphage 7y ago
They do display that comparison—that the counties they identify represent 32% of the GDP, but only 22% of the population. Still, they also show that it's been pretty constant, so I don't know if it's a meaningful grouping.

workthrowaway 7y ago

> And 2/3rds of the US population lives in 3.5% of the land area oh wow! really?! very interesting

brookhaven_dude 7y ago

You may have confused cause and effect here.

PhasmaFelis 7y ago

> And 2/3rds of the US population lives in 3.5% of the land area, what do you expect? Per the article, it's more than just that, unsurprisingly. "A large population and workforce is only part of the story. Last year, these counties represented $1.3 trillion more of nationwide GDP than the share of workers alone would account for. Looking at population, their combined share of GDP rose even as their share of overall population fell. The difference may stem from other aspects of a city, such as clusters of activity or networks, that improve productivity."