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Once upon a time, a rising tide of economic progress would lift all boats in all communities all around the country. Nowadays, we're in a bizarre reality where
by ddxxdd 7y ago
Once upon a time, a rising tide of economic progress would lift all boats in all communities all around the country.
Nowadays, we're in a bizarre reality where a 200% productivity gain among the average worker nationwide means a 1500% productivity gain in the top 10% of counties, coupled with a 55% productivity loss in the bottom 90% of counties. (Numbers generated randomly for illustrative purposes).
One would expect that productivity-boosting technology such as computers, robots, cell phones, and various forms of automation would increase productivity for nearly every person on every square inch of this planet. That is no longer the case, and it is something I plan to study in depth at a later date.
- paulsutter 7y agoThose would be really interesting statistics to know, anyone know where we could get actual numbers? Also be interesting to know his much is due yu concentration of professions and how much to local network effects.
- conanbatt 7y ago> Once upon a time, a rising tide of economic progress would lift all boats in all communities all around the country. I think this hasn't been true for centuries. Moving rural to the cities has been documented since the 1700's very clearly by economists.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoIt may be true that all boats were being lifted before, but some more than others. Or at least the gap between the boats wasn’t as big as it is now.
- 0x445442 7y agoI agree with your assessment and the irony with respect to this topic is a big contributor to the current state of things in places like the Rust Belt is what other's have said is not feasible; jobs moving to the people. If all that manufacturing can move to China why can't FAANG move to Toledo?
- scottLobster 7y agoBecause most people who want to work at FAANG don't want to live in Toledo, and it's a lot harder to find competent software developers than factory workers. Not that there aren't competent devs in Toledo, but the supply would be dried up pretty quick, and good luck convincing rich, coastal, Elizabeth-Warren-beat-Hillary-in-my-district Californians to move to an area with lake-effect snow in a state that just passed a heartbeat law for abortions. Obviously painting with broad strokes, but FAANG companies would have to fundamentally rethink the kind of person they'd like to hire if they want to move out of affluent Urban cores.
- 0x445442 7y ago> but FAANG companies would have to fundamentally rethink the kind of person they'd like to hire if they want to move out of affluent Urban cores. And yet Apple seemed to have figured out this type of problem quite nicely during the 80's and 90's when they moved their manufacturing from places like Carleton TX, Elk Grove CA and Fountain CO to places like Singapore and Ireland.
- scottLobster 7y agoOnce again, manufacturing. Not design. You can teach anyone with a high school education (even less, see 3rd world factories) how to solder or how to operate machinery efficiently. VLSI, circuit design, operating system development, FPGAs, even app development requires years of specialized training just to be competent at the fundamentals, usually taking the form of a degree. So if you want to hire designers with minimal costs you go to where the largest relevant talent pool already lives, and it ain't Toledo. It's MIT, Stanford and similar places. It's the same reason any company prefers to hire local when they can. Much easier to entice someone to drive somewhere else in town in the morning than to entice someone to uproot their life and move 1000 miles.