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That sounds like yet another wealth transfer from metro areas to rural areas. I understand that the US government is structured that way, by the creation of th

by xapata 6y ago

That sounds like yet another wealth transfer from metro areas to rural areas. I understand that the US government is structured that way, by the creation of the Senate, but as a city-dweller, I'm not a fan. I'd rather pay for people to move, perhaps subsidizing housing where other services have competition and jobs are plentiful.

epicureanideal 6y ago
Having at least some distributed population is a national asset in the event of conflict. Not to mention some people need to live in rural areas due to the nature of their work. Also, what’s it worth to you to enable rural America to have a similar enough lifestyle to you that you’re both more likely to consider yourselves the same sort of Americans? National cohesion is worth something.
- xapata 6y ago
  I think there are enough decently-sized metropolitan areas that we'd be distributed well enough. > National cohesion is worth something There's been this bizarre fairytale of the noble yeoman running through American history, as if that were the true national identity. It's never been less true than today. I think a healthy unemployment benefit and permissive neighborhood zoning policies are sufficient to help them transition. If they're not willing to change, maybe their children will be.
  - epicureanideal 6y ago
    What in particular do you disagree with about the idea of the noble yeoman? I'm not saying I think every rural person fits this image, but there's some percent that do, at least as I think about it.
    - xapata 6y ago
      That it's relevant, given it's such a tiny portion of the population, or that it's an ideal at all. To me the national identity is a 2nd generation immigrant living in a large metro area. That's what I think of as an American.
      - epicureanideal 6y ago
        According to the statistics [1], second generation immigrants are only about 11% of the United States. (6% adult second-generation, 5% still children.) About 19% of the population lives in rural areas [2]. https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2013/02/07/second-generation-americans/ https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2013/02/07/second-generation... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rural_areas_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rural_areas_in_the_United_Stat...
        xapata 6y ago
        Not surprisingly, that 11% (plus whatever % is the 1st generation) forms the majority of who I know. It's interesting how people clique. Less than 2% of the US population is involved in agriculture. We've got more immigrants than farmers.
csense 6y ago
> wealth transfer from metro areas to rural areas I live in the Rust Belt, and when I visited San Francisco, it was like visiting a different planet. I find it hard to believe that wealth transfer from metro to rural is larger than wealth transfer in the opposite direction. Why does $HOT_TECHBRO_STARTUP invariably choose to locate its offices in the ultra-tight real estate and labor markets of SF, NYC or Austin when there are plenty of small cities who desperately need an employer like them, since they're full of factory ruins, empty storefronts, hordes of unemployed workers, and all the most promising young people leave as soon as they finish high school or college?
- steveklabnik 6y ago
  As someone who originally is from the Rust Belt (Pittsburgh), ended up moving to LA, then SF, then NYC, then Austin: one reason is that VCs congregate in the valley and need to make board meetings. I did a startup in Pittsburgh (though it’s been 11 years...) and you just don’t get the same opportunity to raise. Another is that folks jump between companies often, and don’t want to move to do it. If you want to attract talent from a FAANG, the people who work there are probably already in these areas and won’t want to move. I love my hometown dearly but I spent most of my life there. I’d rather be elsewhere.
- burlesona 6y ago
  Because businesses have gravity and naturally condense into gravity wells. Why is the oil industry (executive and R&D) so heavily centered in Houston, or finance so heavily centered in New York? Why don't some of those giant banks move their headquarters to (fill in your struggling town) where they need the jobs? The reason is that businesses aren't charities. The people who work in the industry benefit enormously from proximity to a bunch of other people in their industry. I grew up in the midwest, but I moved (with my family) to the Bay Area a couple years ago, and it's been like rocket fuel to my career and income. It's hard to even describe how advantageous it is when your social network naturally includes so many people in your industry - when your neighbor works at Google, and the other parents at your preschool work Stripe and Apple, and when your friends from the gym work at Github... etc. It's just nuts. Most people, once they've lived some place a little while and established a network, don't really want to leave. So then when they start their business they launch it with a few friends who are all here and either worked with them at their last business or are part of that extended social network, and of course they all live in the Bay Area already so they just stay because why move? I understand the frustration of geographic inequality of jobs, but honestly the hot startups are not who you should target if you want to inject some vitality into a struggling city. By far the better way forward is to combine a mix of training/education, public investment, and attracting some mid-size business to help seed the local market. As one example, this is roughly what they did in Chattanooga, TN, and have turned it into a small but nice little tech outpost.

by xapata 6y ago

epicureanideal 6y ago

Having at least some distributed population is a national asset in the event of conflict. Not to mention some people need to live in rural areas due to the nature of their work. Also, what’s it worth to you to enable rural America to have a similar enough lifestyle to you that you’re both more likely to consider yourselves the same sort of Americans? National cohesion is worth something.

xapata 6y ago
I think there are enough decently-sized metropolitan areas that we'd be distributed well enough. > National cohesion is worth something There's been this bizarre fairytale of the noble yeoman running through American history, as if that were the true national identity. It's never been less true than today. I think a healthy unemployment benefit and permissive neighborhood zoning policies are sufficient to help them transition. If they're not willing to change, maybe their children will be.
- epicureanideal 6y ago
  What in particular do you disagree with about the idea of the noble yeoman? I'm not saying I think every rural person fits this image, but there's some percent that do, at least as I think about it.
  - xapata 6y ago
    That it's relevant, given it's such a tiny portion of the population, or that it's an ideal at all. To me the national identity is a 2nd generation immigrant living in a large metro area. That's what I think of as an American.
    - epicureanideal 6y ago
      According to the statistics [1], second generation immigrants are only about 11% of the United States. (6% adult second-generation, 5% still children.) About 19% of the population lives in rural areas [2]. https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2013/02/07/second-generation-americans/ https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2013/02/07/second-generation... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rural_areas_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rural_areas_in_the_United_Stat...
      - xapata 6y ago
        Not surprisingly, that 11% (plus whatever % is the 1st generation) forms the majority of who I know. It's interesting how people clique. Less than 2% of the US population is involved in agriculture. We've got more immigrants than farmers.

csense 6y ago

> wealth transfer from metro areas to rural areas I live in the Rust Belt, and when I visited San Francisco, it was like visiting a different planet. I find it hard to believe that wealth transfer from metro to rural is larger than wealth transfer in the opposite direction. Why does $HOT_TECHBRO_STARTUP invariably choose to locate its offices in the ultra-tight real estate and labor markets of SF, NYC or Austin when there are plenty of small cities who desperately need an employer like them, since they're full of factory ruins, empty storefronts, hordes of unemployed workers, and all the most promising young people leave as soon as they finish high school or college?

steveklabnik 6y ago
As someone who originally is from the Rust Belt (Pittsburgh), ended up moving to LA, then SF, then NYC, then Austin: one reason is that VCs congregate in the valley and need to make board meetings. I did a startup in Pittsburgh (though it’s been 11 years...) and you just don’t get the same opportunity to raise. Another is that folks jump between companies often, and don’t want to move to do it. If you want to attract talent from a FAANG, the people who work there are probably already in these areas and won’t want to move. I love my hometown dearly but I spent most of my life there. I’d rather be elsewhere.
burlesona 6y ago
Because businesses have gravity and naturally condense into gravity wells. Why is the oil industry (executive and R&D) so heavily centered in Houston, or finance so heavily centered in New York? Why don't some of those giant banks move their headquarters to (fill in your struggling town) where they need the jobs? The reason is that businesses aren't charities. The people who work in the industry benefit enormously from proximity to a bunch of other people in their industry. I grew up in the midwest, but I moved (with my family) to the Bay Area a couple years ago, and it's been like rocket fuel to my career and income. It's hard to even describe how advantageous it is when your social network naturally includes so many people in your industry - when your neighbor works at Google, and the other parents at your preschool work Stripe and Apple, and when your friends from the gym work at Github... etc. It's just nuts. Most people, once they've lived some place a little while and established a network, don't really want to leave. So then when they start their business they launch it with a few friends who are all here and either worked with them at their last business or are part of that extended social network, and of course they all live in the Bay Area already so they just stay because why move? I understand the frustration of geographic inequality of jobs, but honestly the hot startups are not who you should target if you want to inject some vitality into a struggling city. By far the better way forward is to combine a mix of training/education, public investment, and attracting some mid-size business to help seed the local market. As one example, this is roughly what they did in Chattanooga, TN, and have turned it into a small but nice little tech outpost.