4 ms·

I live in Memphis, TN (a couple of hours northwest of Tupelo, MS). I moved back to Memphis in 2008 after a couple of years in San Jose working for the Paypal an

by rsbrown 15y ago

I live in Memphis, TN (a couple of hours northwest of Tupelo, MS). I moved back to Memphis in 2008 after a couple of years in San Jose working for the Paypal and Microplace divisions of eBay. One of the reasons for moving back was to have a meaningful and positive impact through entrepreneurship. How much impact would a company (say, a web startup) making $2M - $3M in annual revenues have in Silicon Valley? Very little, in my opinion. However, the same company located in a community like Memphis would have a tremendous positive impact -- not only on the local economy, but on the local psyche. And this is important to me. I often wonder if this is really important to others, though. It's an honest question: do we believe that American society needs the Memphises and Tupeloes and Detroits and Clevelands? If so, we really should reach out and do something about it. If not, fair enough. And for what it's worth, the move back to Memphis has been incredibly enriching for me. I'm very happy I did it. The relatively low cost of living has provided an excellent opportunity for me work on various projects and live a much more balanced life than I felt was possible when my family lived in the valley. I'm currently working on my second startup attempt here and I'm thrilled about it. Look for a "Show HN" post soon.

pchristensen 15y ago
"do we believe that American society needs the Memphises and Tupeloes and Detroits and Clevelands?" American society doesn't need any city. Outside of the city they live in and those they visit, the whole rest of America (and the world) is an abstraction to any given person. I don't ultimately care if my car is assembled in Detroit or Ohio or South Carolina or Mexico or Japan - I mainly care about build quality, reliability, price, etc. Despite repeated campaigns to "Buy American", people favor local and personal interests over national ones. Now if X,000 productive people decide they need a place, they can turn it into something meaningful. If Memphis had 5,000 new businesses generating $3M, then Memphis will live and prosper. Sounds like it's one down, 4,999 to go :)
- rsbrown 15y ago
  "American society doesn't need any city" I agree that American society doesn't need any one particular city, but we do need a healthy ecosystem of urban areas. My question is: are the smaller, lower-tier cities necessary in order to have that healthy ecosystem?
  - pchristensen 15y ago
    "are the smaller, lower-tier cities necessary in order to have that healthy ecosystem?" And that question can be rephrased as "Do smaller, lower-tier cities contribute to a socially and economically healthy America?" Don't get me wrong, I really, really want there to be a reason for cities of 50K-500K to exist. Unfortunately, I think it's too small of a labor market for talented but not self-suffiently entrepreneurial people to bother staying in. The only towns this size that are prospering outside of major metros are state capitals or college towns, which benefit from a large, captive employer.
  - anamax 15y ago
    > I agree that American society doesn't need any one particular city, but we do need a healthy ecosystem of urban areas. Do we? I'm happy to assume the benefit of a couple of finance-urban-centers, but it's unclear that there's a huge benefit from having finance, art, and fashion in NYC. If fashion and art were elsewhere, NYC would be significantly smaller, but would we be worse off? My point is that the big urban areas in the US contain aggregates that may not be particularly synergistic. If they're not, then its the "lower-tier" cities that are actually important, and that we happen to co-located many of them.
- xbryanx 15y ago
  There are a great many things that American society needs that can't be quantified in this way. I think that's what some of this post is getting at. There is value in tech innovation boltering places beyond the places where it is most efficient and profitable.

by rsbrown 15y ago

pchristensen 15y ago

"do we believe that American society needs the Memphises and Tupeloes and Detroits and Clevelands?" American society doesn't need any city. Outside of the city they live in and those they visit, the whole rest of America (and the world) is an abstraction to any given person. I don't ultimately care if my car is assembled in Detroit or Ohio or South Carolina or Mexico or Japan - I mainly care about build quality, reliability, price, etc. Despite repeated campaigns to "Buy American", people favor local and personal interests over national ones. Now if X,000 productive people decide they need a place, they can turn it into something meaningful. If Memphis had 5,000 new businesses generating $3M, then Memphis will live and prosper. Sounds like it's one down, 4,999 to go :)

rsbrown 15y ago
"American society doesn't need any city" I agree that American society doesn't need any one particular city, but we do need a healthy ecosystem of urban areas. My question is: are the smaller, lower-tier cities necessary in order to have that healthy ecosystem?
- pchristensen 15y ago
  "are the smaller, lower-tier cities necessary in order to have that healthy ecosystem?" And that question can be rephrased as "Do smaller, lower-tier cities contribute to a socially and economically healthy America?" Don't get me wrong, I really, really want there to be a reason for cities of 50K-500K to exist. Unfortunately, I think it's too small of a labor market for talented but not self-suffiently entrepreneurial people to bother staying in. The only towns this size that are prospering outside of major metros are state capitals or college towns, which benefit from a large, captive employer.
- anamax 15y ago
  > I agree that American society doesn't need any one particular city, but we do need a healthy ecosystem of urban areas. Do we? I'm happy to assume the benefit of a couple of finance-urban-centers, but it's unclear that there's a huge benefit from having finance, art, and fashion in NYC. If fashion and art were elsewhere, NYC would be significantly smaller, but would we be worse off? My point is that the big urban areas in the US contain aggregates that may not be particularly synergistic. If they're not, then its the "lower-tier" cities that are actually important, and that we happen to co-located many of them.
xbryanx 15y ago
There are a great many things that American society needs that can't be quantified in this way. I think that's what some of this post is getting at. There is value in tech innovation boltering places beyond the places where it is most efficient and profitable.