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Houses are already dirt-cheap in US small towns. Move to a 3rd or 4th tier college town or dying farm town in Kansas, say, far from any metros, and you can scor

Houses are already dirt-cheap in US small towns. Move to a 3rd or 4th tier college town or dying farm town in Kansas, say, far from any metros, and you can score big-ass brick houses that’re nice & updated for like $100,000 or less, still. You’ll have bad public schools, local median wages will be shockingly far under what you’re used to, it’ll be far from major cities and notable natural attractions, and medical care will probably be mediocre at best. But there are tons of cheap houses in this country today. [edit] my point is there are tons of cheap houses now, but you (the general “you”) don’t want to live in them. In the future there may be more, but they will also be places people don’t want to live (economic decline and bad schools & medical care go hand-in-hand)

rnk 3y ago
Your comments are so important and correct. Not many people have noticed that this will be increasingly a fact of life in the US. I remember when it was Walmart that destroyed the business districts of small towns when they built on the edge of town. Shrinking population in the US, lack of workers is here today! That also means fewer people to buy stuff over time. The population and economic retrenchment in the viability of life in small towns is one of the sources behind the passionate support for terrible people like Donald Trump. Their world is shrinking and they don't know what to do about it. It's not because of liberals or trans people somehow taking your stuff, and people trying to motivate you with cultural conflicts are not your friends. The economic model changed and we have fewer people around too. I'm not immune, as a software engineer my value to society will ebb and flow, who knows what Chat GPT will do to it.
themagician 3y ago
And those $100k homes will go to zero. Rural Japan and Italy both face this today. The homes are dilapidated and free. I generally agree though. Population decline is going to decimate areas at a scale and with a speed I don't think anyone is prepared for. If you get trapped in the decline you are screwed.

rnk 3y ago

Your comments are so important and correct. Not many people have noticed that this will be increasingly a fact of life in the US. I remember when it was Walmart that destroyed the business districts of small towns when they built on the edge of town. Shrinking population in the US, lack of workers is here today! That also means fewer people to buy stuff over time. The population and economic retrenchment in the viability of life in small towns is one of the sources behind the passionate support for terrible people like Donald Trump. Their world is shrinking and they don't know what to do about it. It's not because of liberals or trans people somehow taking your stuff, and people trying to motivate you with cultural conflicts are not your friends. The economic model changed and we have fewer people around too. I'm not immune, as a software engineer my value to society will ebb and flow, who knows what Chat GPT will do to it.

themagician 3y ago

And those $100k homes will go to zero. Rural Japan and Italy both face this today. The homes are dilapidated and free. I generally agree though. Population decline is going to decimate areas at a scale and with a speed I don't think anyone is prepared for. If you get trapped in the decline you are screwed.