One consideration is that, from a legal rights and social inclusion perspective, places aren’t fungible.

The market can’t make a culturally inhospitable place welcoming.

It's not just culture. Not being American, I don't know what's really up with Detroit, but I categorise it as "like Blackpool" in that it was an economic powerhouse and then industry shifted and it became poor; there's now a lot of empty (or at least cheap) homes.

"One consideration is that, from a legal rights and social inclusion perspective, places aren’t fungible."

You do understand that works both ways? If you reverse the areas you're thinking of, there are people who prefer the rights or social environment in the opposite direction. Shouldn't we be trying to bring similar opportunities to all social groups? If we want to look at how this turns out, take a look at Native American reservations.

Edit 3:

Originally I'd replied about population demographics and migration; @giantg2 has a good reply to that, which you can see below. In reviewing the conversation, I got mentally stuck on the comparisions to reservations, because I think it's a severely fucked up comparison. But saying that alone isn't a helpful or effective conversation, so -

> Shouldn't we be trying to bring similar opportunities to all social groups? If we want to look at how this turns out, take a look at Native American reservations.

In terms of "should we be trying to bring..." - yeah, more or less, yeah, we should. The issue, for me, comes first from trying to say that the social group that is a reservation is the same kind of social group that is a disappearing small town; second, that "bring[ing] similar opportunities" to both would look similar (ye olde equality/equity conversation), and lastly that a meaningful comparison of outcomes can be made between the polities, due to, you know, all the ethnic cleansing (Trail of Tears, etc). But, that's a a hard conversation to have, or to continue, and it's based off of me making a lot of assumptions about what comparison actually is trying to be made.

So, to be constructive about it:

> If we want to look at how this turns out, take a look at Native American reservations.

Can you walk me through this? What are you seeing as the outcome, and why do you think these polities are comparable?

Yeah, but you generally need the money from the businesses and employment to grow the other amenities. For example, TX is almost the opposite of CA in many political areas, yet it seems they have been successful in attracting businesses and people to migrate to them. The amenities and infrastructure has been increasing in many of those cities.

"That’s (part of) why the places that are emptying are emptying, and then they’re surprised when only trying to be attractive to businesses doesn’t work out."

I'm not sure I understand you. Places like TX, FL, AZ, etc are actually growing populations while being hailed as business friendly. Yet places like CA and NY are losing population while considered being tought for business and progressive (rights, social atmosphere fron your prior comment?).

Ah; it looks like my impressions are /somewhat/ out of date: https://www.ppic.org/publication/whats-behind-californias-re... Although I’d say trying infer things from numbers during the pandemic is going to, uh, run into some pretty serious confounding factors. Still, looks like the trend was happening /before/ that, so.

The main comparison points for the rural areas and the Native Americans are:

- Both groups had pressures, albeit to very different degrees and methods, to remove rights and land. We see that rural populations are losing farm land due to the way the market treats commodity crops and the way the government subsidizes - get big or get out. Many people in rural communities feel ignored and even mistreated by their governments on a variety of issues, including things like eminent domain, property rights, due process, and constitutional rights, especially the 10th and 2nd amendments. As urbanization increases the rural areas just have things pushed down their throats. While reservations have a lot of autonomy, they miss out out on a lot of programs and incentives due to having almost no representation at various levels of government.

- The general attitude towards each is that they are dumb, superstitious/religious, and they should stay in their backwater areas if they don't want to get in line with progressive agendas. That it's their own fault they're choosing to be poor by not moving to the cities, or they don't deserve the same sort of opportunities in their area.

- There has been animosity towards both groups. We've had presidents make fun of both groups. While the Native Americans were targeted with more active methods of elimination, there are passive methods of eliminating people - most of it unintentional. If you eliminate enough opportunities the people have to move, as we've seen with the increasing urbanization. It can be hard to believe that things like free trade (elimination of many factories) and elimination of fossil fuel industries without any geographic replacements aren't politically strategic.

Those make sense, and they’re useful to bring up, but I do think that generally considering one informative to the other is A Problem - reservations are from forced relocation and generations of systematic cultural destruction. Even if you’d argue rural areas are facing cultural destruction, it’s (a) not a specific, deliberate aim and (b) has been occurring for a fraction of the time (1-2 generations, vs what, 6 to 20?).

So like, I’d buy that it’s worth taking about both, due to their similarities, but I wouldn’t buy that any conclusions could be made on those alone.

PS - I also want to say, I really appreciate your response; you’ve spoken with a measured an informative tone/etc, and that’s worth celebrating.

There are a lot of homes in every country that are essentially worthless. You can live in them, and they may even be in good condition. But if you try to sell them, you probably can't find anyone willing to pay real money for them. Because very few people have a reason to live in that area. And good luck if you need to borrow money to renovate the home.

Then there are areas where many people have a reason to live in. Imagine a highly educated couple. At least one of them probably works in a field where fully remote work is not possible. When they choose where they want to live, they likely prioritize areas with many potential employers within an easy commute. If they take the risk and move to a small city with only 1-2 relevant employers and it doesn't work out, they're in trouble. And because educated people move to larger cities, businesses that need talent also concentrate there.

Homes as such are not worth much. Almost all of the value is in the location. And most locations are not worth much.

Transformation to information economies really re-centered urban areas as well. People used to flee from urban areas (and for reasons like crime) now they're flowing in the opposite direction.

In the US though I see a lot of attitude for "ugh who wants to live in a building with people, I want huge lawns where I don't have to see my neighbors on the end of a cul-de-sac with no traffic. I want to live in a town thats as far from 'walkable' as possible." So many people I come across especially when talking about how housing has a supply-side problem and needs to build more with better density and access to transit.

And why aren't we doing anything to address that distribution? If the employers are having to lay exorbitant salaries so people can afford housing, shouldn't they be looking at opting offices in other cities to reduce their cost? If not, the system is broken and the leaders are poor. In my opinion the leaders should be looking where they are creating jobs as part of their societal duties, maybe even put it under DEI (as worthless as the DEI programs tend to turn out in practice, maybe not).

Everyone is already doing that, which is exactly the problem. When every leader is trying to make their city/company more competitive, the ones that are already competitive will win. They can do more, because they have more money.

If you want to fight the market, you need centralization. You tax everyone and use the collected money to subsidize a limited number of cities with unrealized potential. Selecting the winners is essential. The more evenly you spread the money, the less effect it will have.

"Everyone is already doing that, which is exactly the problem."

I'm not seeing that. I'm seeing concentration and not social equity focused distribution.

"You tax everyone and use the collected money to subsidize a limited number of cities with unrealized potential."

There are already cities with untapped opportunities. In my opinion the reason rhey remain untapped is because leaders don't care. They'd rather follow group-think.

> If the market works the way it should, then people should shift out of the tighter areas and into the looser areas, reaching something closer to an equilibrium.

The problem is that households require two wage earners. Consequently, it is very difficult for a family to move since both earners have to find better jobs simultaneously.

One of the reasons to stay in the overpriced areas is that when one person loses a job, they can get another job without uprooting the whole family.

"Consequently, it is very difficult for a family to move since both earners have to find better jobs simultaneously."

If cost of living is significantly lower, they don't have to be better.

My whole comment was about job distribution. What are we doing to address it? Do the mega corp leaders not see the social and business value in opening offices in smaller cities?

The maximum cost of living differential is something like +25% (NYC) to -25% (Beaumont, TX).

Most differentials are much smaller. "Cheap" places are no longer very much cheaper.

Cost of living changes are no longer extreme enough to offset the loss of a wage earner.

> Do the mega corp leaders not see the social and business value in opening offices in smaller cities?

Um, no?

The difference between opening an office in San Jose and one in Pittsburgh is quite large, for example. Your connectivity due to air travel is much worse. Your personal networking is much worse. etc.

It was the former CTO of Modcloth who talked about how having the programmers in Pittsburgh was great but that they needed to park the executives in the Bay Area.

Google actually has an office in Pittsburgh. That's the more or less the type of expansion I'm talking about - satellite offices for the large corps.

It's still an international airport, even if the schedule isn't as robust. The emphasis on in-person personal networking, and personal networking in general, is atrocious. Personal networking and the requirement to so it in person is a huge factor in many biases and discrimination. It's only going to get worse as the group-think and physical concentration increases while the job market gets worse.

Also, 25% is a big difference. I think we have to compare the commutable areas as well. Some places like NYC and SF do not have much cheaper areas in a reasonable commute. Other areas can have much cheaper areas in a reasonable commute. Many costs are largely the same due to the national brands - cars, electronics, appliances, etc. But things like housing can be massively different. An apartment in a commutable suburb can be close to 50% of what it is downtown in many cities. It's no secret that the salaries and property costs are extremely above average in the bay area.

> then people should shift out of the tighter areas and into the looser areas, reaching something closer to an equilibrium

thats if infrastructure(roads, airports, hospitals, grid, etc) will appear there

There are plenty of places with infrastructure that also have available land within about an hour or so from an airport. Many of those places have decent hospitals with great hospitals (for specialists) a reasonable drive away. Those decent hospitals would likely get better if they had employed patients to reduce the percentage of their patients on Medicare and Medicaid (both low reimbursing).