Telling Rural People To Move Won’t Solve Poverty

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

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New Republic

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

I am disappointed by the lack of responses here. I typed up a response this morning but realized I have no connection to rural America, so it's a bit harder for me to conceptualize. I do think its extremely disheartening that the left has taken a "Do what the market forces want" approach instead of advocating for more government investments to redirect the movement of capital back to these locations. You can't blame the Bank of America branches for leaving small town Michigan if there is no appetite from the other stakeholders to maintain requisite investment to keep a place afloat. I have spoken with seatown on AAD briefly, and he adopts an "Everyone should be entitled to a job in their hometown" stance - which can be interpreted as a bit radical but ultimately correct.

Healthcare is an obvious impediment for the rural South in particular that needs to be taken care of by DC. Even with proper public investment, you just have an unfit workforce that cannot attract private enterprise. But if we selectively look at the rural Midwest / New England, that's not exactly what's missing even as the towns continue to dwindle. I wish I could pinpoint this to something in the 80s as the era of deregulation as the cause and something easy to undo, but the "decline" seems to have started even before that. Depending on how we define decline. I wonder if e-commerce on the heels of the Great Recession is an even greater cause for the recent exacerbation of the decline? I don't have a feel for how important "Main Street" is in this definition of rural. We know how chain retailers have been affected in suburbs and exurbs, but I don't consider them to be part of the same category.

Jao covering a jumble of considerations at 3 in the morning...

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

And there's the fact that (I assume) many if not most people in rural areas don't have the resources to move.

[Bismarck]

And there's the fact that (I assume) many if not most people in rural areas don't have the resources to move.

The average rural person can afford to move, rural areas aren’t that poor. Impoverished rural people like those described in the article probably cannot afford to move, so you are correct there. Plus many people don’t want to move. Many people have connections to their communities and land that is real and admirable.

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

And there's the fact that (I assume) many if not most people in rural areas don't have the resources to move.

The average rural person can afford to move, rural areas aren’t that poor. Impoverished rural people like those described in the article probably cannot afford to move, so you are correct there. Plus many people don’t want to move. Many people have connections to their communities and land that is real and admirable.

I don't know what to say other than that this is a good post.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

And there's the fact that (I assume) many if not most people in rural areas don't have the resources to move.

The average rural person can afford to move, rural areas aren’t that poor. Impoverished rural people like those described in the article probably cannot afford to move, so you are correct there. Plus many people don’t want to move. Many people have connections to their communities and land that is real and admirable.

I don't know what to say other than that this is a good post.

[Starry Eyed Jagaloon]

And there's the fact that (I assume) many if not most people in rural areas don't have the resources to move.

The average rural person can afford to move, rural areas aren’t that poor. Impoverished rural people like those described in the article probably cannot afford to move, so you are correct there. Plus many people don’t want to move. Many people have connections to their communities and land that is real and admirable.

I don't know what to say other than that this is a good post.

I disagree with this. Regardless of economics, America ought to move around more. I grew up in a town like this--it was an insular, ignorant old-boys club. Every community could use a bit more rootless cosmopolitanism.

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

And there's the fact that (I assume) many if not most people in rural areas don't have the resources to move.

The average rural person can afford to move, rural areas aren’t that poor. Impoverished rural people like those described in the article probably cannot afford to move, so you are correct there. Plus many people don’t want to move. Many people have connections to their communities and land that is real and admirable.

I don't know what to say other than that this is a good post.

I disagree with this. Regardless of economics, America ought to move around more. I grew up in a town like this--it was an insular, ignorant old-boys club. Every community could use a bit more rootless cosmopolitanism.

I really like the feel of some urban areas ("liberal millenially" ones), but I'd hate to see what the "rootless cosmopolitanism" you advocate is like.

Also, what does your ideal society look like?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

And while moving could bring in income, it can also sever a person’s access to vital family networks. “The poorer you are the more you depend on a safety net that is more likely to be made up of your relatives and friends, family, community than of whatever the official safety net is,” Tickamyer continued. “So if you are poor, sporadically employed or unemployed with kids, who provides the child care? Who helps out when you run out of money to purchase groceries or need an emergency car repair or whatever? It’s going to be the people who you are connected to in your community and in your family.”

This sounds exactly like what I have been saying for the past two plus years now.

[RINO Tom]

And there's the fact that (I assume) many if not most people in rural areas don't have the resources to move.

The average rural person can afford to move, rural areas aren’t that poor. Impoverished rural people like those described in the article probably cannot afford to move, so you are correct there. Plus many people don’t want to move. Many people have connections to their communities and land that is real and admirable.

I don't know what to say other than that this is a good post.

I disagree with this. Regardless of economics, America ought to move around more. I grew up in a town like this--it was an insular, ignorant old-boys club. Every community could use a bit more rootless cosmopolitanism.

Do you think poor minorities stuck in the inner cities' failing school systems "really should just move already"?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

And there's the fact that (I assume) many if not most people in rural areas don't have the resources to move.

The average rural person can afford to move, rural areas aren’t that poor. Impoverished rural people like those described in the article probably cannot afford to move, so you are correct there. Plus many people don’t want to move. Many people have connections to their communities and land that is real and admirable.

I don't know what to say other than that this is a good post.

I disagree with this. Regardless of economics, America ought to move around more. I grew up in a town like this--it was an insular, ignorant old-boys club. Every community could use a bit more rootless cosmopolitanism.

Everybody needs a place to rest
Everybody wants to have a home
Don't make no difference what nobody said
Ain't nobody like to be alone

I am fine with traveling, meeting new people and doing new things, but I fundamentally disagree in that I think some people need to have roots, connections and so forth.

[Kyle Rittenhouse is a Political Prisoner]

This is really sh**tty surface level analysis.

[支持核绿派 (Greens4Nuclear)]

And there's the fact that (I assume) many if not most people in rural areas don't have the resources to move.

The average rural person can afford to move, rural areas aren’t that poor. Impoverished rural people like those described in the article probably cannot afford to move, so you are correct there. Plus many people don’t want to move. Many people have connections to their communities and land that is real and admirable.

I don't know what to say other than that this is a good post.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

And there's the fact that (I assume) many if not most people in rural areas don't have the resources to move.

The average rural person can afford to move, rural areas aren’t that poor. Impoverished rural people like those described in the article probably cannot afford to move, so you are correct there. Plus many people don’t want to move. Many people have connections to their communities and land that is real and admirable.

I don't know what to say other than that this is a good post.

I will say that more federal investment might not be the answer. There have actually been many periodic investments to inject cash into rural communities to rebuild pieces of infrastructure, build skate parks for kids, &c, and it hasn't worked. We have to realize that the things undermining rural communities (agricultural consolidation in the cornbelt + plains, for example) are concrete, structural choices we've made about the economy over the course of the 20th century, either through inaction or in a quest for efficiency at the expense of social relations and economic well-being for many people.

We have to make the conscious choice to structure our economy differently, IMO. And that choice will have trade offs in growth, economic efficiency, &c. It's not about adjusting the market, it's about changing the fundamental incentives at the base structure of society.

[MasterJedi]

Government should incentivize living in an urban area and disincentivize living in rural areas unless you're actual farmers or need to be there for some reason.

[Torie]

I asked this question of a lady who grew up in an impoverished part of rural Vermont, with huge social problems. Why don't folks just get the hell out like you did, I asked? The answer was as alluded to in a post above, that often the rural poor are heavily dependent on a familial social safety net (and sometimes high school friends), which also comprises much of their social world. So leaving would be a very traumatic experience, and in some ways a cruel thing if they are forced to leave.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

Government should incentivize living in an urban area and disincentivize living in rural areas unless you're actual farmers or need to be there for some reason.

Does 'not wanting to live in an urban area' count as a need?  Family ties, any of the aforementioned reasons why people do not want to abandon their roots or conform to an urban way of living?

Or do you just want to punish rurals because you hate us for some reason?

[Frozen Sky Ever Why]

Government should incentivize living in an urban area and disincentivize living in rural areas unless you're actual farmers or need to be there for some reason.

Are you of a fan of Ceausescu's Systematization?

[Ban my account ffs!]

Government should incentivize living in an urban area and disincentivize living in rural areas unless you're actual farmers or need to be there for some reason.

Are you of a fan of Ceausescu's Systematization?

These things have a way of coming back to bite you in the ass.  The birth rate in Romania doubled from 1966 to 1967 thanks to his decree... but then fell generally back to rates slightly higher than the 1966 levels.

Then, when those "decretei" babies reached adulthood, they were an integral part of removing Ceausescu from this earth.

[MasterJedi]

Government should incentivize living in an urban area and disincentivize living in rural areas unless you're actual farmers or need to be there for some reason.

Are you of a fan of Ceausescu's Systematization?

These things have a way of coming back to bite you in the ass.  The birth rate in Romania doubled from 1966 to 1967 thanks to his decree... but then fell generally back to rates slightly higher than the 1966 levels.

Then, when those "decretei" babies reached adulthood, they were an integral part of removing Ceausescu from this earth.

In the US at least getting people to live in urban areas would be a good thing. Overall consolidation of services, less environmental destruction due to sprawl. We could build much better effective public transit systems that would hopefully decrease car use. Would provide easier access to jobs and concentration of labor for businesses. No real reason for people to live in rural areas.

[Beet]

Government should incentivize living in an urban area and disincentivize living in rural areas unless you're actual farmers or need to be there for some reason.

Are you of a fan of Ceausescu's Systematization?

These things have a way of coming back to bite you in the ass.  The birth rate in Romania doubled from 1966 to 1967 thanks to his decree... but then fell generally back to rates slightly higher than the 1966 levels.

Then, when those "decretei" babies reached adulthood, they were an integral part of removing Ceausescu from this earth.

In the US at least getting people to live in urban areas would be a good thing. Overall consolidation of services, less environmental destruction due to sprawl. We could build much better effective public transit systems that would hopefully decrease car use. Would provide easier access to jobs and concentration of labor for businesses. No real reason for people to live in rural areas.

The problem with urban areas is all the inequality there. In a very rural area, I've noticed there's not that much inequality. There's a reason the New Deal started in New York City... it needed something like that. You have jobs and huge monopolies increasingly concentrated in a few cities (New York, DC, San Fran, and LA) sending housing prices skyrocketing. That turns middle and working class people into debt peons, or forces them to move out to the boonies, and poor people can even become homeless. Meanwhile smaller towns and rural areas are emptied out, which creates resentment and anger (e.g., Trump) and drug addiction (opioids). And since this is Atlas, I can mention it's those same angry, failing groups that our political rules give disproportionate power to, while the big cities are virtually irrelevant.

[wxtransit]

Government should incentivize living in an urban area and disincentivize living in rural areas unless you're actual farmers or need to be there for some reason.

Are you of a fan of Ceausescu's Systematization?

These things have a way of coming back to bite you in the ass.  The birth rate in Romania doubled from 1966 to 1967 thanks to his decree... but then fell generally back to rates slightly higher than the 1966 levels.

Then, when those "decretei" babies reached adulthood, they were an integral part of removing Ceausescu from this earth.

In the US at least getting people to live in urban areas would be a good thing. Overall consolidation of services, less environmental destruction due to sprawl. We could build much better effective public transit systems that would hopefully decrease car use. Would provide easier access to jobs and concentration of labor for businesses. No real reason for people to live in rural areas.

Wait...what?

I'm all for more public transit and a better environment, but this argument doesn't make sense at all.

Urban areas are the sprawl. Dallas-Fort Worth is one example of many. Our urban area has sprawled so large that it now takes over an hour to get from one part to the other. Is that a good example of "consolidation of services, less environmental destruction due to sprawl" and "decreased car use"? No. What you are likely refering to is people moving to the cities. The problem with that; however, is that in many urban cores the cities are already packed. For this reason, people move to the sprawling suburbs in the same urban area when they want to move away from a rural area.

Making more people move to an urban area won't solve the problem. It'll become the problem.

[MasterJedi]

Government should incentivize living in an urban area and disincentivize living in rural areas unless you're actual farmers or need to be there for some reason.

Are you of a fan of Ceausescu's Systematization?

These things have a way of coming back to bite you in the ass.  The birth rate in Romania doubled from 1966 to 1967 thanks to his decree... but then fell generally back to rates slightly higher than the 1966 levels.

Then, when those "decretei" babies reached adulthood, they were an integral part of removing Ceausescu from this earth.

In the US at least getting people to live in urban areas would be a good thing. Overall consolidation of services, less environmental destruction due to sprawl. We could build much better effective public transit systems that would hopefully decrease car use. Would provide easier access to jobs and concentration of labor for businesses. No real reason for people to live in rural areas.

Wait...what?

I'm all for more public transit and a better environment, but this argument doesn't make sense at all.

Urban areas are the sprawl. Dallas-Fort Worth is one example of many. Our urban area has sprawled so large that it now takes over an hour to get from one part to the other. Is that a good example of "consolidation of services, less environmental destruction due to sprawl" and "decreased car use"? No. What you are likely refering to is people moving to the cities. The problem with that; however, is that in many urban cores the cities are already packed. For this reason, people move to the sprawling suburbs in the same urban area when they want to move away from a rural area.

Making more people move to an urban area won't solve the problem. It'll become the problem.

I don't mean urban area as in how the census department defines it, so no, suburban isn't urban. I mean dense city cores with condo/apartment towers or inner ring burbs, not the sprawl you're describing.

[wxtransit]

Government should incentivize living in an urban area and disincentivize living in rural areas unless you're actual farmers or need to be there for some reason.

Are you of a fan of Ceausescu's Systematization?

These things have a way of coming back to bite you in the ass.  The birth rate in Romania doubled from 1966 to 1967 thanks to his decree... but then fell generally back to rates slightly higher than the 1966 levels.

Then, when those "decretei" babies reached adulthood, they were an integral part of removing Ceausescu from this earth.

In the US at least getting people to live in urban areas would be a good thing. Overall consolidation of services, less environmental destruction due to sprawl. We could build much better effective public transit systems that would hopefully decrease car use. Would provide easier access to jobs and concentration of labor for businesses. No real reason for people to live in rural areas.

Wait...what?

I'm all for more public transit and a better environment, but this argument doesn't make sense at all.

Urban areas are the sprawl. Dallas-Fort Worth is one example of many. Our urban area has sprawled so large that it now takes over an hour to get from one part to the other. Is that a good example of "consolidation of services, less environmental destruction due to sprawl" and "decreased car use"? No. What you are likely referring to is people moving to the cities. The problem with that; however, is that in many urban cores the cities are already packed. For this reason, people move to the sprawling suburbs in the same urban area when they want to move away from a rural area.

Making more people move to an urban area won't solve the problem. It'll become the problem.

I don't mean urban area as in how the census department defines it, so no, suburban isn't urban. I mean dense city cores with condo/apartment towers or inner ring burbs, not the sprawl you're describing.

Read the bold.

[Storebought]

Government should incentivize living in an urban area and disincentivize living in rural areas unless you're actual farmers or need to be there for some reason.

Are you of a fan of Ceausescu's Systematization?

These things have a way of coming back to bite you in the ass.  The birth rate in Romania doubled from 1966 to 1967 thanks to his decree... but then fell generally back to rates slightly higher than the 1966 levels.

Then, when those "decretei" babies reached adulthood, they were an integral part of removing Ceausescu from this earth.

In the US at least getting people to live in urban areas would be a good thing. Overall consolidation of services, less environmental destruction due to sprawl. We could build much better effective public transit systems that would hopefully decrease car use. Would provide easier access to jobs and concentration of labor for businesses. No real reason for people to live in rural areas.

Wait...what?

I'm all for more public transit and a better environment, but this argument doesn't make sense at all.

Urban areas are the sprawl. Dallas-Fort Worth is one example of many. Our urban area has sprawled so large that it now takes over an hour to get from one part to the other. Is that a good example of "consolidation of services, less environmental destruction due to sprawl" and "decreased car use"? No. What you are likely referring to is people moving to the cities. The problem with that; however, is that in many urban cores the cities are already packed. For this reason, people move to the sprawling suburbs in the same urban area when they want to move away from a rural area.

Making more people move to an urban area won't solve the problem. It'll become the problem.

I don't mean urban area as in how the census department defines it, so no, suburban isn't urban. I mean dense city cores with condo/apartment towers or inner ring burbs, not the sprawl you're describing.

Read the bold.

There is nothing "packed" about Dallas (3,876/sq mi), Fort Worth (2,181.0/sq mi), or Houston (3,660/sq mi). The contention that these places are congested entirely because of car-centered sprawl is entirely correct.