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Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

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Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#141

Post by chrischen »

stonogo wrote: post #126
dmode wrote: post #105

The fundamental problem with American cities is that Americans failed to recognize them the core engine of growth and prosperity as they are. Instead cities are viewed through a political lens. This NYC's problems are to be solved by the city/county and San Francisco's are to be solved by their local city/county politicians. The Federal government, which takes in 30% of income, chips in a very limited manner. Investi…

This is not just an oversimplification, it is also incorrect. Military installations are put in rural areas because nobody wants artillery practice to happen near their houses. That money comes from the DoD, not generally classed as 'infrastructure spending.' Futhermore, all interstate freeways are built with federal investment, and HUD is heavily involved in funding development of low-income housing nationwide -- th…

I’m not sure you can bundle India with the likes of Japan. Two totally different levels of development.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#142

Post by chrischen »

0x4f3759df wrote: post #119
dmode wrote: post #105

The fundamental problem with American cities is that Americans failed to recognize them the core engine of growth and prosperity as they are. Instead cities are viewed through a political lens. This NYC's problems are to be solved by the city/county and San Francisco's are to be solved by their local city/county politicians. The Federal government, which takes in 30% of income, chips in a very limited manner. Investi…

The suburbanization (or decentralization) was promoted by the Federal Government as a deterrent against nuclear strikes https://www.oftwominds.com/blogjuly10/suburbs-defense-07-10....

Funny how Japan actually got nuclear striken and they took the completely opposite approach.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#143

Post by niftich »

francisofascii wrote: post #133
tptacek wrote: post #123

What I don't get about this is: why Boise? Are people just moving there for the scenery? There are major US metros with affordable housing and much better job markets. There's a sort of implied dichotomy in this article: major metros are too expensive, so people will move into a succession of mid-sized towns. But, no: a couple major metros are too expensive. Others, like Miami, Chicago, Cleveland, Atlanta, DFW, and H…

You are right. Guessing they picked Boise because it is fast growing.

They absolutely did, and that's the entire point: the growth-begets-growth tautology of land (and job) development in the US; a subtly-hyped gold rush for milquetoast everymen wherein people tired of high costs of living are trying to catch their lucky break by moving to the handful of areas at the exact right time where you can still buy a big house and snag a semi-rare high-paying job. They read 'metros with the highest rates of income growth' and they think their incomes, but strangely not their costs, would grow too.

People do want this, because they've done it with Raleigh, Nashville, and Boulder, and Austin before that, and Portland before that; and the article's point is that there's always another metro somewhere where growth can be jumpstarted for a few years before it fizzles out.

Established and mostly well-functioning metros like Chicago and DFW don't qualify in their entirety, because individual suburbs or exurbs within them fulfill the same role that Boise now plays. Boise is being used here because it's remote from other cities of comparable size, so it's riding solely its own coattails, and the failures of regions far away that draw people in.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#144

Post by lostapathy »

mcguire wrote: post #135
nshelly wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's just that many of the stakeholders in these areas such as long-time property owners in the westside of San Francisco and residents with rent control fearing gentrification would not benefit directly from new development. Their incentives simply aren't aligned with younger generations who want to live and raise families in a city with reasonable housing costs. To break this quandary we simply to need intervention…

Pardon me for appearing to be the spokes-person for market economics, but if "congestion, long commutes and sprawl is hurting the U.S. (and Californian) economy", wouldn't they be self-healing problems? Do "younger generations ... want to live and raise families in a city with reasonable housing costs" or do they want to accumulate as much of the easily-available money there a fast as possible? (The former is availab…

It probably is self-solving, but probably not over useful timescales.

Further - it seems like the people truly making the decisions (i.e., the people deciding to keep company headquarters in SF rather than moving) are in a better economic position than the entry-level people who pay for those decisions in quality of life.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#145

Post by [deleted] »

elefanten wrote: post #120
anabis wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people commute by train. We are improving, but the morning commute is something foreigners consider particularly wacky, and not something that they want to repeat everyday. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7kor5nHtZQ

I've seen these clips before and always wonder where these examples are on the scale of "average experience". Is this the worst of the worst? ie- only the few most congested stations experience this during peak hours on a particularly bad day? Or is it relatively expected? ie- most major stations will experience this during peak hours on an average day?

[deleted]

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#146

Post by lostapathy »

nshelly wrote: post #100
aclimatt wrote: post #32

Not the crux of the article, but: > This doesn't mean that they, or the even higher-cost, more congested coastal metros, will adopt Manhattan or Tokyo-style density and transit patterns. Instead, Austin and San Antonio might be the new Houston and Dallas. My goodness, can we /please/ stop this false dichotomy that a city either has to be a Tokyo megalopolis or a suburban sprawlfest? I don't think any reasonable perso…

If there were a Paris or Barcelona in the U.S, tons of people would move there. Cost of living in this "Paris" or "Barcelona" would skyrocket and you'd see the transit system hit the max and cost of housing skyrocket. There are just fewer cities in the United States with good transit systems, low-crime, high quality of life and urban amenities. This hypothetical city would go through similar growing pains as NYC and…

Perhaps the federal government doesn't need to step in by paying for rail, but by creating efficiencies (and/or removing obstacles) that make transit so expensive now?

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#147

Post by mcguire »

tptacek wrote: post #121
CydeWeys wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? Why do you define upper middle class so as to exclude the trades? Trades are frequently lucrative enough to place tradespeople in the income percentile required to reach upper middle class, especially if you own your own business, as many tradespeople do.

"Upper middle class" has a definition in sociology that basically excludes the trades; it's the "managers and professional" class.

And it is not too unusual to find "trade" households making more than professionals.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#148

Post by Naritai »

StudentStuff wrote: post #53
Naritai wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience 60-70k is considered to be a 'high' salary in Boise. Like, someone outside of tech who is making is 60k considers themselves to be upper middle class. I know people who relocated from Boise to Bay area, and were given 30-40% salary boosts for cost of living. Of course, at the time real estate was so cheap in Boise, it was commonly noted that it actually costs much more than 30-40% more to live in the…

Huh? A plumber or electrician can earn more than that even in rural areas, I wouldn't consider $60k to be upper middle class.

The key factor that you seem to be ignoring is ratio of the income to cost of living in that area. For the purposes of this I'll define upper middle class as 'can afford a house, a reasonably nice car, and can afford to go to pretty much any restaurant in town for special occasions'. Sure you can argue about details but that may well be true for a successful tradesman, especially one who runs his or her own business.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#149

Post by [deleted] »

lostapathy wrote: post #144
mcguire wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pardon me for appearing to be the spokes-person for market economics, but if "congestion, long commutes and sprawl is hurting the U.S. (and Californian) economy", wouldn't they be self-healing problems? Do "younger generations ... want to live and raise families in a city with reasonable housing costs" or do they want to accumulate as much of the easily-available money there a fast as possible? (The former is availab…

It probably is self-solving, but probably not over useful timescales. Further - it seems like the people truly making the decisions (i.e., the people deciding to keep company headquarters in SF rather than moving) are in a better economic position than the entry-level people who pay for those decisions in quality of life.

[deleted]

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#150

Post by [deleted] »

mcguire wrote: post #135
nshelly wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's just that many of the stakeholders in these areas such as long-time property owners in the westside of San Francisco and residents with rent control fearing gentrification would not benefit directly from new development. Their incentives simply aren't aligned with younger generations who want to live and raise families in a city with reasonable housing costs. To break this quandary we simply to need intervention…

Pardon me for appearing to be the spokes-person for market economics, but if "congestion, long commutes and sprawl is hurting the U.S. (and Californian) economy", wouldn't they be self-healing problems? Do "younger generations ... want to live and raise families in a city with reasonable housing costs" or do they want to accumulate as much of the easily-available money there a fast as possible? (The former is availab…

[deleted]
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