
The large parts of America left behind by today's economy - rndmize
https://www.axios.com/americas-fractured-economic-well-being-2488460340.html?utm_medium=linkshare&utm_campaign=organic
======
jroseattle
This is nothing new, and it didn't happen overnight. The prosperous-vs-
declining areas have been moving in that direction for at least a generation.
Perhaps more magnified/pronounced in one area vs another, but on the whole
this has been the trend for as long as I can recall.

Nonetheless, a couple of observations:

\- Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska: regional chunks of
comfortable/prosperous areas compared to the rhetoric espoused during the 2016
election campaign. I expected these to look _much_ worse.

\- The map looks a lot like the federal distribution of taxes per dollar
contributed:
[https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vby1dJlsXmM/VtkJnusdGXI/AAAAAAAAJ...](https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vby1dJlsXmM/VtkJnusdGXI/AAAAAAAAJqk/EQXnfNLOqT0/s1600/fed_spending_dollar.JPG)

\- "A large portion of the country..." is actually "a large _geo-graphic_
portion of the country"

~~~
uoaei
Dismissing it offhand as "nothing new" is a little disingenuous.

There may have always been this momentum but it didn't hit critical levels
until lately, and that combined with the rise of globalism (whether that
really is the culprit or not) has left a lot of people feeling down,
literally, in the dumps. This information adds another facet to our
understanding of today's political stage and it's worth paying attention to so
we can better resolve it.

~~~
jroseattle
> "Lately"

I'm originally from Missouri and would say it hit critical level over 10 years
ago. The state has been in decline in terms of personal income, GDP growth,
and a host of other economic indicators since 2009.

This includes the metro areas of KC and STL, who represent the lion's share of
the upside of growth numbers. Take those away, and the rural areas are
disastrous -- just as the chart shows. Stark differences when viewed on a
county basis, but it's been on this trend for a long time.

I can't speak to the rest of the country, though. As always, your mileage may
vary.

------
pm90
I don't really see how this can be remedied, besides there being a revival of
traditional industries (unlikely) or current workers retraining in massive
numbers (again, unlikely). It almost seems like this is a post-industrial
great migration, where people from distressed areas would need to move to the
few areas that are thriving.

It doesn't help that the republican dominated political parties in many of the
distressed states are more concerned with cutting taxes on the rich (Kansas)
or trying to pass ridiculous and unnecessary laws (bathroom bills in NC, Texas
etc). This has got to stop.

Accepting Medicaid expansion, as I see it, is probably one way to immediately
kickstart many of these distressed states. The federal money that comes in
might just help create jobs in the healthcare sector (or fund existing ones
better) that might somewhat mitigate the affects of economic duress. Not to
mention better healthcare for the people.

~~~
deusofnull
I think this reality has to be frankly talked about. If liberal tax policies
are so destructive to business and innovation, why are the most successful
counties often times (as shown in this map) run by more liberal / progressive
/ dare I say socialistic governments? People often criticize this line of
inquiry and call it divisive or inappropriate or callous, but I cannot see how
it is unrelated nonetheless.

Tax breaks, gender discriminative bathroom laws, climate protection
deregulation, and "appeals to traditional values" do not seem to be improving
the lives of these people very much.

~~~
thephyber
I personally think that the issue is orthogonal, but correlated.

Liberal policies in the US are highly correlated with high population density.
Even in red states, the cities are mostly outposts of blue politics; even in
California, the rural landscapes are dominated by red politics.

Communities seem a bit like ponzi schemes, or are at least creatures of
inertia. If the community is growing, it exudes promise and hope and more
people are interested in moving there. Growth leads to job openings, which
leads to more growth. The inverse is dire. When cities go bankrupt or when
rural areas lose residents faster than they replenish them, it becomes a
downward spiral and a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Rural areas don't sustain themselves. Urban or "hip" suburban areas have a
much better chance at sustaining. College towns constantly have fresh blood
(so long as the college stays out of bankruptcy).

I think cities thrive _despite_ the friction created by more socially liberal
policies and higher taxation. It's far easier to pivot your business and there
are more serendipitous events in densely populated areas with highly educated
people. I suspect people would prefer to move to a place with a reasonable
social safety net as religious institutions lose the prestige they once had in
the US. Perhaps in liberal areas people don't have to fear the social
darwinism of the similar situation in a state+county with no funds to help the
poor/homeless.

The obvious counter-example to "liberal policy places thrive" is Detroit.
Detroit had very liberal policies in a state with very strong labor laws.
After car manufacturers moved their manufacturing to cheaper labor areas (the
US south and other countries), Detroit's population collapsed to less than 50%
of it's peak.

~~~
alphonsegaston
The story of Detroit is far more complicated than what you describe,
especially when you choose to gloss over decades of racist violence and
humiliation that preceded its collapse.

And its economic collapse was also the product of broader right-wing attack on
the political/economic power of working class people in the US. Under the
guise of “free trade,” they were forced to compete with labor of poorer
countries, while the wealthy and their administrators were largely exempt from
the same pressures.

------
no_wizard
Yet again, Minnesota bucks the trend. Wonder why they keep doing so well while
the rest of the middle states flounder.

By bucking the trend I mean that compared to most other states it appears to
be very comfortable and prosperous across the state in most but not all
counties at least according to this map. I’ve seen similar findings in New
Yorker and in the NYT too.

Edit: is there something MN is doing that we could all learn from? They
weren’t apart of the North Dakota oil boom really so I don’t think it’s that.

~~~
alphonsegaston
They also have a long-tradition of left-wing politics, rooted in a sense of
“Midwestern decency.”

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Minnesota](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Minnesota)

~~~
no_wizard
It appears they have one of the highest education rates in the country too
"Education in Minnesota" on @Wikipedia:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Minnesota?wprov...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Minnesota?wprov=sfti1)

------
jbob2000
>This isn't a Republican or Democratic problem. At every level of government,
both parties represent distressed areas. But the economic fortunes of the
haves and have-nots have only helped to widen the political chasm between
them, and it has yet to be addressed by substantial policy proposals on either
side of the aisle.

I don't understand how the article can claim this when their own graphic at
the top of the page shows that the majority of distressed communities are in
Republican-dominant areas.

~~~
Clubber
This is an honest question and not intended to be snarky, but what have
Democrats done to improve job scarcity in middle America? I'm not insinuating
that the GOP has done anything either.

~~~
Florin_Andrei
You can't force change on people who distrust you and all your ideas.

~~~
krapp
Arguably, that is exactly what governments are for.

------
bhewes
In Oklahoma the Internet has shown up in the rural areas. Oklahoma is 30%
rural which amounts to 1.3M people who don't live in any kind of town. Rural
Oklahoma is rapidly changing so fast many of the people are having a hard time
understanding the changes. It is not that it is falling behind, but
generations old ways of order became obsolete or massively challenged
overnight. This community is being asked to catch up on multiple decades of
urban cultural in a few years. So they vote to slow it down.

The Urban-Rural divide is real. Massive investments in Rural Oklahoma and
Rural America are needed. Something I hope to promote if and when I enter the
Oklahoma State House.

------
bglazer
From the article: "It's not likely to fix itself," said EIG co-founder Steve
Glickman. "Entrepreneurs are everywhere, but capital flows are really isolated
and captured in a handful of places."

From YC's FAQ section:

 __Location __Can we do it without moving to where you are?

-Sorry, no. We tried this once, and by Demo Day that startup was way behind the rest. What we do, we have to do in person. We would not be doing a startup a favor by not making them move.

I've said this before, but the conservatism of YC regarding location is
astounding when considering the diversity that YC accepts in virtually all
other facets of its operation.

They'll invest in a file sharing app and a nuclear reactor company in the same
batch, but apparently investing outside the Bay Area is just too hard.

~~~
emerged
Sorry, if you don't move to SF, attend burning man regularly (and use the
Experience to completely define yourself from then on) and disavow any right-
leaning views, you have no right to participate in the startup world. Well,
that's how it feels as someone living in the midwest who has tried to be a
part of startups.

I lived in California for over a decade and the entire startup thing was
almost too easy to participate in. Money thrown all over the place, easy to
find new startups or participate in your own. But god help you if you don't
feel like living in California.

------
treebeard901
As someone who has lived in the southern United States for over 30 years I can
say with confidence that America did not leave these people behind... They
left themselves behind.

~~~
bglazer
This is such a profoundly useless sentiment. What's the point of spreading the
"Southerners are backwards" meme except to win some feeling of self-satisfied
collective superiority?

You're ignoring the fact that investment has been plainly beneficial
everywhere in the south. From land grant universities and TVA electrification
to NASA in Huntsville and St Jude in Memphis, it's pretty clear that
southerners don't just choose to "leave themselves behind" when given
resources.

~~~
zzalpha
I think the point is they frequently vote against their own interests. For
just one example, one need only look at the Kansas experiment to see what
unchecked conservative tax policy can do to a state.

