
Urban-Rural Divide in American Politics - jgwil2
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/21/upshot/america-political-divide-urban-rural.html
======
bhupy
> In most European democracies, geography doesn’t matter in the same way.
> Legislators are elected from larger districts, each with multiple
> representatives, granting parties proportional power. If a party wins 50
> percent of the votes, it doesn’t matter much if those votes are evenly
> spread around or tightly clustered.

Comparisons with European democracies strike me as counterproductive; the US
is a federal republic, whereas most European democracies are unitary states.

I'd be interested in an analysis that compares the urban-rural divide in the
US with that of the EU, which are both similarly large, similarly
heterogenous, similarly Federal in nature, and (perhaps most importantly) have
similar structures of government.

The US's Senate looks less like the upper houses of most European democracies,
and a lot more like the EU's Council of the European Union[1], which is the
upper house of their (essentially) bicameral legislature. Like the Senate, it
grants equal representation to its states.

I'd also be interested in an analysis that compares the US with Switzerland,
whose structure similarly favors decentralization. The Swiss Council of
States[2] distributes its seats by state (canton), rather than by population.

[1] [https://europa.eu/european-union/about-eu/institutions-
bodie...](https://europa.eu/european-union/about-eu/institutions-
bodies/council-eu_en)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_States_(Switzerland...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_States_\(Switzerland\))

~~~
petschge
While the majority of countries in the European Union are not federation of
states, there is several that have exactly that structure: Austria, Belgium,
Germany, Denmark, Finland, France and the Netherlands. Austria, Germany,
Finland and France being republics, the other ones with a (ceremonial) monarch
as head of state.

~~~
bhupy
Sure, and the majority of States in the US are themselves federations of yet
smaller administrative subdivisions. 49 out of 50 US States have bicameral
legislatures.

The point still stands, the US looks less like Austria or Germany or Denmark,
and more like the EU, as a whole.

~~~
learc83
Bicameral legislatures don't imply federalism. In my state and the ones around
me, the upper house members don't represent counties, just slightly larger
districts than the lower house.

~~~
bhupy
You're right, my point was more that there exists some states that look like
Austria/Germany, and some states that look like Denmark. The existence of a
bicameral legislature was more a reference to the self-governing nature of the
states (which have executive branches, constitutions, and judiciaries).

Which is all to say: the US is more similar to the EU than it is to any one of
its individual member states.

------
Animats
"Rural sprawl" from a century or two ago is biting back. Much of the growth of
the US was driven by agriculture. The early version of the American dream was
finding cheap land and farming it. That filled much of a continent. Small
rural towns were built to support farmers nearby. Larger towns and cities
supported small towns.

Today US employment in agriculture, forestry, fishing, and hunting is only
1.5% of the US workforce.[1] That's all. A century ago it was around 50%. A
profitable farm today is a lot of land, a lot of machinery, and very few
people. The small towns and small cities built to support farming still exist
on the ground. But there are not enough farmers to support them. Which is why
they are dying.

Plus, of course, the remaining farmers use Wal-Mart, Amazon, UPS, and the
Internet to get many of the things they need. Much less need to drive into
town. Which is probably half boarded up anyway.

[1] [https://www.bls.gov/emp/tables/employment-by-major-
industry-...](https://www.bls.gov/emp/tables/employment-by-major-industry-
sector.htm)

~~~
bduerst
Much of the regression from agricultural professions happened in the early
20th century, due to automation from the combustion engine. The phenomenon
talked about in this article is much more recent, and more likely due to rural
areas being susceptible to polarization after not recovering after the
recession.

------
dwiel
While I do agree there are differences between urban and rural voters, this
analysis is still ignorant of quite a bit of subtlety due to the simplistic
red vs blue framing. The article does try to address this slightly, but they
fail to explain the fact that rural Democrats voted for Bernie Sanders in the
primary and urban voters for Hillary. This two axis red vs blue kind of
thinking puts a large amount of rural America in this theoretical "center".
This misunderstanding is what results in centrist Democrats in these places
not getting votes. The answer isn't shifting the "center" further right or
distancing from AOC.

~~~
cybersnowflake
"The answer isn't shifting the "center" further right or distancing from AOC."

Then I guess its a good thing for them that they're doing the exact opposite.

~~~
equalunique
I can understand why someone who watches Fox News, and/or listens to a lot of
Ben Shapiro / Lauren Southern / Charlie Kirk / Candace Owens, and/or is subbed
to r/The_Donald might believe this. (Sorry if I'm being presumptuous) These
sources push the narratives that "The Left" is trapped inside of their own
radicalizing echo chamber, but don't go far enough to acknowledge that "The
Right" is not immune to that problem either. What's dominating US political
discoure is the bases of both sides focusing their outrage on a small
percentage of the other. Both sides say that the other is becoming more
radical every day. When it comes to the Democrats, however, the vast majority
of candidates vying for the nomination are really the "centrist" (translation:
"swampy") types.

~~~
cybersnowflake
You're totally right. I miss the transgender bathroom promoting
microaggression concerned Republicans from 50 years ago.

------
FiatLuxDave
People vote their wallets, and we have two very different economies in America
currently.

We are in a period of history with a lot of similarities to the gilded age,
and one of the big issues of that time was "Free Silver":
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_silver](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_silver).
Back then, there was desire by the mostly-rural side to allow a silver-based
monetary standard. This would effectively increase inflation.

Today, we see significant inflation disparities between the big coastal cities
like NY and SF and the rest of the country. Essentially, the fed rate is too
low to have low inflation in the cities and too high for economic growth in
the rest of the country. This becomes a self-reinforcing effect, as the
relative cost of borrowing is lower in the cities. So, the city and the
country are just not going to agree about what to do economically.

~~~
war1025
Your last paragraph is very similar to what I've read is going on in the
European Union with the Euro. (I don't remember what book I read it in)

Basically their argument was that it works in America because the federal
government is strong enough to redistribute wealth to places that can't keep
up. In Europe the federal government is weak, so the southern countries have
an economy they can't keep up with.

I don't remember the specifics, but that was the gist of it.

~~~
jgwil2
I've read that another problem is that unlike in the US with its relative
cultural homogeneity, people in Europe are less willing to move where jobs
are. The result is less efficient population distribution. EDIT: fixed typo.

~~~
aeternus
That may not be entirely desirable.

In the US that ability to move where the jobs are is creating a concentration
of prosperity in certain cities. Often those with above average skills are
able to move, leaving the others behind.

This leads to overcrowding in cities like NY and SF. Layer in economies of
scale, increased competition, and better talent pools, and it becomes
increasingly difficult for other areas to compete. Creates a kind of feedback
loop which increases the geographical wealth disparity.

The only thing that seems to balance that is the increase in cost-of-living in
those areas.

------
40acres
Call me a big city liberal but in my view small states have way too much power
and Congressional reform is needed to balance it out. If demographics stay on
trend eventually we'll have something like 70% of Senate seats going to 30% of
the population. The arbitrary limit of 435 House of Representative seats is
not enough to accurately model the population growth of this country and
ensure that the ratio of representative : constituent is feasible. We cannot
keep operating on a constitution built for a completely different country and
expect to grow with the challenges of the 21st century.

~~~
rayiner
Or we need to split up the US into blocks that have less divergent values. The
urban rural divide within Maryland is present but manageable. The divide
between urban Maryland and rural Alabama is unmanageable.

~~~
petschge
What will stop rural Alabama from devolving into a third word country? Or do
you still expect the successful urban blocks to pay for the backwaters blocks,
but now without any input into their political structure?

~~~
rayiner
Fun fact: Alabamans are richer than most Western Europeans. But that aside,
I’m proposing letting Alabamans govern Alabama and Marylanders govern
Maryland. The states wouldn’t subsidize each other or have input into the laws
governing each other’s internal politics. Maybe there would be a military
coalition like NATO.

~~~
noobermin
To be honest, apart from huffing and puffing, I really find there isn't really
any motivation for an actual divide of the country at the end of the day.
Also, the divide is often within states, not just amongst the states, just
look at California.

~~~
bin0
I would argue reducing federal control is step one. Local governments may want
to take more power instead. Take Texas: many cities have become stark-blue due
to immigration from south of the border. If they wish to pass certain
policies, let them. If the rural areas wish to pass different policies, let
them.

America was consciously designed with these divisions in mind. By federalizing
the minimum number of things, we reduce the number of things on which we must
agree.

~~~
dragonwriter
> America was consciously designed with these divisions in mind. By
> federalizing the minimum number of things

If we are going to fetishize the decisions of the architects of the design of
our government (which several of them would be appalled by), we should at
least understand them: the Constitution (even in its original form, though the
subsequent evolution also reflects this) is an embodiment of the idea that the
correct amount of federalization at time _n+1_ may be significantly greater
than seemed (and perhaps even was) ideal at time _n_ , rather than the idea
that federalization should be aggressively minimized. (Radical minimization of
the federal power was the design of the Articles of Confederation and the
impetus for the revision effort that produced the Constitution as a fairly
strong rejection of that approach.)

~~~
bin0
> the correct amount of federalization... may be significantly greater than
> seemed

Wrong. This is why the Constitution enumerates a few, very specific powers and
says that the rest are reserved to the states and to the people.

> Radical minimization of the federal power was the design of the Articles of
> Confederation

Wrong. Congress couldn't even regulate foreign trade; there was _no federal
power_. When the federal government cannot represent the nation as a whole to
foreign powers, there is no true federal government. We moved to a
Constitution with minimum federal power because that solution didn't work.

------
ergothus
I was talking with a coworker from India at lunch about 7 years ago. He talked
about the extreme urban/rural divide in his country - to the point that movies
were made for different audiences - and asked about it here in the US. I said
how rural communities tended to be more conservative and urban ones more
liberal, but in terms of mass-media and entertainment none of those
differences appeared to be very significant.

Either I was naive or I broke the universe, because ever since then it seems
like everything wants to prove me wrong on this point. I browse headlines from
many publications, and I can often see a divide between what is being covered.
Just today I read that PBS had a "Arthur" episode with a gay marriage and
Alabama isn't airing it.

~~~
learc83
I live on the edge of the divide, and there are differences, but everyone
farther out from the city than me still sees the Avengers just like everyone
in the city does. The rednecks driving jacked up trucks are just as likely to
listen to rap as they are to country. If you stop at a red light in the city
on a nice day, you're still likely to hear someone singing about pickup trucks
and beer from the car next to you. And 95+% of Americans bought something from
Walmart last year.

I remember visiting relatives on the other side of the country in Burbank as a
kid, and if anything the culture is far more homogeneous than it was then.

------
SolaceQuantum
I belive FiveThirtyEight covered disparate living areas between democrats and
republicans within city lines, also [0]...

There were several projected theories for this, although I don't believe any
were provided with significant evidence/links.

0\. [https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/republicans-
democrats-c...](https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/republicans-democrats-
cities/)

------
jweir
Here in Oregon the Democrats are further working to create a divide.

Oregon allows electronic signatures for ballot measures and petitions - which
benefits rural areas and marginalized neighborhoods. But the Democrats are
going to outlaw this for the next four years.

The reason is to avoid a ballot measure on a new tax increase which the public
might not approve.

Democrats have a super majority in Oregon.

[https://www.wweek.com/news/2019/05/20/as-critics-of-the-
new-...](https://www.wweek.com/news/2019/05/20/as-critics-of-the-new-
corporate-tax-increase-ponder-referring-it-to-voters-democrats-seek-to-hinder-
signature-gathering/)

~~~
AcerbicZero
Having recently left Portland for Seattle, its pretty easy to see how
precarious the situation is out here. Oregon seemed to do a better job of
keeping "Portland" laws in Portland, whereas Seattle is doing its legal work
at the state level and forcing it on down to everyone.

If Oregon isn't careful they'll end up with Portland running the entire state,
and the consequences of that are pretty obvious.

------
crooked-v
I've seen some studies that indicate this is less about regions and more about
exposure to high population densities and everything that goes with it, though
I can't find the links now.

~~~
eropple
I've heard the same, and Ezra Klein recently had on an interesting guest, Will
Wilkinson from the Niskanen Center, who discussed political sorting and
population density in some detail.

[https://cms.megaphone.fm/channel/theezrakleinshow?selected=V...](https://cms.megaphone.fm/channel/theezrakleinshow?selected=VMP8633970355)

------
AcerbicZero
The last thing we need is another 2D way of looking at politics. Left/Right
Red/Blue Urban/Rural may all be useful* ways of visualizing generalities about
data, but without a holistic approach obvious things get missed, and every
other person is a corner case. A 2 axis chart is a good start, but even that
lacks the nuance to really nail down something as complicated as a multi-
tiered federal republics' politics.

Right now there are more layers of bureaucracy between an individual and true
political power than ever before. At the same time, the emotional state of
those individuals has never been more important to the political class. Using
legislation as a weapon against your political enemies based not on principal,
but emotional will of your base (or the emotional reaction of your opponents,
etc) is likely to end badly for everyone.

------
drak0n1c
Australia is experiencing the same trend. Quillette has an interesting
analysis of the trend - both sides have their own empathy deficits, but when
the deficit pits the party against electorally significant populations, losses
inevitably follow. This phenomenon exists regardless of whether "electoral
significance" stems from direct democracy (popular votes) or republic
(electoral college, region-based voting).

[https://quillette.com/2019/05/20/at-australian-ballot-
boxes-...](https://quillette.com/2019/05/20/at-australian-ballot-boxes-the-
lefts-empathy-deficit-came-home-to-roost/)

------
sneakernets
This is very simple:

One side wanted a more agrarian nation with hard manual labor (The Protestant
work ethic)to prove self worth, while the other side wanted a more industrial
nation with all the automation and efficiency that went with it, which in turn
fueled the arts and sciences.

There may be some overlap, but these divisions are nearly as old as the nation
itself.

------
drinane
This is the red v. blue dichotomy... this is why I think they need to admin
gubment at another split level... urban rule set V rural rule set

~~~
MegaButts
I am not a lawyer or a policy expert, but I do not understand how this would
work. Can you elaborate?

~~~
thrower123
To some extent, I think we could use some redrawing of the borders and
reallocation of the states to better map to actual metro regions and group
areas that have common interests together. It'd be a bit ticklish to get
right, and leave everything functional, but there are some wicked schisms
between areas of our historical states, and other places that are spliced up
into multiple states that probably should be joined together.. It'll never
happen, but it's a fun thought experiment.

I don't think things are going to get better on this front by themselves, as
the economy seems to be centralizing more and more, such that even the second
and third rate regional cities are hollowed out and population and money
clusters ever tighter. It's already evident that the urban areas can throw
their weight around and vote in pretty much whatever they want in a lot of
places, and the rest of the state has to mobilize completely to defeat them.
I'm from Maine originally, and it's been a constant battle lately to keep the
Portland metro area from passing ballot initiatives that make sense in their
little neck of the woods, but are insane when you get off the I-95 corridor.

~~~
cybersnowflake
The best answer is to decentralize and devolve power as much as feasible. That
way, everybody can go their own way as much as possible. Of course some
people/groups don't like that and want to impose their way of doing things
everywhere.

~~~
Retra
All groups do that. Even you're doing that with your comment right here.
"Everybody should do X." That's what humans do with our shared moral
languages. It is inevitable.

But you probably think it's different when you're proposing a decentralization
rule like this, because it is about empowering people, not oppressing people.
Of course, you'll empower people who want to oppress people, but you'll have
shirked any responsibility for actual consequences, so it's all ok, isn't it?
You're not advocating for your country to be divided and conquered, just
divided. So you won't be responsible for the inevitable conquering that occurs
afterward.

You have solved the problem of personal responsibility, but social
responsibility still exists, and you haven't proposed anything to manage it.

~~~
iamnothere
Different people have different values, and one person's tolerance is
another's oppression. (The more authoritarian sides of the Left and Right each
see opponents as "too tolerant" of different things.)

Recent studies have suggested that there may be some fundamental cognitive
factors that control political alignment. They may even be genetic. If this
turns out to be true, are you still OK with forcing the other side to live by
your "correct" rules? Isn't that just tribalism and conquest?

~~~
Retra
Just because people have different values does not mean we don't share values,
and more importantly, that we don't share reality. The things that I am
intolerant toward are a disregard for the facts, a disregard for demonstrated
relevance, and a disregard for the legitimacy of expertise and aggregate
authority.

>Isn't that just tribalism and conquest?

I mean, if you're saying that this conflict is an integral part of human
nature, then you're not asking me to change my mind; you're giving me a
justification for why I don't have to. That knife cuts both ways.

This is always the problem I have when trying to reason about American
conservatism; if God gave you your riches, then if you lose them, attribute it
to God. If might makes right, then I am not wrong to deny it so long as that
denial leads to victory. Etc.. There's nothing there to tell me I'm _wrong_ ,
only that people _disagree_. So wrongness has to be a kind of aggregate
disagreement, and that leads to liberalism. Both roads lead to liberalism.

~~~
iamnothere
> Just because people have different values does not mean we don't share
> values, and more importantly, that we don't share reality. The things that I
> am intolerant toward are a disregard for the facts, a disregard for
> demonstrated relevance, and a disregard for the legitimacy of expertise and
> aggregate authority.

We may share the same physical reality, but many facets of reality that are
critical to human experience may not be shared. In particular, and I am aware
that this contradicts what you've just said, _values_ seem to be very
different across cultural boundaries. There are some general shared values
that are often shared across cultures, but these shared values are also not
the values that people care most about on a day-to-day basis. (Not too many
people out there protesting murder, theft, etc in any organized sense.)

The values that people seem to care most about are the ones that distinguish
them from other tribes. These values are often more important to people than
basic needs. People will starve themselves over values, they will kill
themselves over values. You can say they shouldn't. Obviously they disagree!

> I mean, if you're saying that this conflict is an integral part of human
> nature, then you're not asking me to change my mind; you're giving me a
> justification for why I don't have to.

It is an integral part of human nature. I'm not sure it can be "solved"
without creating a truly oppressive superstate and permanently reducing human
genetic diversity. Conflict is inherent to being alive; the best you can do is
keep it on a slow boil.

~~~
Retra
You keep framing this conflict as though it is a purely political/value-based
disagreement. It is not. When somebody denies basic facts about the world or
the validity of rational methods and/or scientific reasoning, you are not
simply disagreeing with me in a political sense, you are advocating for a
world that is entirely arbitrary. This is what I'm saying is the double-edged
knife: _at best_ , if such people get their way, they have only provided
others the justification to be cruel to them. They have not provided any
argument that their opponents are _wrong_.

I don't deny anybody their experiences. If you trust someone who swears upon a
bible, I will tell you that you are gullible, and point out that this activity
neither aids in the service of justice nor pays due consideration to our
mutual respect for freedom of religion. But if you say "homosexuality is a
choice", you are marginalizing people's fundamental perceptions. This is not
merely a difference in values, it is deception and oppression that supports
one's _arbitrary_ values, and if anyone else did the same thing, they'd be in
a position to oppress and marginalize just the same.

This conflict is not simply about political disagreement -- it is about the
denial of the _validity_ of basic reasoning methods solely on the basis that
the outcome is _personally_ inconvenient.

~~~
iamnothere
> You keep framing this conflict as though it is a purely political/value-
> based disagreement. It is not. When somebody denies basic facts about the
> world or the validity of rational methods and/or scientific reasoning, you
> are not simply disagreeing with me in a political sense, you are advocating
> for a world that is entirely arbitrary.

Isn't that a position based on its own set of values, though? And your
position would clearly be based on a different set of values.

> I don't deny anybody their experiences. If you trust someone who swears upon
> a bible, I will tell you that you are gullible, and point out that this
> activity neither aids in the service of justice nor pays due consideration
> to our mutual respect for freedom of religion.

Followed immediately by

> But if you say "homosexuality is a choice", you are _marginalizing people 's
> fundamental perceptions_.

[Emphasis added]

Look, there's nothing wrong with having values and staking out a firm position
based on those values. Claiming that one's own values-based position is
distinct and special and is fundamentally _different_ than other values-based
positions, however, is merely dogma.

~~~
Retra
And if everything is dogma, then we must simply fight to the death. I am
arguing it is _not_ , precisely because that is not the outcome I want to
occur. You can disagree -- but you do not improve anything by doing so.

As I've been saying, if you argue that our positions are merely equal, you do
_not_ change my mind, you simply cause me to stop trying to justify my
position. (You've justified it for me!) That is unacceptable, and betrays the
entire reason we're talking about this.

~~~
iamnothere
> And if everything is dogma, then we must simply fight to the death.

Only if everyone feels they have to "win".

It is possible to force a draw or stalemate, in perpetuity. That's what I'm
arguing for. The only alternative is to force your opponents to comply,
globally, through overwhelming oppression.

~~~
Retra
Well, that's just a different set of values.

~~~
iamnothere
Yep, it's my personal set of values and it's what I contribute towards. Others
can and do disagree, I'm aware of that.

