
Let’s relocate a bunch of government agencies to the Midwest - zonotope
http://www.vox.com/new-money/2016/12/9/13881712/move-government-to-midwest
======
rhexs
I've worked with a lot of ex-federal employees that left mostly due to cost of
living in DC (need a married couple both working with a federal salary to live
anywhere close to work) and not enjoying the incredible sprawl of the area.
Always fantasized about government jobs being relocated to less populated
areas. Would be a great chance to develop better planned cities or help
rejuvenate areas.

Just a fantasy though. About as likely as high-speed rail from SF to NY.

~~~
achamayou
It's been done before, check out Brasilia, Yamoussoukro, Naypyidaw more
recently.

I think it's fair to say that it's not been a massive success, and that
federal employees generally did/do everything they could to stay in the old
capital.

Aside from the fact that the entertainment and cultural options available tend
to be limited, distance from the rest of the family and friends, as well as
the perspective of being tied very strongly to a single employer are usually
unappealing.

You run a real risk of losing anyone senior/competent, and keeping only the
most junior of your staff, who have no other option but to relocate.

To stand any chance of success, I would think that the process needs to be
fairly gradual, with good transport connections with the historical centres of
activity.

~~~
maxerickson
DC itself is an example of a new planned city for a government capital. It
just happens to be pretty old (for a US city).

~~~
achamayou
Yes, but it was created from scratch rather than relocated from a pre-existing
well-established capital. It was also set up relatively close to the large
cities at that time, unlike the examples I've given, or a location deep in the
Midwest.

~~~
maxerickson
The majority of the Midwest is within 200 miles of a major population center.
And then any effort to establish more government offices would tend to choose
areas at least nearby existing centers.

(You can check this with chains like Cleveland-Detroit-Chicago-St Louis-Kansas
City; each interval is less than 300 miles)

I don't disagree that it would need to be an incremental process.

~~~
achamayou
It sounds like we agree completely then, 200/300 miles is just the kind of
distance that a high-speed train is perfect for.

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gibsjose
Although I don't think this is feasible or even necessarily the right thing to
do, I personally am dying to go back to the Midwest.

Coming from beautiful, friendly, cold Northern Michigan, I'd be ecstatic to
get out of the DC area, but good luck moving the other 10,000 NASA employees.

It's a different culture in the Midwest. Some good, some bad, but overall I
personally prefer the ability to have friendly conversations with strangers
back home than the (generalizing here) awkward, egotistical, self-interested
metropolitan area here. The first questions you are asked in DC are inevitably
"Where do you work?" and "What's your title?". That being said, DC is a
beautiful city and there's a lot of great things here.

But still, I'd much prefer to be camping on a beach on Lake Michigan...

~~~
hellofunk
I think you are really stereotyping here. I suspect your impressions are based
more on your social circles than the actual culture. If your circles are in
work related settings or with other transplants from outside D.C., the
experienice is a lot different than if interacting with D.C. natives. Likewise
for non midwesterners who move to the Midwest.

~~~
gibsjose
You certainly have a point, and I definitely was generalizing.

My social circles consist mostly of international folks who work in various
agencies and laboratories, and a few who work in private industry.

My biggest fault with DC (and most of the east coast to be honest) is just the
difficulty of starting a conversation with someone. It seems like a lot of
people walk around with their heads down here (either glued to a phone or the
pavement) so as to avoid making eye contact. Folks here also give me strange
looks when I say "sorry" all the time.

But hey, different cultures and different strokes. Not saying one is
objectively better, but I definitely know which one I prefer personally.

------
user5994461
Management 101: Go back to reading peopleware before taking (or suggesting)
stupid decisions.

All case studies ever done about relocating an entire company to far away have
_always_ gone bad.

People didn't follow. Of the few who did, some will realize next year that it
was a bad idea and leave. All your present and past employees will distrust
you because you forced them to abandon their life.

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oakesm9
It's on a different scale, but in the UK the BBC decided to move a lot of
their operations out of London. This was party done as a political move to
spread the jobs out from the south east of the UK to the north of England,
which is in a similar postindustrial situation to the Midwest (I presume).

They needed up moving most of the tech and R&D departments, children's
programming, and see news, sport, and radio shows.

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nightski
Judging by comments it fees like the HN crowd has an incredibly warped view of
the Midwest. It is amusing because it is a rather great place to live.

~~~
Chos89
A lot of snobbish comments here IMO, coming from Europe I'm getting an image
of the Midwest as a place where 99% people work in agriculture and don't know
how to read or write.

~~~
vinay427
It's a very misleading stereotype because where I grew up in the Midwest,
seemingly 80% of my classmates had a parent who was an engineer.

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GFK_of_xmaspast
The author suggests moving all 20k NIH employees to Cleveland, and seems to
think that all 20k will go along with this instead of finding different
employment that doesn't involve uprooting their families and moving to Ohio.

~~~
benbrown
The basic premise may be disruptive in a "Big Bang" move but could be
accomplished gradually by building new facilities and shifting project flow
over time.

Also, the DoD makes fast changes like this all the time as the result of BRAC.
Government employees don't tend to just up and change jobs - they are career
workers who like the stability and promise of a pension.

~~~
MistahKoala
Would the German experience of transitioning from Bonn to Berlin be of much
relevance here?

~~~
mschuster91
It's STILL not completed, over two and a half decades after the wall fell. The
amount of money wasted is incredible (7.5M € in 2016 in direct costs,
[http://www.merkur.de/politik/hendricks-stellt-bericht-zum-
bo...](http://www.merkur.de/politik/hendricks-stellt-bericht-zum-bonn-berlin-
umzug-vor-zr-6828708.html)), not to mention wasted time and the loss of
efficiency because teams and management are split across Germany.

~~~
MistahKoala
Really! I had no idea. I barely ever see a reference to Bonn in anything I
read about Germany these days; I'd formed the impression that everyone had
moved in the 90s.

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60654
Pretty weird to see a discussion of the economy in the midwest without a
single mention of Chicago - you know, the third largest city in the US... ;)

~~~
nrjdhsbsid
Just moved out of Chicago. Would not recommend. Besides the north corner and
downtown the city and state are broke poor and crime ridden.

Enjoy your insane taxes without much to show for it. Chicago is notorious for
corruption and the massive state budget routinely evaporates and screws
everyone

~~~
60654
FWIW, I moved back to Chicago from SF. Would totally recommend. World class
cultural institutions (SFBA can feel a little provencial at times), great
quality of life, super affordable for a city of its stature so starting a
business is much much cheaper here.

To each their own, but if you think taxes or politics are broken here, you've
clearly not experienced SF. :)

~~~
nrjdhsbsid
Didn't move there either for many of the same reasons :) . Nicer weather but
otherwise most of the same issues

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cmurf
Already exists. It's called the Denver Federal Center.

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

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madengr
Back in the early 90's the CIA had planned to move to WV; never happened
obviously.

~~~
greglindahl
Sen. Byrd moved a bunch of federal facilities to the part of WV closest to DC.
No entire departments, but significant back-office operations are there.
Here's an FBI example:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI_Criminal_Justice_Informati...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI_Criminal_Justice_Information_Services_Division)

Looks like Byrd was behind the attempted CIA move, here's how that ended:
[http://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal92-...](http://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal92-1108662)

~~~
kevindong
For context: the `Sen. Byrd` referred to above was the senator from West
Virginia from 1959 to 2010. Clearly, he was trying to get federal dollars for
his state.

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spaceisballer
I really do enjoy the DC area, however I would love to be back in the Chicago
area. Sure it would be a locality pay cut, but housing is so much more
affordable.

------
beansbeans
The supposed precedent for this is that DC survived sequestration?

The worst thing to happen during sequestration was a week or two of furloughs
-- the author is proposing the permanent removal of tens of thousands of jobs.

More than half of federal employees are over 45. So you're either forcing them
to uproot their families, or (more likely) forcing them to switch careers at
an age where that's not so easy.

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mtberatwork
There are government agencies and regional offices in the midwest already.
DFAS in Indianapolis, for example, is housed in one of the largest government
buildings outside of the Pentagon. [1]

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Finance_and_Accounting...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Finance_and_Accounting_Service)

------
saycheese
66% of Americans live within 100 miles of the border. It would make more sense
to move all the Americans living in the middle (sometimes middle of nowhere)
and focus on making the cost of living in major cities more affordable; 9 of
the top 10 cities are all within 100 miles of the border.

~~~
djrogers
Have you considered that some of the 34% of people living in 'the middle'
prefer to live there? I find it hard to believe you are seriously advocating
the forced relocation of citizens in the name of making 'more sense'...

~~~
saycheese
I'm suggestioning that American stop subsidizing vast unpopulated areas of its
country for the benefit of a subset of the country. Once the subsidies are
deverted, the areas will naturally depopulate.

~~~
madengr
Subsidize? Maybe those vastly unpopulated areas of the country ought to stop
feeding those 100 miles from the coast.

~~~
hiram112
I agree with you. I constantly hear (especially during election season) about
how the blue coastal states are basically 'subsidizing' the idiots from fly
over country - some statistics about tax payments and farm subsidies tossed
out to make the case.

In reality, the situation is reversed. The US largest export, by FAR, is
agriculture and meat, almost none of which comes from the coasts.

If you want to count GDP, do you really think that the trillions of dollars of
bank profits from lower Manhattan are really as important to the economy of
the US as the trillions of dollars of corn, soy beans, wheat, beef, pork, etc
that's produced in the Midwest? The former is just redistribution of wealth,
the latter is actually traded to other countries.

How bout all that energy produced in Oklahoma, North Dakota, Pennsylvania,
West Virginia, and Texas? Do you think the US would miss it more than they'd
miss the hundreds of billions of dollars spent in DC on mostly dubious
military spending or on the thousands of silicon valley companies finding
creative ways to serve tracking ads?

In reality, if the red states and blue states separated from each other, you'd
have one nation with massive real exportable wealth divided by a small
population, and another nation with mostly printed and worthless dollars
backed by non exportable services, divided by a huge amount of people and
their unfunded entitlements.

~~~
saycheese
Less than 1% of the GDP if you're being generous:
[https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/ag-and-food-
statistic...](https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/ag-and-food-statistics-
charting-the-essentials/ag-and-food-sectors-and-the-economy.aspx)

What am I missing?

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heysunshine123
So this guy wants just a little bit of a planned economy. Not too much, mind
you. Just the right amount.

Newsflash: If doing business gets easier, then more business will be done.
More business leads to more economic activity and more jobs.

It's not that complicated.

~~~
Tempest1981
But momentum is definitely factor. Once you have a successful city/region,
people flock there, often to the point of overcrowding. Businesses want to be
where the "talent" is.

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aaron695
So move jobs to a place where people don't want to be?

~~~
SiVal
You can move the jobs without moving all the people. There are a lot of people
outside of the DC Metro area who have the necessary qualifications for most
federal jobs.

When I was a kid, my father worked for a federal agency in an office that was
two hours from Washington and, for some reason, they moved all 400 jobs out of
our town to Philadelphia. The jobs all moved even though many of the people
didn't.

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aaronhoffman
How much of the money that would be re-injected into these communities was
taken via taxes in the first place?

~~~
pmorici
[https://mises.org/blog/which-states-rely-most-federal-
spendi...](https://mises.org/blog/which-states-rely-most-federal-spending)

The current situation is that 39 of the 50 states get back more in Federal
spending than they put in in Federal Taxes.

