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Comment by bluGill | Hacker News Reader

Until urban centers decide to become more family friendly this will continue. Bad inner city schools, traffic, and no wonder families want to get away.

There are plenty of counter examples (mostly Asia). It isn't like this cannot be fixed, but without families nobody as arguing for family friendly things and so people move out when the kids come.

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Until urban centers decide to become more family friendly this will continue. Bad inner city schools, traffic.

Chicken, egg; The family that moves to the suburbs (and commutes) IS the traffic and is the economic and brain drain from the city.

There was a 30 year shift into the cities, so family-friendliness can't explain the trend. This is mostly likely a consequence of the virus.

I agree its a recent phenomenon but it's not just the virus. I was born in raised in the city. I remember the bad old days. I see what's happening with the far left and their want to gut the NYPD and I foresee it backsliding into the bad old days. Crime is already ticking up but it's too early to point at that and say it's happening. It's a longer term projection I am making.

It will unfortunately get worse with all the people and money pulling out of downtown if this continues.

Probably more like 20 years. Boston, for example, was still losing population until the late 90s. (And the last major tech employer at the time also left during the 90s.)

Demographically, you were mostly seeing college-educated young people make up the net inflow over the past 20 years. I suspect that layered over the virus effects, you probably had some demographics who were on the edge of moving anyway--which is one reason that so many of them pulled the trigger fairly quickly.

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