The Rust Belt Theory of Low-Cost High Culture
slate.com
slate.com
If you have to take a pay cut for a software job from $150k in Silicon Valley to 75-100k here, you still come out with a much higher standard of living and more left over to save for retirement. What baffles me is that more tech companies haven't set up shop in these areas. Around here we have Michigan State University, Grand Valley State University, Calvin College, U of M, and many other schools with solid engineering programs cranking out a steady supply of good to excellent engineers. I think that other rust belt cities have similarly good schools.
Everything you need to live is on sale from the perspective of an individual, and talent is on sale from the perspective of an employer. In Detroit there is much engineering talent available due to the presence of the automotive industry, and once again, everything in certain areas on the east side of the state is incredibly cheap. I guess the real question is what has failed for these cities - has leadership failed to attract industry, has the community failed to advertise the wonderful things happening in them (Grand Rapids, at least, is a good place to live), or are people just unwilling to put up with the winters?
I paid just over $200k for 2500 sqft on 3/4 of an acre that's within easy walking distance of four transit lines. It was amusing to hear my friends home for the holidays talking about their $2k+ rents for tiny apartments in NYC and similar locales. Yes, they have access to far more entertainment options than I do, but I have yet to get anywhere close to utilizing all of the options we have here in GR, either.
I also appreciate our easy access to water - I can remember once in my lifetime when we had any restrictions on water usage due to drought (lawn sprinkling was limited to alternating days, IIRC). Lake Michigan makes for a great reservoir.
As one currently seeking a new job, I've also been disappointed with the number of truly top-notch tech employers in the area; there are a few, but less than we should have IMHO, given the potential client base in the area. Part of it is a function of the labor market, I'd guess—the talent pool here is not as large as it could be. I think that this will continue to improve as GR continues to cement its reputation as a "millenial-friendly" city and the healthcare sector continues to explode.
This is slightly related; It may not be tomorrow, next week, or next decade, but eventually, there will come a time when climate change makes living in the west and/or southwest prohibitively (or increasingly) expensive. I'm not talking full abandonment often espoused by preppers, far from it. People will continue to live in the west, it's not going to disappear. However, it will become cheaper by orders of magnitude to live and do business elsewhere in the country.
The biggest reason for this is that fresh water will be at a high premium. They're already experiencing drought issues in the west and southwest due to climate change, and I suspect places like Las Vegas will be the first to turn into a ghost town.
Many people mistakenly believe that we can pump water around the country where its needed. While we have the technology, infrastructure and motivation to do it, we don't have the legal authority. You see, a few years ago, the Great Lake states and 2 Canadian Provinces signed the great lakes water compact. It's a (federally) legally binding contract which forbids exporting the water from the great lakes out of their respective states. In short, if you want cheap water, you're going to need to move back to the midwest/north east. I'm 1000% confident that the "rust belt" will rise again. It's only a matter of time.
Agriculture and inland cities like Las Vegas and Phoenix may very well be completely screwed though.
I ask that, because I'm of an age where I and my cohort get asked that question. The question always strikes me as conveniently indignant, because it's easier to trace the results backward than forward.
But mostly, I didn't even know I was doing anything. I thought I was doing reasonably good when I thought about it. I Got Milk (probably not so great an idea), I didn't eat grapes (for awhile), I recycled aluminum (for awhile), and ate from the food pyramid (terrible idea).
It's an interesting question. What are we fucking up today? I don't think it's global warming, that's probably my generation's fault from years ago, but we didn't know, we thought it was going to be global cooling if not nuclear winter.
I'm a carnivore, but I wouldn't be if I had to confront the meat industry directly. Witnessing the stuff that goes on even in the small/medium-size farms that some of my friends run turns my stomach, to say nothing of the videos of animal torture that wash up on the internet from time to time. And as a cognitive scientist, the knowledge that animals, even 'primitive' ones like rats, unequivocally have emotions makes it worse. I live in dissonance until I can work up the guts/strength of character to go vegetarian.
Generally speaking, I think a lot of questions about 'what are we fucking up' can be answered by rising living standards leading to an extension of empathy. The more secure you are in your own personal circumstances, the more you have mental room leftover to give a shit about others. In the not too recent past it was actually an okay thing to attempt to wipe out a civilization because they were inconveniencing you. Nasty stuff still happens, but it's generally behind the scenes. Nobody today thinks it's okay to butcher people just because they don't look like you. Even the most hardcore nutters in the States these days don't want to wipe out Mexicans or enslave black people. "Stay out of my neighborhood and leave my family alone" is about as bad as it gets in terms of position statements, which, considered in light of human history, is an astounding improvement.
So barring the cataclysm, I think empathy will continue to be extended, and three generations from now the idea of systematically torturing billions of chickens so we can have cheap buffalo wings will be officially appalling to the majority.
Three generations from now to majority vegetarian seems a little fast to me. In fact, at all or ever for the majority seems unlikely to me, but I'm not surprised by being surprised anymore.
I suppose we could consider the tobacco industry. Although we (the non-smokers in the US) aren't appalled when we encounter a smoker today, a lot of us are surprised. That only took a couple generations, I think. Maybe three. But changing habits for something you don't need for survival (tobacco) is probably a lot easier than changing habits for something that you do need for survival (food, the ultimate addiction).
I can't say I look forward to majority vegetarian, but I wouldn't mind it, even for myself (in theory :) My fear would be the horrid industrial food practices now observed in the meat industry transferring over in some way to veggies and fruit, as the companies involved "pivot."
By the way, will I be still able to eat insects? I think WRT to emotions, they're basically organic robots, no?
I would have agreed with you until very recently -- I lived in CA when the proposition to legalize gay marriage failed, just a couple of years ago. I figured we'd be waiting twenty years for that one. Similarly, in line with your point, I lived in NYC in the early 2000s when bars were smoker sanctuaries; even after smoking in bars was made illegal everybody was still doing it when I moved. Now it's impossible to imagine smoke in bars, and when I was last in Buenos Aires I couldn't believe people could still tolerate the practice. All of this has increased my sensitivity (or perhaps bias) to 'idea[s] whose time has come.'
"By the way, will I be still able to eat insects? I think WRT to emotions, they're basically organic robots, no?"
A lot could be said on the topic, but knowing what I know I am totally fine with eating insects. Can't really see that one changing.
And personally? I'm a vegetarian who bikes to work. The smug emissions around my house are lethal.
Did you mean smog emissions? Believe me, I don't feel smug in my 25 year old car, even if it does still pass emissions. :)
Speaking personally, it's the biting cold that starts about now and goes to about mid March that beats you down. But the weather's pretty good the other 9 months of the year.
I couldn't handle the lack of mountains or the winters, speaking just for myself.
> What baffles me is that more tech companies haven't set up shop in these areas.
Sounds like a good problem for an entrepreneur to come along and solve :-)
Also a lot of US states have start up unfriendly labour laws.
Uhm, obviously, the people who want to can go to San Francisco. That they haven't all cleared out indicates that some people - quite a few of them, infact - don't want to live there, perhaps because of considerations such as partners and kids.
Edit: also the NIH and at least one big biotech company do have branches in my small town which persist essentially because it is so easy to get people to want to live/stay here.
Also, it's easy as pie to form an LLC or corp -- it's a $50 fee and generally effective the same day you email the form and payment to the state. Annual renewal is $25.
Everything is not cheaper. Depending on what your comparing to, roughly 30-40% of things are cheaper. But 30-60% of your wages get lost at local employers. Depending on how you spend your money, you can easily come out ahead. But there's also a good chunk of people who won't.
Housing is cheaper. Land is cheaper. Parking is cheaper. Higher-end food / restaurants / entertainment is cheaper. This is all very true.
However, Gas is not significantly cheaper. Home / Medical insurance is not significantly cheaper. Food / groceries is not cheaper. Medical bills are not cheaper. Consumer products, electronics, automobiles are not any cheaper. Utilities are higher. Maintenance costs on houses and automobiles are much much higher. Your student loans actually jump (as a percentage of your monthly costs) out here.
Taxes might be higher in GR too, depending on where you come from. (I think it's higher than Seattle, for instance, which has no income tax, but higher sales tax than GR does)
Plus, the bad winters (which I don't mind, but I understand many people will).
You also loose nearly a lot of the benefits of real cities. For instance, Grand Rapids has no real public transit of any kind (we have a single commuter bus, that only goes from downtown to a run down part of town). To compare, GR has 25% of the population of Minneapolis, but less than 10% of the public transit that Minneapolis offers. You have to own at least one car in Grand Rapids.
The job market for technology is competitive, but not nearly as competitive as it is in real cities. So wages are lower than normal. More important than that, there's also there's very little room for improvement. If your happy just programming for twenty years straight -- GR is great. But if you'd like to get more autonomy, or lead projects, or similar, the opportunities for that here are very very small.
Do you want to someday start your own business? Watch out -- non-competes from your previous employer are still heavily enforced in Michigan, and unlike California, there's no state-level protection for you against this.
Do you have a spouse that works? Because while technology is hiring in Grand Rapids, most of the other industries are still significantly depressed. You'll see articles about how there's job growth in Grand Rapids, but if you read the fine print, you'll notice they're actually press releases from Manpower -- they're mostly just minimum-ish-wage temp jobs.
GR is still heavily religious and heavily conservative. For some people, this can be very off-putting. For instance, legalized discrimination almost became law last month - http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/12/05/1349672/-Michigan-H... . And I have literally been pressed about my religious affiliation in an interview for a programming position in Grand Rapids. There's enough open-minded companies that this won't be a complete roadblock in technology, but it cuts down on the available employers in a market that's already very small.
> has leadership failed to attract industry, has the community failed to advertise the wonderful things happening in them (Grand Rapids, at least, is a good place to live), or are people just unwilling to put up with the winters?
It's not that the community isn't pushing the wonderful things happening -- I think they are. Things like our extensive amount of meetup groups, or the work of GR Makers are wonderful additions to the community.
Most folks here just like to ignore all the things that still aren't happening. Even if we're doing the best we can in GR (and I believe we are -- I've seen lots of people doing amazing things) we're still one or two decades behind real cities.
People who aren't from here, are less skewed in their perception of where GR is at. They see things a lot more clearly than folks who are in Michigan.
You'll notice, in the article, they still work in DC. They're getting the best benefits of both worlds in their situation (cheaper living in Baltimore, good careers in DC).
You usually can't do that in Grand Rapids. You get most of the "small town" benefits, but you have to loose nearly all the "big city" benefits. (Unless you have remote work, but then you could choose from literally any small town to live in)
- - -
I'm not trying to trash GR. There's a lot of benefits to it. But there's a lot of drawbacks too -- it's not an obvious winning decision.
You have to weigh whether the drawbacks are worth the cost savings. And for a large number of people/companies, I suspect they aren't.
For me, it's not the winter, but the darkness. Those short winter days are a real drag. Even here in DC, the shorter days are depressing. I don't think I could deal with days that are shorter (even with upside of the longer days that come in summer).
The issues with working in software out here in the (so called) hinterlands is few-fold.
1. You can work for companies in the traditional rust belt industrial base, but companies like the Big3, Delphi, etc (I'm sure whirlpool and Amway are like this out in western Mich). seem to be just as happy outsourcing IT to the lowest bidder. And why wouldn't they? It's not their core business. GM is trying to change that but their job descriptions still mostly read like the kind that ask for 8+ years in a specific esoteric technology so they can claim they can't find anyone and will just go with an H1-B.
2. You can work for companies that aren't in any way related to the big names. Smaller software companies in the 50-500 employee range exist around the area. The thing is it can be kind of lonely working at one of these places because there's not a huge industry of producing software to sell out here. There aren't a whole lot of them. And the benefits are certainly not Silicon Valley, though the pay adjusted for the cost of living is still pretty good. This is the kind of place that I work in.
3. You can work for a company based elsewhere with a branch that's local. These kinds of jobs can be hard to find since companies don't usually advertise their secondary and tertiary locations. Plus working in the small branch of BIGCO(TM) may mean that you will have the choice of having to either find a new job or move when they close that branch down. There's also the issue that you may not be able to really grow professionally at a small branch office.
4. You can work remote. I am starting to perhaps explore this option.I think there's lots of promise here. But it's still hard to search and find remote jobs. And I'm not sure that remote employees are treated equal to in office ones in a lot of employers when it comes to career progression.
5. There is a local startup scene here. Both in Ann Arbor and Detroit with their own incubators, and I'm sure there are ones strewn about the rest of the rust belt. I think this also holds a lot of promise. But I'm not sure we're there just yet. I don't know if there's been any truly huge exits for startups native to the rust belt.
The linked-to article about Detroit is quite depressing:
> Officials at the city-owned museum, which, along with Detroit, has struggled financially for many years, had said as recently as two weeks ago that such a huge commitment — money to help the city pay its pensions — would be “completely unfeasible.” But in a statement on Wednesday the museum said that it had reached out to corporate leaders in Detroit and would commit to a multiyear effort that would “stretch our fund-raising abilities to their capacity” as a way to protect its collection.
What a particularly grotesque expression of intergenerational wealth transfer: taking art away from the young to pay for pensions for the old.
They are working to reduce the footprint of the city by literally plowing sections of it under, thereby reducing upkeep costs, and through this process will eventually end up with a physically smaller city that is financially feasible given the current taxbase (fun fact- you can buy a decent fixer upper house in Detroit for less than the cost of a used car, due to massive oversupply). Outside of Detroit proper, the surrounding areas have fared much better.
Just a few years ago the pension board, without oversight, continued to give out 13th checks (a bonus pension check for the 13th month of the year) in years that they happened to have above-average returns. Of course, the years with above-average returns were supposed to balance out the years with below-average returns.
Google Detroit 13th check for more on that one. Some groups sued to get the 13th check turned back on, arguing that the issuance of them, even though it happened without oversight, created an expectation of them and therefore a contractual obligation.
Random story about a visit there. Some time in the mid-90s I was in Baltimore to visit an old friend of mine. We went to the Walters, and as we were leaving we were walking down the street and randomly ran into a friend of hers, who she'd also known from college. Talking to him, it turned out I also knew him, from when he'd interviewed me over the phone for an article in Baltimore magazine about game designer Sid Meier (who was from Baltimore). I was just a fan of Meier's, but the friend had found me via Usenet, where I'd written about one of the Civ games, and then interviewed me about the impact of the Civ series on game-dom.
Still friends with that guy on Facebook today. He's still writing about tech stuff and taking great pics of graffiti in Brooklyn, where he lives now.
Fun thing about the internet, never know who you'll run into.
All London's major museums and galleries offer free entry.[1][2] The BBC Proms, a classical music festival in the Royal Albert Hall spanning almost three months each year between July and September, offer £5 tickets to every concert, if you're willing to promenade (stand).[3] Even tickets for reasonable seats can be obtained for less than £20, although popular concerts do book out well in advance.
The article author's assertion that high prices in "creative-class capitals" are driven by "deep-pocketed local elites and high-spending tourists," is clearly not true everywhere.
[1] http://www.timeout.com/london/museums/free-museums-in-london
So do be aware of how you support your local museum. In some cases, I might argue they're total losses and we'd do everyone involved a favor by letting it dissolve. Many museums are glorified corporate or robber baron legacy temples. Museums aren't necessarily money-driven either and each one is highly reflective of whom the board has appointed to lead it.
I'm not being anti-corporate, just making it clear that museums can be corporate-run and are highly variable in operations.
Disclosure: my wife is a museum collections curation professional
The 2011 Fringe sold 1,877,119 tickets for 41,689 performances of 2,542 shows, in 258 venues, over 25 days, for an average of more than 75,000 admissions and 1,360 performances per day. There were an estimated 21,192 performers, from 60 countries participating. There were 607 free shows.
607 free shows, not performances, separate shows!
The BBC Proms, [...] offer £5 tickets to every
concert, if you're willing to promenade (stand).
The BBC FAQ [1] says "you always have a good chance of getting in (although early queuing is advisable for the more popular concerts)" - does "early" mean 30 minutes before the concert starts, or 6 hours before? And how do you tell which concerts will need earlier queuing?
The last time I went though I think almost everyone in the queue got in. The person who sells the tickets in the queue can normally tell you what your chances of getting in are.
My advice is to arrive 30-45 minutes before the performance, with a blanket to sit on and some snacks and just have some alternative things to do in South Kensington in case you don't get in
One doesn't have to stand the entire time either. Plenty of people do sit around the edges, and almost everyone does during interval. The advice to bring a blanket to sit on is good.
If you're not sure get there a couple of hours early, have a look at the queue and if its non-existant pop down to the Science Museum for a bit, or The Natural History Museum, or the V&A, they're all within 5 minutes walk of the Albert Hall, all free, and all worth the trip by themselves.
I'm not really a classical music fan but I would certainly recommend going to the Proms at least once just for the experience.
Will be looking to go to the globe theatre in the summer as its just over the river to where I am working
Standard of living hasn't always been the best but, in the foreign cities I've now lived the longest in, I've often found the standard way better than anything I found in the US (a period spanning most of my life).
The main take-away for me has been that a higher/better standard of living in exchange for lesser pay is a game-changer. The kinds of things danjayh (currently the top comment) says make it totally worth it. Take the pay cut, make the change. You may surprise yourself.
Actually, "excellent" is the wrong adjective. "Competent" is all that is necessary. However, the non-profit world is often beset with incompetent employees at all levels, from your average worker all the way up to the top directors (well, usually B begets A). There is a problem in the field of people interpreting "we are a non-profit" as "we are a charity in all aspects, including hiring". There is definitely a feeling that only "heartless" (i.e. for-profit) companies worry about productivity.
Let's put it this way: if'n you ever had the notion to lie on your resume to get a job, look first to the non-profit world[1]. I've seen several instances at several locations of people with long-standing careers where they STILL aren't competent at the skills they lied about having on their resume when they got hired.
[1] that should be read as an indictment of the field, not a recommendation for lying on your resume.
Yes, you'll be hard-pressed to find a beer in DC for $3, that is for sure. It's not impossible, but Baltimore is definitely more of a beer drinking town than DC.
But all of the other talk on music and cultural events is way off. Many of the museums in DC are free, and there are far more of them. I would say the Hirshhorn Museum is the finest modern art museum I've ever been to, and it's completely free, with a wide, rotating selection.
For theater, the Kennedy Center has several shows for as little as $10, so I feel like you could probably beat the "7 shows for under $100" metric Mr. MacGillis has thrown down. But there are also many, much bigger events of much more variety as well. And that's just one theater, there are a lot of theaters in the DC area.
I also haven't been terribly impressed by Baltimore's housing offerings. They aren't that much cheaper, when you start considering the commuting costs, and it's starting to age poorly. Everyone I've known to buy a house in Baltimore has had to do major renovations. Even living in somewhere like Bethesda is not that much more expensive than Baltimore and you are still inside the DC metro area. But taking an hour on a good day to drive 20 to 30 miles to work (he says he and his wife still work in DC) is ludicrously unsustainable. There aren't any major road projects going in the north-south direction between DC and Philly, as far as I know. The traffic we have today is the best traffic we're ever going to have.
Where I think Baltimore succeeds far and away from DC is in neighborhood culture. You just don't have neighborhoods in most of DC and the suburbs. I mean, there are neighborhoods, but there is no identity to each neighborhood. It's all just bedrooms for the Pentagon and Arlington contractors. Why didn't he talk at all about that? The DC area is a monotone, corporatized town. You don't have a local bar. You don't have a local hangout. You don't have that place to go "where everybody knows your name". There is no local flavor because there are no locals.
I understand the point he's trying to make. I'd like to get out of DC eventually, because the costs are astronomical (I think it's the 5th most expensive area in the country). But it won't be to go to Baltimore. The way in which he's used Baltimore is not playing to Baltimore's strengths.