I don’t understand the point of these posts - at this point we all understand that the economy has changed in the last 60+ years and even changed dramatically in 2000, 2008, and 2019 in rapid succession.
I’ve seen a lot of danger in belaboring these sorts of point, often sowing the seeds of hopelessness, generational dissent (which ultimately isn’t productive), and it never seems to come with a meaningful call to action or what better advice would be.
Which is concerning given the rising rates of depression, anxiety, and suicide attempts in younger generations vs previous.
And none of these people want to consider moving to a city where homes are nuch cheaper. No. They cluster all around LA, SF, NYC, and go online to post how unfair it is.
I mean this is just ignoring where a majority of jobs are. I moved out of one of the cities you listed and it took 6 months to find a job to move back to the big city in my state. I had to completely change industries. The competition is 2 other companies in my new industry otherwise I’d have to move (again) for better opportunities.
My brother lives in one of the cities you listed. He wants to move home but again there are 3-4 companies with roles in his industry. He ended up taking a role with one of those companies in his current city and is going to request a transfer in a yr or 2 because there were no openings in this city.
“These people” are there working because that’s where the jobs are. A very small percentage are okay being poor to live in those areas just because. We saw this when remote work was popular in Covid. A lot of small towns complained that city folk with remotes jobs were moving to their towns and driving up prices. My home town still complains about this.
Same way you go on any subreddit of a southern state where somebody posts about moving there. There are always comments about it being full, at capacity or jokes to move somewhere else.
You can live 30 miles from San Francisco and own a condo for under $400k
You can live 30 miles from Northern Virginia and own a single family home in Jefferson County for under $300k
There are plenty of places to live and own your own home if you are willing to make a commute for work without having to live in the city proper.
How long is that commute for either of those places (I don’t know, I’m genuinely asking)?
It wouldn’t matter if Remote work was still the norm but that’s no longer the case so people are naturally going to gravitate to areas that are under an hour commute (one way). I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect anybody to live over an hour (1 way) commute from the hub of jobs in their area.
WV to NOVA you can do under an hour if you are going to Loudoun County, if you are going to Fairfax County it will be an hour or a little over if you work near Chantilly or Reston... Tysons would probably be worth it if the job paid enough, that would be around 1hr15min. Anything past that would suck, you wouldn't want to work in Arlington and live in WV.
Concord CA to SF you can take the Concord BART yellow train and be in the city in under an hour.
It’s a lot easier to live on a full time McDonald’s salary in Omaha or Tulsa than it is San Fran or LA. You can make $20-25 an hour as a fork lift driver in those cities and afford to live. Can you do that in the big cities you are talking about?
I’m not disputing that but how many forklift drivers do you think are needed in Omaha compared to the Port Newark and Port Jersey-Port Authority or Port of LA?
It’s also incredibly telling that you took my comment and used McDonalds/hourly work as a response instead of salary positions.
Most people on here have shit jobs so they complain nonstop. If you are making 80k as a financial analyst you can find that job in much lower cost of living areas. I’m in an infrastructure engineer who makes 140k/yr in a MCOL medium city. I’d make 175-185k for an equivalent job in SF. I like the weather but not more than my badass house I live in now
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u/draconicmonkey 20h ago
I don’t understand the point of these posts - at this point we all understand that the economy has changed in the last 60+ years and even changed dramatically in 2000, 2008, and 2019 in rapid succession.
I’ve seen a lot of danger in belaboring these sorts of point, often sowing the seeds of hopelessness, generational dissent (which ultimately isn’t productive), and it never seems to come with a meaningful call to action or what better advice would be.
Which is concerning given the rising rates of depression, anxiety, and suicide attempts in younger generations vs previous.