Off topic, but, I wonder if we will see some big demographic changes in the years ahead, with big cities seeing big declines.
With critical masses of people who work in gleaming downtown office buildings having worked at home due to the virus, and businesses struggling to pay eye popping rents for office space in those office buildings, will many businesses move out of the cities?
And their employees, who see that they can do their work from places other than the downtown office building, seek to move to distant suburbs or small towns, to escape high living costs, AND to escape increasing crime and unrest in the big cities????
Will some people move away from big cities, and get a lower paying job in some small town area, just to escape the social and criminal unrest in cities?
I am not sure if each city can be held the same. In Boston, two areas that thrive are the medical fields and college ed. The former is plentiful in the city and the surrounding regions and my guess is that there will always be a desire to live nearby. The latter, with all the colleges, unless something drastic changes, the youth will always gravitate towards downtown and nearby due to recreation, entertainment, ease of mobility especially via public transit and other resources. Other areas will see a downswing. If police are reduced, then the average person will not be visiting the city with as much frequency. Boston has a beautiful waterfront and in the summer there are few better destinations for those who want to visit an urban region that for the most part is void of violent crime (North End/waterfront, for instance). That is the region where the Columbus statue was beheaded. Many of these killings are conducted in parts of the city where there is not much desire for tourists or even locals to visit. It should be obvious why.
Rush was speaking of this a few weeks ago - Twitter has told its employees that they can work from home in perpetuity - some of them couldn’t get out of San Francisco fast enough - paying $3,000/month for an apartment in a marginal part of town. Those I heard interviewed couldn’t depart fast enough - and were relieved that they could move to Boise, ID and live like kings on their salaries.
My son is a software engineer and said he knows of businesses like his that are closing their office space and taking everything completely online so they don’t have to pay for the building, rent or otherwise. They use Zoom for meetings.
Saw in the local rag today that prices are dropping in SF for the very first time.
I think same will happen in cities like Boston that are becoming dangerous.
Yes. I am one who did.
FMCDH(BITS)
Check out this article from The National Review:Biden and Dems Are Set to Abolish the Suburbs
Leftists just HATE it that normal people don't want to live in the city. They think it is better than sliced bread, and can't understand the stupid people who don't want to live that life.