Abandoning Cities

People are leaving America’s larger urban centers at an unprecedented rate this year.  Kristin Tate of the Hill writes that “an estimated quarter million New York residents are moving upstate for good while another 2 million could permanently move out of state.”  She cites the spread of the coronavirus due to the dense living conditions and the lack of proper local government planning as reasons for the exodus.  Redfin, a real estate search engine, reports that over 40% of urban residents are brousing for new homes, more than twice that of rural residents.  Rural states such as Colorado, Montana, Vermont, Connecticut, and Florida are popular destinations.

Real estate prices have dropped over 50% in San Francisco, while demand in the suburbs has driven prices up 10%.  Seattle and the District of Columbia have also been losing residents.  It is not just adults with assets that are moving out of cities, some 2 million young people moved out of cities and into their parents houses in March and April.  Tate also correctly notes that “Social unrest and urban crime rate spikes also raise the possibility of a sharp increase in exits from large cities.”  The push by anarchists to defund police, which has already been implemented by city governments in Los Angeles, New York and Minneapolis guarantees substantial increases in crime, driving more people who are able to leave, out of cities.   Those who can’t leave; the working-class  service employees and the urban minorities who rely on government handouts to survive, will remain in the war zones where children are shot while playing on the sidewalk.  For many big cities, the much-needed changes in leadership, a Renaissance in education, the restoration of the nuclear family, the revival of pro-active policing and real consequences for crime, seem today like an impossible dream.