A 2025 Retrospective.

[jon-nyc]

[Doctor Phibes]

@Jolly said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

@Doctor-Phibes said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

Guess what this is a map of...

Does it really mean anything?

What's the cost of living? How much are taxes? Can you grow any of your own food? Can you afford a house?

What it's a graph of is how much money is donated to or taken from the Federal government.

So yes, it does mean something. It's an indication of how much money is needed from DC for a State to survive.

[Aqua Letifer]

@Jolly said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

@Aqua-Letifer said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

@Jolly said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

What do the cities have that the rural counties do not have?

Money. Oh, and the industries that drive the vast, vast majority of our exports.

In 2019, the United States agriculture exports accounted for $135.54 billion. Media and entertainment accounted for $771 billion.

You're going to find a way to twist or nullify this because you value famers more than you do city-slickers making movies and video games, but the numbers aren't going to change.

EDIT
I'm not saying I like or dislike the breakdown either. Just that the numbers are what they are.

If the cities are so important, why are so many people leaving them?

Cost of living. And some industries are going more remote.

I'm not saying cities are better. Just that their economic benefit can't be written off just because you personally like rural survivalist stuff more.

Most of the movies you've personally mentioned on this board were produced and edited by companies who don't do their work on a farm. Most of the publishers who published the books you've mentioned, too.

[Doctor Phibes]

Personally, I'd absolutely love to live in the countryside. I also loved where we were in Canada, which was a small town surrounded by a shit-ton of rocks, trees, fields and what-not.

The work dictates the place, unfortunately.

[Aqua Letifer]

I hate cities, by and large. Smaller ones down south have been okay.

[Doctor Phibes]

It's not like I live in a city now. We're just outside the Boston commute zone, but it's still kind of miserably suburban.

[Rainman]

@Doctor-Phibes said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

Personally, I'd absolutely love to live in the countryside. I also loved where we were in Canada, which was a small town surrounded by a shit-ton of rocks, trees, fields and what-not.

The work dictates the place, unfortunately.

That sums it up for me completely. The economics are one thing, but the quality of life as one perceives it, that's different.
It will be interesting how the economics pans out when working from home allows people to live where they want. I know that with my business I could make it work so I could live anywhere on the planet. If I were younger and didn't have so many ties in regards to family, I'd do it. Or, buy one of those humongous motor homes and deck it out with all the latest for internet connections. Or if there were even smaller gadgets I could stuff them in my motorcycle saddlebags. Then Came Bronson. That would be me.

I've read about the grumblings of rural folks that are not happy with the city-slickers and their attitude moving out into their communities. Matter of face, the same is said about States e.g., Californians moving to Arizona and Texas. Heck, for decades, Oregonians were upset that Californians were flooding the Portland area, and bringing their ideology with them.

Thanks, California!

[Doctor Phibes]

There's one thing that unites us all. We love complaining.

[taiwan_girl]

@Larry said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

@taiwan_girl said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

@Doctor-Phibes by any current measuring, the more agricultural a country is, the poorer it is.

Nope. Not true at all. lol

It is absolutely true. I am to sure why you say it is not true. What measuring do you use to dispute this?

I love farming, but farming is a tough business, especially when talking about subsistence farming.

Countries Most Dependent on Agriculture. The table below is a bit bad formatted but is the % of country GDP that is associated with agriculture. None of those countries would be considered "rich"

Rank Country Agriculture as Percentage of GDP
1 Liberia 76.9
2 Somalia 60.2
3 Guinea-Bissau 55.8
4 Central African Republic 53.1
5 Chad 52.7
6 Comoros 51.6
7 Sierra Leone 51.5
8 Togo 46
9 Ethiopia 41
10 Niger 39
11 Mali 38.8
12 Burma (Myanmar) 38.2
13 Democratic Republic of the Congo 37.5
14 Benin 36
15 Nepal 34.9

[Larry]

I thought you were using that fact to make the claim that the rural areas of the US are poor. I see now that you weren't, so I'm left with the question - why did you even bring it up if that wasn't your intent? Farm areas of third world countries has nothing to do with this discussion.

[taiwan_girl]

@Larry What I was trying to say (not very clearly LOL) was that agricultural areas need cities to prosper. And vice versa.

The sum of the parts is greater than the individual parts.

[Larry]

I see. Well, I was trying to respond based on the US, which was what we were talking about. And I can assure you that the vast majority of the rural (read "not urban") areas of the US do not need a thing from cities.

[jon-nyc]

@jon-nyc said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

Most of the wealth and substantially all of the creativity is in the blue areas.

Biden counties vs Trump counties, sized by income.

[Loki]

@jon-nyc said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

@jon-nyc said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

Most of the wealth and substantially all of the creativity is in the blue areas.

Biden counties vs Trump counties, sized by income.

So are most the problems, no?

[xenon]

@loki said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

@jon-nyc said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

@jon-nyc said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

Most of the wealth and substantially all of the creativity is in the blue areas.

Biden counties vs Trump counties, sized by income.

So are most the problems, no?

Link to video

[Jolly]

I'm just laughing at y'all. While rural areas may not have some of the things the urban areas have, let me list a few things...

1. Oil.
2. Natural gas.
3. Wheat
4. Corn.
5. Cattle
6. Chickens.
7. Coal
8. Hogs.
9. Rice
10. Sugar
11. Timber
12. Etc.

Now, I'm in a pretty rural area and the regional per capita income would never compare with Boston or New York. But...

I can draw a 120 mile circle and encompass a couple of automotive manufacturing plants, a refinery, one of the largest gas fields in the country, one of the largest soap mills in the country, the largest private sawmill in the country, two plywood/OSB plants, one of the biggest specialty aluminum factories in the country, four power plants, linerboard mill, toilet paper mill, a copy paper mill and the largest concentration of chemical plants in the country. And there's lots more, big and small.

Maybe y'all can import it, I don't know, but it looks to me that if y'all can't import it, you're going to starve in the dark, without anything to wipe your backside except your worthless, fiat money.

[Klaus]

@jolly said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

Oil.
Natural gas.
Wheat
Corn.
Cattle
Chickens.
Coal
Hogs.
Rice
Sugar
Timber
Etc.

And how much of those things could be produced without the technology, education, finance etc. mainly provided by cities? You are looking at standards of living from 300 years ago.

Have you ever climbed the stairs of the Eiffel tower? If the steps were labeled "countryside" or "city", you are claiming that you can reach the top merely because the bottommost step is labeled "countryside".

Like it or not, but it's a symbiotic relationship.

[George K]

I was assured that the Republicans are the party of the rich.

:man-shrugging:

[Aqua Letifer]

@klaus said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

Like it or not, but it's a symbiotic relationship.

I can't believe this even needs to be pointed out.

[Jolly]

@aqua-letifer said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

@klaus said in A 2025 Retrospective.:

Like it or not, but it's a symbiotic relationship.

I can't believe this even needs to be pointed out.

Point it out. It's symbiotic, but if the two are separated, who dies and who lives?

That is the question.