Despite booming job growth in “star cities” like New York and the Bay Area, qualified Americans aren’t flocking to live where the jobs are – in fact, they’re doing just the opposite.
Many of the highest-opportunity cities in America are also among the wealthiest, and median home prices in many of the nation’s “star” cities have risen to 9 to 10 times the average median income in that city. As a result, many of the wealthiest metro areas are experiencing net domestic population outflows, and mobility across state lines has fallen by half since the 1980s.
Newgeography’s Cullum Clark attributes this exodus, and the resulting loss of economic power on the macro and micro level alike, to the convergence of a number of economic trends. Land-use regulations in high-productivity “star cities” restrict or drive up the price of new housing, creating vast geographic distances between job opportunities and attainable housing for those who work them, and throttling the potential for economic growth.
Read More
