3 days ago
Fewer Americans move, but when they do, it's for housing and a story
Armin Samii moved to Pittsburgh in 2019, and got involved.
The startup founder and bicycle-safety advocate is a political organizer and a champion of various local causes. Compared to his previous home in Silicon Valley, he was attracted to Pittsburgh because living was affordable, and the city's identity wasn't dominated by tech startups.
'I think the fact that Pittsburgh isn't centered on tech is actually a great thing,' Samii told back in 2023. In this way, Samii is representative of the American way: We'll move cross-country for cheaper housing and a narrative about a place. That's true even if we've been changing homes less frequently of late.
Back between the 1950s and 1980s, Americans may have been the most mobile large population in human history.
In any given year over that timeframe, about 1 in 5 United States residents moved — no other country came close. A good chunk of them moved across state lines. Rather than fleeing war or famine, most moved for work, love or education. Combine that with high rates of immigration, and it's clear the lifeblood of 20th century American economic supremacy was an exchange of ideas, culture and approaches.
That's why economic development strategy was so focused then on courting big established firms. People moved for jobs, the thinking went, so better get those jobs.
Not so anymore.
Before the 1980s, the spread of knowledge workers was roughly evenly distributed around the United States. Then, as Bill Bishop popularized in his influential 2008 book ' The Big Sort,' that began to change. Hubs of specialized knowledge in technology and the sciences emerged and accelerated. Now, people aren't moving for jobs but rather companies are moving for people.
If you are lucky enough to be in one of a few dozen of the country's most dynamic regions, who needs to move anymore? Most living everywhere else stay put too, either because they can't or won't move.
Economists have closely charted the decline in American mobility since the 1990s. In 2019, fewer than 1 in 10 US residents moved, the lowest percentage on record.
Contrary to the pandemic story of people storming out of cities for Zoom-powered pastoral retreats, the decline has continued. In 2022, the share of Americans moving even within the same county dropped to its lowest level since the Census Bureau began tracking this in 1948.
To win more residents, regions can focus on housing
Declining, yes, but Americans are still more likely to move than just about any other rich country on the planet. And when we do move, it's more likely we'll go farther (not just a new neighborhood, but a new city). Over her lifetime, the average American will move nearly four times more than the average European.
Each move is a chance to add to a population (read: tax base). About 25 million of us moved last year — with a rising share heading to urban centers.
That's why state and local economic development strategies still sensibly include a focus on attracting new residents. What industry execs call BRE (business relocation and expansion) looks positively traditional compared to winning over people: from B2B to B2C.
So why do Americans move? Three reasons dominate: cheaper housing, family changes and new jobs. Those three accounted for almost 85% of all moves in 2022, per the Census Bureau, with housing costs driving two in five of all American moves. In contrast, moving for or after college accounted for just 3% of moves — closer to the 1 in 100 moves driven by climate change.
The best way to win more residents is to make it easier to build more, denser, cheaper housing.
For decades, this looked easiest in the US. Southeast and Southwest. Populations boomed in old Republican states with a reputation for less regulation. But this has changed recently enough to ask the question: Did old expensive Democratic cities just run into the expensive housing problem sooner than everyone else? Americans are still not building enough to meet demand, and this is becoming truer everywhere.
Forget the politics, we just want solutions, which appear to have their best chance at happening locally. In Baltimore, Parity Homes and other advocates focus on this. So-called YIMBY (yes in my backyard) groups in cities across the country are encouraging denser construction, especially near transit and mixed-use development.
Meanwhile, compared to top tier tech hubs, local champions say they already have cheap housing. If they aren't all known for it, what gives?
Well, the second-best way to win more residents is to make sure anybody knows it — and lots of places are foolishly overlooking their own story.
Doesn't matter how great your city is if it's a secret
New research out of Germany demonstrates a missing piece in economic development strategy: Stories about places aren't just passive reflections, they're active drivers of economic and social decisions. Consider a few points from the authors, Max Roessler, Markus Grillitsch, Johan Miörner and Daniel Schiller:
Narratives actively shape perception: Powerful local stories transform public perceptions.
Stories become self-fulfilling prophecies: Communities that tell future-oriented stories can realize the futures they envision.
Authentic local stories resonate most: Narratives that genuinely reflect local experience shape not just local opinion but perception from afar
Yet nearly every place in the United States let their local journalism community wither away. A new analysis from local journalism grandees quantifies that even many big cities have a worrying lack of professional local news, information and story gatherers.
Smarter place-based economic development strategies have attempted to fill the gap, but tooting your own horn only goes so far.
Anyone charged with attracting a declining share of mobile Americans: Storytelling isn't just an output of a community, but an input. This is a foundation of case for investing in storytelling, but the examples are more convincing.
Emerging tech hubs around the country lay claim to lower cost of living — but they don't tell anyone. Of the thousands of Philadelphians working remotely at big-tech firms, many are here because of affordability, proximity to family and/or a conscious or subconscious awareness of the story that other smart people are here too.
Same goes for Samii, the entrepreneur who moved to Pittsburgh. The city's relative cost of living and quirky culture were the right fit for him. But he had to discover it first.
