I’ve been in Manhattan for over 30 years. My apartment was in the 9/11 dust cloud, close enough to find a keyboard that landed on the roof. I lived there with a 2 year old daughter and a pregnant wife. Never considered leaving then. Now, enough of the craziness. I’m leaving. Crime is going up and quality of life is going down. Daniel Penny’s ordeal with the legal system lasted almost 2 years, and he was 100% innocent. Alvin Bragg and Laticia James are criminals. Stay away.
Barely cracking six figures here is like living on minimum wage. $4k/month will get you a studio, maybe a one bedroom or share an apartment. It is hard to move to the city without significant cash. Guliani and Bloomberg ran the city well. De Blasio was a disaster. Adams was known only for corruption and partying. With the Zohrantifada on the way, NY is demonstrating that good leadership was the aberration. Leadership by virtue-signalling fools is the natural state of affairs here. I’m out. Leaving in January.
I have gone on vacation in Manhattan several times. The last time was Jan of this year. I know my impression was that making 125k there was barely lower middle class. It is a very expensive place.
reading those whiney tweets, I'm reminded yet again just how narrow minded, delusional and downright stupid so many people are. it's quite sad but not unexpected.
Shapiro is the smartest guy in the room, by a long shot. Thinking people know this. It pisses off the slugs. Witness some of the retorts to Shapiro. Barely two brain cells hooked together. They can’t handle what he says.
100% agree. Unless you’re exceptionally financially fortunate, most people have to compromise. We live near an expensive city in the UK, a lot of people complain about the prices here, but you can live 30 mins away for half the price, or rent a room and live centrally. My sister lives in a really cheap town an hours commute from London, it’s safe and clean with decent schools, not fashionable or cool. There *are* options, and nearly no one gets everything they want.
Everybody wants government to solve everything. The right wants it to reinforce competition, the left wants it to nationalize industries. Nobody wants to vote with their feet and their pocketbooks, which is what reduces demand and then increases supply.
I grew up in a tiny town (fewer than 1,000 residents) and had to move away to continue my education. I have stayed here since but am planning a move in the spring because it is affordable and housing here has become too high. And I am finished with my career.
I grew up in a tiny, one stoplight town. Not that I was ever a big fan of it to begin with, but it never even crossed my mind that I would live there because there was zero economic opportunity.
I love it when people say they deserve this or that and expect it to magically happen. Life is about reality and it is never what we think it should be.
I have always wanted to live live in a rural, mountainous area. I love hiking, fishing and other outdoor activities. I do not live in a mountainous area because jobs are difficult to come by and most of the jobs available would require I lower my standard of living. So, I live where I can work and earn a decent living and visit the mountains on vacation.
Now, I really dislike living in CA with its high costs of living, high tax rates and a government that wants to provide free stuff to just about everyone but those of us who actually work. I would have moved 10 years ago but nowhere will provide pay me the salary I would need to live at my current standard of living.
When I retire next May, I will move to be closer to my son and his family. It is not where I would like to live. I am moving there because my top priority is to be near my son and my grandchildren. This is life, you always have to make compromises
We have raised a couple of generations that believe that they should be given everything. They cannot handle disappointments and expect the government to solve the issue. The problem is governments rarely solve anything and more often than not make the problem worse. It is better if government left us alone so we could solve our now issue.
Personally I like the idea of New York becoming a rent-control free stuff space for immigrants and young upper class entitled brats. It is no longer a place to visit... for Wall Street... for tech biz. It is just a bedroom community for the bottom feeders and crybabies.
However, I do see some of the point from conservative critics of Shapiro. There are people outside of urban areas, especially in border states, that are rightfully pissed that their working class economic opportunity has been taken and given to China and other countries for corporate profit and shareholder return maximization. Now telling them "too bad, so sad, you have to pull up your roots and move to somewhere else to get a job" is salt on an already festering wound.
New York is a different story... and I don't think that many of these right-leaning posters are living there... although I might be wrong about that.
There are high cost of living places... where the demand exceeds the supply of resources. I love Santa Barbara but housing is way under supply and expensive, and good available jobs are few. Santa Barbara is blocked by mountains in the east and south and a military air base to the north... and the ocean in the West. New York City can only expand upward. This is another thing to consider... the lack of land to develop on. If population is increasing it only stands to reason that some are going to be priced out.
Now if your family roots are in the Detroit area and globalism killed it.... there are vacancies galore and space for a great population... but it is suggested you move because of economics... well I get the anger at that. The MAGA view is that government needs to fix the globalism problem and re-industrialize places like Detroit. Telling someone they need to move is giving in to the corporatist oligarchs feasting on big corporate returns enabled by the globalism project.
Believe it or not, although it will take time, a lot of companies will build manufacturing plants here to try to avoid Trump's tariffs. So, although it does increase prices of some products, it will create a lot of jobs in America. That being said, it's hard to control WHERE those companies set up shop. Tax incentives matter, but so does having a place you can recruit a workforce
I'd also add that a lot of this is just not fixable. Once computers and shipping containers came along, some manufacturing stuff just no longer made sense in the developed world. If you can pay workers in India $3 per hour and ship Nike's here for a quarter per pair, you're not going to pay American workers $40 per hour to do the same thing.
I get that people don't like the idea of having to move to have opportunity, but that's just how it is and always has been. Assuming we don't all get replaced by AI and robots, it may always be that way, too.
There was a great oped in the slowing turning commie WSJ that the problem in NYC is related to grade inflation. Other recent good journalist work has been done to explain feminizing of the younger population.
This is related as it is the codling and trophy giving. These kids are not of the same stock as previous generations. They want their mommy. They got great grades at prestigious campuses, but they are largely unemployable. It is no wonder that they don't want to move away.
I worked in the same general location where my parents have lived for my full career, but that was only because I kept finding good employment steps in my career. I had considered taking jobs that would have required a move, but never needed it. In the global economy people are moving to different countries for employment. These people that think they can sit their ass in the same place and scream that the jobs need to be brough to their lap are more than irritating. However, I do get the working class anger over their communities being once rich in employment and then hollowed out by globalism. Now we are saying they should leave and hollow them out even more.
There is a great story about Cobalt boats moving to a rural area in Kansas. The owner noted all the displaced farmers that are some of the hardest workers in the nation.... and took advantage. Trained them and Cobalt boats are some of the best respected in the market.
China put together a program to move temporary factory workers from rural areas to manufacturing centers where they would live on campus. I think we can find rural land that sits in an area that can draw workers from outside of the area where there is lodging so people can come to work in shifts that are 10-12 hours 3-4 days a week and then they can spend the off time back at home. There are ways to reindustrialize that can be creative.
I actually preach this to people. I'd like to find a Conservative area that either has beautiful mountains and also high paying diesel tech specialists or instructors or a Conservative area with plenty to do and beautiful weather no higher than 85 degrees. Those things don't exist at the same time, so for now, it's Memphis. And before that, it was a small town to make sure we had the skills and credit first. This is all because Tucker sent out his email this morning drawing attention to this. Imma have to cut him loose. People are taking this out of context on purpose.
Good comment, I did similar things, lived in a small rural town for years. I live in a suburb now, because the nearest city is a liberal hive that won't tolerate conservatives (they just burn up my state and county income tax dollars). I won't open up the Tucker can of worms except to say that I too cut him loose after watching him clown through his Ted Cruz gotcha interview...
Mostly agree. But, in the meantime, you gotta eat and flop for rest. Crying about things being bad fixes nothing in the short run. Gotta go where you can make the dough.
Insightful; the observation on how coordinated campaigns weaponize sentiment resonates with patterns seen in emergent social network behaviors, where initial disagreement can rapidly cascade into disproportionete responses.
I got into this argument with a guy I follow this week and he literally wrote a post on our conversation he was so upset. He's a failed software engineer that can't afford health insurance and refuses to leave Brooklyn. Live within your means and if you aren't happy, work harder or adjust your lifestyle expectations. It's the way it's always been.
We have a super competitive economy and rampant shitification of cities since the 1960s has made huge swaths of formerly functional neighborhoods and suitable housing unlivable. There are only a handful of decent places to live and raise a family in even the largest cities. Part of this is because things get more expensive and there are so many wealthy people. Part of it is that your choice is either outrageously expensive and functional, or unlivable neighborhood.
The problem is that people are refusing to accept that life is not static - not frozen in a point of time they would like to preserve. The modern world is hurtling at an ever-faster pace towards the future. I grew up in an era when there was an actual human face in banking and not some machine I have to learn to manipulate and l have to learn anew as it upgrades. But you can’t fight time. Right now both the left and the right are electing people offering 20th century solutions to 21st century problems. Rent freeze? So 1970s. Deport all immigrants? So 1990s. Community-run grocery stores? The late-night talk of dormitory undergraduates living off their parents. It seems that the whole of America is living in a bubble where everyone is trying hard to stay in yesterday. Perhaps the solution is not to elect people who grew up with rotary phones.
This is how conservatism gets branded a heartless, cruel ideology and how socialism gets traction.
Conservatives act like they don’t understand that humans aren’t rational beings - we’re emotional creatures who’re capable of being rational when we feel like it. One implication of that truth is that perception IS reality. If you’re barely making ends meet, who’s gonna sound more appealing - the guy who quotes dry statistics and tells you your problems are your fault because of what you’ve done & what you HAVEN’T done, or the guy who shouts that corporations are out to fuck you because they’re selfish, greedy & predatory? Especially if it seems that second guy’s RIGHT half the time? And especially if the message from the Good Guys is “Just pull up on your bootstraps harder!” when Weyland-Yutani’s either sent all the good jobs to Shanghai or brought half of Bangalore to Ohio to avoid paying Americans proper market rate.
Socialism gets traction because facts don’t care about your feelings. Leftist ideas don’t work and usually kill lots of innocent people in the process. But conservatism has this Social Darwinist mindset that discounts luck & chance in the attainment of success, attributing everything good in life to pure Hard Work (and bonus points for crediting Teamwork!), moxy & gumption, and ignores the very real human costs of that success, while demanding payment up front, in cash, for that success with only a promise to pay up later.
“Work hard, pay you dues, follow the rules, honor all your debts to the last penny. But there are no guarantees.” Wow. Is that how life works? What do I get out of it? Especially when I KNOW, I KNOW that 20 years from now, the only people who’ll remember I stayed late at the office every night will be my kids.
If conservatives want to get traction for their good ideas, they have to stop acting like the autistic kid for whom empathy is an utterly alien concept, and who genuinely thinks people care about hard numbers more than soft feelings. Nobody listens to their favorite song because it’s a rigorously intellectual examination of love, they like it because of the sweet guitar riffs that fire off that dopamine rush. People love the Big Damn Heroes moments in action movies because they get you going “FUCK YEAH!!!”, not because they’re how-to instructional videos or fly-on-the-wall documentaries about US Navy air combat flying.
New tactics are needed if conservatives want to take America back. Let’s try NOT going into cultural and political debates with visions of moral high grounds and rational discourses with intellectually-honest opponents dancing in our heads. These arenas are bloodsports and Marquess of Queensbury rules don’t cut it against MMA World Champions determined to win. Start spicing up dry statistics with appeals to emotion. Yeah, I get it, that’s not intellectually rigorous but hey - neither’s your audience. And if you wanna sell your message, whatever the facts of the matter are regarding the situation, you can’t insult your audience.
The problem is that people are refusing to accept that life is not static - not frozen in a point of time they would like to preserve. The modern world is hurtling at an ever-faster pace towards the future. I grew up in an era when there was an actual human face in banking and not some machine I have to learn to manipulate and l have to learn anew as it upgrades. But you can’t fight time. Right now both the left and the right are electing people offering 20th century solutions to 21st century problems. Rent freeze? So 1970s. Deport all immigrants? So 1990s. Community-run grocery stores? The late-night talk of dormitory undergraduates living off their parents. It seems that the whole of America is living in a bubble where everyone is trying hard to stay in yesterday. Perhaps the solution is not to elect people who grew up with rotary phones.
I’ve been in Manhattan for over 30 years. My apartment was in the 9/11 dust cloud, close enough to find a keyboard that landed on the roof. I lived there with a 2 year old daughter and a pregnant wife. Never considered leaving then. Now, enough of the craziness. I’m leaving. Crime is going up and quality of life is going down. Daniel Penny’s ordeal with the legal system lasted almost 2 years, and he was 100% innocent. Alvin Bragg and Laticia James are criminals. Stay away.
Barely cracking six figures here is like living on minimum wage. $4k/month will get you a studio, maybe a one bedroom or share an apartment. It is hard to move to the city without significant cash. Guliani and Bloomberg ran the city well. De Blasio was a disaster. Adams was known only for corruption and partying. With the Zohrantifada on the way, NY is demonstrating that good leadership was the aberration. Leadership by virtue-signalling fools is the natural state of affairs here. I’m out. Leaving in January.
I have gone on vacation in Manhattan several times. The last time was Jan of this year. I know my impression was that making 125k there was barely lower middle class. It is a very expensive place.
reading those whiney tweets, I'm reminded yet again just how narrow minded, delusional and downright stupid so many people are. it's quite sad but not unexpected.
Shapiro is the smartest guy in the room, by a long shot. Thinking people know this. It pisses off the slugs. Witness some of the retorts to Shapiro. Barely two brain cells hooked together. They can’t handle what he says.
Ben, is that you? Is this one of your sockpuppet accounts?
It sure is…
100% agree. Unless you’re exceptionally financially fortunate, most people have to compromise. We live near an expensive city in the UK, a lot of people complain about the prices here, but you can live 30 mins away for half the price, or rent a room and live centrally. My sister lives in a really cheap town an hours commute from London, it’s safe and clean with decent schools, not fashionable or cool. There *are* options, and nearly no one gets everything they want.
Compromise, etc.
Everybody wants government to solve everything. The right wants it to reinforce competition, the left wants it to nationalize industries. Nobody wants to vote with their feet and their pocketbooks, which is what reduces demand and then increases supply.
It's funny that the people that can't bother to call their parents cite family ties as a reason not to move.
I grew up in a tiny town (fewer than 1,000 residents) and had to move away to continue my education. I have stayed here since but am planning a move in the spring because it is affordable and housing here has become too high. And I am finished with my career.
I grew up in a tiny, one stoplight town. Not that I was ever a big fan of it to begin with, but it never even crossed my mind that I would live there because there was zero economic opportunity.
I love it when people say they deserve this or that and expect it to magically happen. Life is about reality and it is never what we think it should be.
I have always wanted to live live in a rural, mountainous area. I love hiking, fishing and other outdoor activities. I do not live in a mountainous area because jobs are difficult to come by and most of the jobs available would require I lower my standard of living. So, I live where I can work and earn a decent living and visit the mountains on vacation.
Now, I really dislike living in CA with its high costs of living, high tax rates and a government that wants to provide free stuff to just about everyone but those of us who actually work. I would have moved 10 years ago but nowhere will provide pay me the salary I would need to live at my current standard of living.
When I retire next May, I will move to be closer to my son and his family. It is not where I would like to live. I am moving there because my top priority is to be near my son and my grandchildren. This is life, you always have to make compromises
We have raised a couple of generations that believe that they should be given everything. They cannot handle disappointments and expect the government to solve the issue. The problem is governments rarely solve anything and more often than not make the problem worse. It is better if government left us alone so we could solve our now issue.
Personally I like the idea of New York becoming a rent-control free stuff space for immigrants and young upper class entitled brats. It is no longer a place to visit... for Wall Street... for tech biz. It is just a bedroom community for the bottom feeders and crybabies.
However, I do see some of the point from conservative critics of Shapiro. There are people outside of urban areas, especially in border states, that are rightfully pissed that their working class economic opportunity has been taken and given to China and other countries for corporate profit and shareholder return maximization. Now telling them "too bad, so sad, you have to pull up your roots and move to somewhere else to get a job" is salt on an already festering wound.
New York is a different story... and I don't think that many of these right-leaning posters are living there... although I might be wrong about that.
There are high cost of living places... where the demand exceeds the supply of resources. I love Santa Barbara but housing is way under supply and expensive, and good available jobs are few. Santa Barbara is blocked by mountains in the east and south and a military air base to the north... and the ocean in the West. New York City can only expand upward. This is another thing to consider... the lack of land to develop on. If population is increasing it only stands to reason that some are going to be priced out.
Now if your family roots are in the Detroit area and globalism killed it.... there are vacancies galore and space for a great population... but it is suggested you move because of economics... well I get the anger at that. The MAGA view is that government needs to fix the globalism problem and re-industrialize places like Detroit. Telling someone they need to move is giving in to the corporatist oligarchs feasting on big corporate returns enabled by the globalism project.
Believe it or not, although it will take time, a lot of companies will build manufacturing plants here to try to avoid Trump's tariffs. So, although it does increase prices of some products, it will create a lot of jobs in America. That being said, it's hard to control WHERE those companies set up shop. Tax incentives matter, but so does having a place you can recruit a workforce
I'd also add that a lot of this is just not fixable. Once computers and shipping containers came along, some manufacturing stuff just no longer made sense in the developed world. If you can pay workers in India $3 per hour and ship Nike's here for a quarter per pair, you're not going to pay American workers $40 per hour to do the same thing.
I get that people don't like the idea of having to move to have opportunity, but that's just how it is and always has been. Assuming we don't all get replaced by AI and robots, it may always be that way, too.
There was a great oped in the slowing turning commie WSJ that the problem in NYC is related to grade inflation. Other recent good journalist work has been done to explain feminizing of the younger population.
This is related as it is the codling and trophy giving. These kids are not of the same stock as previous generations. They want their mommy. They got great grades at prestigious campuses, but they are largely unemployable. It is no wonder that they don't want to move away.
I worked in the same general location where my parents have lived for my full career, but that was only because I kept finding good employment steps in my career. I had considered taking jobs that would have required a move, but never needed it. In the global economy people are moving to different countries for employment. These people that think they can sit their ass in the same place and scream that the jobs need to be brough to their lap are more than irritating. However, I do get the working class anger over their communities being once rich in employment and then hollowed out by globalism. Now we are saying they should leave and hollow them out even more.
There is a great story about Cobalt boats moving to a rural area in Kansas. The owner noted all the displaced farmers that are some of the hardest workers in the nation.... and took advantage. Trained them and Cobalt boats are some of the best respected in the market.
China put together a program to move temporary factory workers from rural areas to manufacturing centers where they would live on campus. I think we can find rural land that sits in an area that can draw workers from outside of the area where there is lodging so people can come to work in shifts that are 10-12 hours 3-4 days a week and then they can spend the off time back at home. There are ways to reindustrialize that can be creative.
I actually preach this to people. I'd like to find a Conservative area that either has beautiful mountains and also high paying diesel tech specialists or instructors or a Conservative area with plenty to do and beautiful weather no higher than 85 degrees. Those things don't exist at the same time, so for now, it's Memphis. And before that, it was a small town to make sure we had the skills and credit first. This is all because Tucker sent out his email this morning drawing attention to this. Imma have to cut him loose. People are taking this out of context on purpose.
Good comment, I did similar things, lived in a small rural town for years. I live in a suburb now, because the nearest city is a liberal hive that won't tolerate conservatives (they just burn up my state and county income tax dollars). I won't open up the Tucker can of worms except to say that I too cut him loose after watching him clown through his Ted Cruz gotcha interview...
Mostly agree. But, in the meantime, you gotta eat and flop for rest. Crying about things being bad fixes nothing in the short run. Gotta go where you can make the dough.
Insightful; the observation on how coordinated campaigns weaponize sentiment resonates with patterns seen in emergent social network behaviors, where initial disagreement can rapidly cascade into disproportionete responses.
Yep. That’s why I don’t live there. See how that works?
I got into this argument with a guy I follow this week and he literally wrote a post on our conversation he was so upset. He's a failed software engineer that can't afford health insurance and refuses to leave Brooklyn. Live within your means and if you aren't happy, work harder or adjust your lifestyle expectations. It's the way it's always been.
We have a super competitive economy and rampant shitification of cities since the 1960s has made huge swaths of formerly functional neighborhoods and suitable housing unlivable. There are only a handful of decent places to live and raise a family in even the largest cities. Part of this is because things get more expensive and there are so many wealthy people. Part of it is that your choice is either outrageously expensive and functional, or unlivable neighborhood.
The problem is that people are refusing to accept that life is not static - not frozen in a point of time they would like to preserve. The modern world is hurtling at an ever-faster pace towards the future. I grew up in an era when there was an actual human face in banking and not some machine I have to learn to manipulate and l have to learn anew as it upgrades. But you can’t fight time. Right now both the left and the right are electing people offering 20th century solutions to 21st century problems. Rent freeze? So 1970s. Deport all immigrants? So 1990s. Community-run grocery stores? The late-night talk of dormitory undergraduates living off their parents. It seems that the whole of America is living in a bubble where everyone is trying hard to stay in yesterday. Perhaps the solution is not to elect people who grew up with rotary phones.
Fuck all of them. Let them live off rat meat.
This is how conservatism gets branded a heartless, cruel ideology and how socialism gets traction.
Conservatives act like they don’t understand that humans aren’t rational beings - we’re emotional creatures who’re capable of being rational when we feel like it. One implication of that truth is that perception IS reality. If you’re barely making ends meet, who’s gonna sound more appealing - the guy who quotes dry statistics and tells you your problems are your fault because of what you’ve done & what you HAVEN’T done, or the guy who shouts that corporations are out to fuck you because they’re selfish, greedy & predatory? Especially if it seems that second guy’s RIGHT half the time? And especially if the message from the Good Guys is “Just pull up on your bootstraps harder!” when Weyland-Yutani’s either sent all the good jobs to Shanghai or brought half of Bangalore to Ohio to avoid paying Americans proper market rate.
Socialism gets traction because facts don’t care about your feelings. Leftist ideas don’t work and usually kill lots of innocent people in the process. But conservatism has this Social Darwinist mindset that discounts luck & chance in the attainment of success, attributing everything good in life to pure Hard Work (and bonus points for crediting Teamwork!), moxy & gumption, and ignores the very real human costs of that success, while demanding payment up front, in cash, for that success with only a promise to pay up later.
“Work hard, pay you dues, follow the rules, honor all your debts to the last penny. But there are no guarantees.” Wow. Is that how life works? What do I get out of it? Especially when I KNOW, I KNOW that 20 years from now, the only people who’ll remember I stayed late at the office every night will be my kids.
If conservatives want to get traction for their good ideas, they have to stop acting like the autistic kid for whom empathy is an utterly alien concept, and who genuinely thinks people care about hard numbers more than soft feelings. Nobody listens to their favorite song because it’s a rigorously intellectual examination of love, they like it because of the sweet guitar riffs that fire off that dopamine rush. People love the Big Damn Heroes moments in action movies because they get you going “FUCK YEAH!!!”, not because they’re how-to instructional videos or fly-on-the-wall documentaries about US Navy air combat flying.
New tactics are needed if conservatives want to take America back. Let’s try NOT going into cultural and political debates with visions of moral high grounds and rational discourses with intellectually-honest opponents dancing in our heads. These arenas are bloodsports and Marquess of Queensbury rules don’t cut it against MMA World Champions determined to win. Start spicing up dry statistics with appeals to emotion. Yeah, I get it, that’s not intellectually rigorous but hey - neither’s your audience. And if you wanna sell your message, whatever the facts of the matter are regarding the situation, you can’t insult your audience.
The problem is that people are refusing to accept that life is not static - not frozen in a point of time they would like to preserve. The modern world is hurtling at an ever-faster pace towards the future. I grew up in an era when there was an actual human face in banking and not some machine I have to learn to manipulate and l have to learn anew as it upgrades. But you can’t fight time. Right now both the left and the right are electing people offering 20th century solutions to 21st century problems. Rent freeze? So 1970s. Deport all immigrants? So 1990s. Community-run grocery stores? The late-night talk of dormitory undergraduates living off their parents. It seems that the whole of America is living in a bubble where everyone is trying hard to stay in yesterday. Perhaps the solution is not to elect people who grew up with rotary phones.