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Musings Report 2017-9 3-4-17 Are Mega-Cities the Incubators of Global Solutions?
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For those who are new to the Musings reports: they are basically a glimpse into my notebook, the unfiltered swamp where I organize future themes, sort through the dozens of stories and links submitted by readers, refine my own research and start connecting dots which appear later in the blog or in my books. As always, I hope the Musings spark new appraisals and insights. Thank you for supporting the site and for inviting me into your circle of correspondents.
Are Mega-Cities the Incubators of Global Solutions?
Richard Florida has authored three books on the increasing concentration of "the creative class" and capital in urban zones--cities and their surrounding satellite cities, suburbs and exurbs: The Rise of the Creative Class and Who's Your City?: How the Creative Economy Is Making Where to Live the Most Important Decision of Your Life.
More recently, he has addressed the soaring costs of living in these urban cores in a new book:The New Urban Crisis: How Our Cities Are Increasing Inequality, Deepening Segregation, and Failing the Middle Class—and What We Can Do About It.
In Florida's view, the repercussions of this concentration of talent and capital is not restricted to the economy--it also has political ramifications, a topic he addresses in this rather hyperbolic-titled article: The Most Disruptive Transformation in History: How the clustering of knowledge lays bare the need to devolve power from the nation-state to the city.
Florida's main claim is straightforward: solutions are coming from city governments and institutions, not central governments. Since the world's populace has rapidly urbanized, this transformation affects the majority of people in both the developed and developing worlds.
I have often written about the need to move from centralization to decentralization: centralized command-and-control mechanisms are optimized for the economy and society of the late 1940s - 1960s, not the economy/society of today that is being creatively disrupted by the 4th Industrial Revolution (digital communications, software, automation, robotics, Internet).
Florida's premise makes a great deal of common-sense, for the basic reason that different cities face different problems (or different versions of the same problem), and each regional mega-city is embedded in a different state and economy.
Cities also have different resources and dominant political cultures.
In effect, devolving political power to cities would enable a suite of local solutions rather than a single solution imposed by a topdown centralized authority.
This article illustrates the spectrum of cities: (the categories are somewhat arbitrary, of course) The Megacity Economy: How Seven Types Of Global Cities Stack Up.
The idea that urban centers are the best place to tackle issues from local homelessness to global pollution doesn't just turn the centralized political order on its head; it also cuts against the grain of the narrative that cities will become hellholes as soon as the trucks stop rolling, and the solution is to have a "bug-out" cabin ready for immediate occupancy.
This article admirably encapsulates that view: Is It Time to Flee the City Yet?
While cities may well become hellholes should the trucks stop rolling, it isn't quite as simple as preparing an isolated rural hideaway. Way back in 2008, I questioned the practicality of the remote "bug-out" cabin, and suggested the more practical place for a hideaway home would be a town or small city: The Art of Survival, Taoism and the Warring States (June 27, 2008).
Analyses of regional trade show that the reach of urban regions is far larger than the core mega-city; goods and services in and out of the core dominate the economies of far-flung rural towns and small cities along established trade routes.
This suggests the "best of both worlds" might be semi-rural towns or small cities with economic ties and trade with distant urban cores. Such locales offer far more employment opportunities than isolated rural towns/areas, while maintaining a buffering distance from the urban core.
For many people, living right in the urban core may well be the best solution, despite the risks of social/financial collapse, as the core attribute we all seek for safety and solace is a resilient community. Regardless of the crisis, isolation is rarely a lasting or practical solution.
Summary of the Blog This Past Week
Why Is the Cost of Living so Unaffordable? 3/3/17
The Illusion of Progress 3/2/17
Dear President Trump: If You Want to Lower Healthcare Costs and Stem the Opiate Death Spiral, Legalize Marijuana 3/1/17
Virtue-Signaling the Decline of the Empire 2/28/17
Those Systems That Aren't Busy Being Born Are Busy Dying 2/27/17
Best Thing That Happened To Me This Week
A family friend dropped off a fresh-caught fish (palani) and we made a Filipino-style fish soup with the gift--wonderful.
Market Musings: Gold Miners
I have a disconcerting knack for getting interested in an investment sector early, becoming frustrated as it goes nowhere for months, and exiting in disgust shortly before it skyrockets.
One such example is the gold miners, represented by the ETFs GDX and GDXJ (junior miners). The miners languished for years, and then leaped in early 2016--and of course I missed the move entirely, having given up on the sector in late 2015.
The chart of GDX is not looking very constructive for Bulls. After soaring from $13 to $32, GDX plummeted to $18 before recovering to $26.
Recently, it fell hard and flirted with the 200-week moving average--a key line in the sand for any tradeable asset.
This "lower high" is not indicative of a sustainable uptrend. Just as telling, the MACD line failed to get above the neutral line in the rally to $26.
As I often note, bad things happen below the neutral line, good things happen above it.
If GDX breaks decisively below the $21.75 200-week MA and does not manage a quick rebound above that line, it opens the door to a complete retrace of the entire move to $32--all the way back down to support around $13.
From Left Field
The World’s First Poor Rich Country -- it's more than financial wealth....
US millennials feel more working class than any other generation -- the nature of the working class is changing rapidly...
10 questions and answers about America’s 'Big Government'
Anxiety is a way of life for Gen Y. In an insecure world, is it any surprise?
The threat from within academia: the intellectual monocultures that have taken over certain disciplines
Number Of Distressed US Retailers Highest Since The Great Recession -- storm clouds on the horizon?
The deathbed of capitalism -- is the system failing us?
Just as neoliberalism is finally on its knees, so too is the left -- can't be said often enough...
An English Sheep Farmer's View of Rural America -- making a living maybe more important than making a fortune...
UN report lays bare the waste of treating homes as commodities:
A massive shift of global capital investment has left homes empty and people homeless, argues Leilani Farha, UN special rapporteur for housing
Moral Outrage Is Self-Serving, Say Psychologists -- as I noted in my piece on virtue-signaling...
Brave new workplace (27:23) discussion of BS jobs with authors David Graeber and Elaine Glaser
"Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth." Marcus Aurelius
Thanks for reading--
charles |
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