> The whole point I was getting at was distribution. Sure you have n households in the country, but nothing says that n/10 need to live in just one or two counties of that country. Even if you get the green light to build more, it will be very expensive to do so, and you will have population density/congestion issues.
Nobody is forcing everyone to all live in one place. Some combination of lifestyle, economic opportunities, and other stuff makes people want to do that. Locals complain that housing is expensive in SV, but housing is expensive because of a vicious cycle, promulgated by locals, that made it that way.
A different set of policies would have prevented the vicious cycle and made housing cheaper and more abundant. In this alternate universe, with smarter housing policy, more people could be living in SV with less traffic congestion for less total cost. The only downside is that locals wouldn't have been able to sell their houses for 20x what they paid.
You can either: accept that an area is desirable and make accommodations for housing the people who want to come; or accept that housing is going to be expensive. Or I guess you can just kill all the newcomers and eat them. Normally, though, we like to at least pretend that we live in a civilized society. As a positive side-effect, being known for cannibalism does stand a good chance of reducing your locale's desirability on the lifestyle front! So maybe try that one first and let us know how it goes.
In other words, you can learn from California's example or your can make the same mistakes. Your choice.
> They are seeing influxes in some areas, but it's not an even distribution.
Sure, but it is making the distribution within the US as a whole more uniform.
> They aren't really complaining about spreading out but more about the problems created when going against the established customs, or bringing the same problems with them (taxes, property values, etc)
That's my point. They are not bringing the problems. They are coming, and locals are creating the problems by following the same bad policies that failed for locals in California. Yes, that does mean some things will change. You can't stop the change, but you do get to choose its character.
"A different set of policies would have prevented the vicious cycle and made housing cheaper and more abundant."
I think that's highly speculative. Many people in that area want single family homes or large homes. There's only so much surface area. It's not just that they want to live there, but also expect specific attributes with their housing.
"In other words, you can learn from California's example or your can make the same mistakes. Your choice."
If the policies work in other places, how can we determine that it's the policies causing the issues? Do you have a real world example of the alternate policies that won't cause those issues?
"Sure, but it is making the distribution within the US as a whole more uniform."
Not in any meaningful way. Over 50% of the US population lives in just 58 counties. They aren't moving to many rural locations, just to suburbs or smaller cities, which helps a little, but sometimes causes the same issues in those places.
"That's my point. They are not bringing the problems. They are coming, and locals are creating the problems by following the same bad policies that failed for locals in California. Yes, that does mean some things will change. You can't stop the change, but you do get to choose its character."
They do bring some of the problems when they go against established culture and force their views on others. This is pretty common. A classic example is people buying a house near an existing highway, then complaining about road noise and advocating for million dollar sound barriers.
Again, you mention policy as the problem, yet there's no example of the alternatives. Even the high level stuff mentioned previously sounds like a zero sum game - either existing owners get screwed or the new people do. I would like to see property tax eliminated and go strictly income based.
Yes, change happens, but it doesn't mean that the existing people need to roll over and not fight for their own opinions.
Nobody is forcing everyone to all live in one place. Some combination of lifestyle, economic opportunities, and other stuff makes people want to do that. Locals complain that housing is expensive in SV, but housing is expensive because of a vicious cycle, promulgated by locals, that made it that way.
A different set of policies would have prevented the vicious cycle and made housing cheaper and more abundant. In this alternate universe, with smarter housing policy, more people could be living in SV with less traffic congestion for less total cost. The only downside is that locals wouldn't have been able to sell their houses for 20x what they paid.
You can either: accept that an area is desirable and make accommodations for housing the people who want to come; or accept that housing is going to be expensive. Or I guess you can just kill all the newcomers and eat them. Normally, though, we like to at least pretend that we live in a civilized society. As a positive side-effect, being known for cannibalism does stand a good chance of reducing your locale's desirability on the lifestyle front! So maybe try that one first and let us know how it goes.
In other words, you can learn from California's example or your can make the same mistakes. Your choice.
> They are seeing influxes in some areas, but it's not an even distribution.
Sure, but it is making the distribution within the US as a whole more uniform.
> They aren't really complaining about spreading out but more about the problems created when going against the established customs, or bringing the same problems with them (taxes, property values, etc)
That's my point. They are not bringing the problems. They are coming, and locals are creating the problems by following the same bad policies that failed for locals in California. Yes, that does mean some things will change. You can't stop the change, but you do get to choose its character.