America's Cities Self-Deconstruct

Is New York City dying? I have prophesied about the imminent demise of my city for years now. The income inequality mixed with radical politics will, I predicted, be the end for a great city. 

Now, what with the pandemic, the political mismanagement and the insurrection, New York’s future is looking bleaker by the day. The city’s days seem more and more to be numbered. And with it will go many of America’s other great cities.

Now, Kyle Smith puts on his prophet hat and sees the same bleak future for America’s great cities. (via Maggie’s Farm)

Regardless of whether Trump or Biden is elected in November, it’s easy to envision the following happening: Americans will flee the cities as they did in the post-1968 era.

Of course, those who will be fleeing the city will be those who can afford to flee the cities. And those who can afford to flee are those who pay most of the taxes. Surely, they will send the city’s real estate market into a severe decline. Surely, Smith knows that, several years after 1968, New York’s real estate market collapsed. Co-ops were going begging. Apartments that today sell for well into seven figures were going for the low five figures.

Smith continues to blame it on telecommuting. But, it is altogether possible that large companies will start looking outside of New York for more friendly places to build corporate headquarters. Amazon took one look at New York politicians and pulled out of Queens. JP Morgan Chase bank is building a headquarters in Texas. And those were actions taken before the pandemic and the riots.

As noted in previous posts, riots against the wealthy will cause the wealthy to decamp for more friendly climes:

The involuntary experiment for telecommuting, particularly among white-collar workers, has proven that workers can be relied upon to work from home. People don’t trust the New York City subway anymore but those who don’t need to come into the office can live anywhere. This is especially true of some of the most successful people — lawyers, people in finance. High-income people will be disproportionately among those leaving.

The balance of cities, already hit by a fiscal hurricane because of the duration of the lockdown, will tip toward heavy consumers of government services and away from high earners. Cities will be forced to raise taxes. The taxes on high earners and corporations will seem punitive. Even more of them will flee as taxes go up. The things successful people like about cities, such as high-end restaurants and culture, will follow them out to the suburbs. Corporate office parks in the suburbs will see a resurgence.

It’s not just the tax base that will erode. Cities will lose Congressional seats and federal funding. Then again, they will remain sanctuaries for illegal immigrants:

Cities will lose congressional seats. Federal funding will be steered away accordingly.

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Voters left behind in cities will be a combination of the indigent, immigrants working in low-end jobs, the young, and the woke. These people will vote for a hard-left agenda focusing on aid to the poor, forgiveness for criminals, hatred of the rich, and boutique woke issues such as global warming that will push the Democratic Party well to the left.

In other words, the demonstrators and rioters are going to remake the cities in their own image. And it’s going to be disastrous for those cities.

So, these cities are going to be taken over by the radical left. Smith is surely correct to see that this will be disastrous.