penturbs

Virtual knowledge industry and the rise of penturbia

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Regions and towns that boomed in the pre and post WWII industrial decades are now losing population, according to a recent article in The Economist. However, some are paying knowledge workers who can now work most anywhere to move to them in order to bolster their declining tax bases and ability to fund local services and pensions for retired local government workers.

In addition to the move in bonus, they also benefit from lower housing costs than in large metros. The newspaper cites Muncie, Indiana as an example. The city of 65,000 people has since 2021 it offered $5,000 grant entice virtual knowledge workers to make their homes there:

So far 152 people have moved to the city under the scheme, which is run by MakeMyMove, a firm based in Indiana which helps promote the incentive schemes of cities that are willing to pay people to move there. From its foundation in 2017 MakeMyMove has expanded enormously, says Christie Hurst, its spokeswoman, not least thanks to the pandemic, which freed many workers from having to go to an office. The result is a much larger pool of potentially mobile workers over whom cities can compete—hence the growth of the business. Yet a taxpayer gained by Muncie, Indiana, is one lost to somewhere else. And with growth overall slowing, not everywhere can win. In fact, remote-working may only hasten the decline of some struggling places, by making it possible for a worker in, say, Muncie, to relocate to a pretty mountain town in Colorado.

This trend was predicted by socioeconomist Jack Lessinger in his 1991 book Penturbia Where Real Estate Will Boom After the Crash of Suburbia. The penturbs represent America’s fifth major residential settlement pattern: regions and towns that lost population since 1970 but destinated to gain residents in future decades where housing dollars go further than metro suburbs and particularly high-cost suburbs close in to metro centers.

Lessinger’s forecast rise of the penturbs came before advanced telecommunications made possible by the Internet, setting the stage for its acceleration.

Rural tech startups see success across the US | TechCrunch

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While tech startups have become synonymous with urban areas that offer improved access to talent, resources and infrastructure, the reality is that rural areas are also home to startups. This may come as a surprise to those who have moved away from rural areas specifically to find a job in the tech industry, which accounts for more than 6.7 million jobs in the United States alone.

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And the advantages to having your tech startup based in a rural area? Plenty. Young was full of praise, citing “low cost of living, no traffic, elbow room, and easy access to the outdoors.” In a similar vein, Langer talked about how Red Wing is a great place for those with a love of the outdoors, its close proximity to both Minneapolis and St. Paul, as well as only being 45 minutes away from the nearest airport. “Red Wing is the perfect mix of small town and big city,” Langer said. “It’s a wonderful place to raise children. It’s got everything.” An important factor Levy brought up was access to quality education. The Gorge has access to quality schools and “employees for a high-tech company want the best schools for their kids.”

Source: Rural tech startups see success across the US | TechCrunch

In my 2015 eBook Last Rush Hour: The Decentralization of Knowledge Work in the Twenty-First Century, I discuss these and other advantages less populated regions offer in terms of housing affordability, enhanced quality of life and the end of stressful, time sucking commutes across congested metro areas. The growth of the knowledge and information-based economy makes location far less relevant — unlike during the Industrial Age when work was centralized in downtown metro areas and suburban office parks.

Key to this reverse Industrial Age migration to what author Jack Lessinger termed Penturbia in his 1991 book of the same name is the modernization and expansion of fiber to the premise telecommunications infrastructure to ensure all areas have access to advanced services. It is as critical to the 21st century as roads and highways were to the 20th.