Chicago population drop (Detroit: oceanfront, how much, house)

[IrishIllini]

Originally Posted by Kamms

This is true to an extent; wait until the 2020. The problem is the current financial situation in the State and City. Businesses will hesitate to expand or relocate in Chicago etc. due to the financial and event the political situation at the State and local levels. Sure there are some corp office relocations downtown and population growth but not enough to offset the area's population drain and certainly not enough to foot the debt and tax bills.

The growth in some of the collar counties was not sufficient to offset the MSA/CSA overall loss. The estimate for Cook County was a bit stunning for a one year period. What wasn't expected is that Lake and DuPage showed declines, albeit very small but nonetheless these counties always took in the Chicago and Cook County transplants. More ominous is that Lake County, Indiana had a larger drop. Another Chicago-Cook transplant location. People are leaving the region.

Rahm's current issue with the pension and Supreme Court ruling as well as his credibility with Chicagoans does not help things in the short and long-term. Can't imagine Rahm winning re-election again at this time.

My overarching point is that growth cycles are cyclical. NYC was a mess for most of the latter half of the 20th century and look at them now. Obviously Chicago is not New York, but all the hysteria is seriously unfounded. We have issues, but we are not Detroit, Michigan.

[Antonio Montana]

Originally Posted by IrishIllini

My overarching point is that growth cycles are cyclical. NYC was a mess for most of the latter half of the 20th century and look at them now. Obviously Chicago is not New York, but all the hysteria is seriously unfounded. We have issues, but we are not Detroit, Michigan.

What you don't seem to get that is that while Chicago isn't Detroit right now, unless these fiscal issues are resolved, which the politicians refuse to do, Chicago and Illinois have a terrible future. The population drop is just one of many signs of this. Will it ever become as bad as Detroit? Who knows? But the future is not looking good.

[dude1984]

I already moved away once and returned, but I am looking to head to another Midwest state or out to the West Coast. Why?

This state is a mess. If I wasn't caught in the middle of this cluster**** I'd be laughing. Until the state government can get their act together which largely rests on the people to elect competent people whose go to fix isn't more taxes to maintain the status quo it's a race to the bottom. Both sides need to come to the table and make some compromises because it is beyond ridiculous. It's like watching two children fight over a toy. It's time for both sides to drop the ego and get something passed. People don't want to do business or live in such a dysfunctional state.

[jonnynonos]

I'm not sure why people get upset about losing people who are moving out of a ghetto. Thank goodness they are. They should all run.

There are plenty of low income places you can live that are going to be 100 X healthier environments than a Chicago ghetto, which is probably the single worst place to raise a child in North America.

Hopefully, like the other ethnic populations before them, these people leave the ghettos behind and go on to live more mundane lives in various other places around the country.

The only real reason to freak out about population loss is likely because the pension funds were likely constructed based on some idiotic measure of population tax revenue/growth that -- shocking! -- will turn out to be completely unsustainable.

Shocking, you can't give an army of city/government workers what amounts to $100K a year for doing nothing from the age of 55-95.

If you want to see the worst the Democratic party has to offer, just come to Chicago.

[Antonio Montana]

Originally Posted by jonnynonos

I'm not sure why people get upset about losing people who are moving out of a ghetto. Thank goodness they are. They should all run.

There are plenty of low income places you can live that are going to be 100 X healthier environments than a Chicago ghetto, which is probably the single worst place to raise a child in North America.

Hopefully, like the other ethnic populations before them, these people leave the ghettos behind and go on to live more mundane lives in various other places around the country.

The only real reason to freak out about population loss is likely because the pension funds were likely constructed based on some idiotic measure of population tax revenue/growth that -- shocking! -- will turn out to be completely unsustainable.

Shocking, you can't give an army of city/government workers what amounts to $100K a year for doing nothing from the age of 55-95.

If you want to see the worst the Democratic party has to offer, just come to Chicago.

Wow. Truer words have never been spoken. Several rounds of applause for you, my friend. There are plenty of reasonable democrats in state governments around the country, including the state in which I now live. However, the democratic party in Illinois and Chicago is absolutely horrible. They have almost single-handedly destroyed the finances of the state and city of Chicago. Thanks, Michael Madigan!

[IrishIllini]

Originally Posted by Antonio Montana

What you don't seem to get that is that while Chicago isn't Detroit right now, unless these fiscal issues are resolved, which the politicians refuse to do, Chicago and Illinois have a terrible future. The population drop is just one of many signs of this. Will it ever become as bad as Detroit? Who knows? But the future is not looking good.

Have you read any of my post? I have consistently stated that we're facing some unprecedented financial issues. With that said, it's not as if they are insurmountable. California was here, New York City was here, Kansas is on its way....

I totally agree we need to address the system ASAP, but it's not like we're going to see a bombed out Chicago from 138th to Howard...Many cities, states, and even nations have faced similar issues and lived to tell the tale.

[Chicago South Sider]

It won't be long before Chicago becomes the 5th largest MSA. This place just has too many problems.

[Bellamouse]

Originally Posted by Frank the Tank

I'm definitely mortified of the financial situation of Chicago and the state of Illinois. However, I think that needs to be separated from what actually drives people to move away. A lot of people will say that they will move or want to move because of high taxes, but that's generally not the driving factor unless you truly don't have to worry about the location of your job or don't need to work at all (e.g. a retired Illinois native that changes residency to his/her winter home location in Florida or Nevada since they have zero state income tax). Illinois has fairly middle-of-the-road taxes compared to the rest of the nation and is downright low tax compared to places like New York and California (who aren't lamenting lack of growth in the way that we are). People that live in Illinois might perceive that we have high taxes because we are comparing ourselves to Indiana next door or our relatives that moved away to Florida, but it's not really the case compared to the nation overall. (Now, whether we're going to have to raise taxes dramatically because our financial situation is an entirely different matter.)

Ultimately, what drives people to move to or away from a place are jobs, jobs, jobs. If you're working on Wall Street or in Silicon Valley, you don't care if New York and California have punitive state income tax rates because there is a critical mass of high income jobs to make up for it. Chicago has actually done a fairly good job (at least as good as you can expect in the Midwest) in terms of attracting upper income jobs, which is why you still see college grads move en masse to the city every year. That's also why there continues to be strong development of higher priced real estate in the nicest areas of the city and suburbs despite overall populations losses. The people that can afford those types of places is still growing in Chicago. In contrast, Chicago has been bleeding manufacturing jobs continuously for the past 4 decades, so the people that would have been working those types of jobs in the past are fleeing the area out of economic necessity (either to find those types of manufacturing jobs elsewhere or simply reduce the cost of living if they have to end up taking low wage jobs). In that sense, high taxes are a secondary consideration since that plays into the overall cost of living, but if you've got a "good job" (however an individual might define that considering his/her experience and education level), you're generally not moving just because of the tax situation. If you have a "bad job" or no job, then you're much more motivated to move simply to reduce costs.

This is simply not true. My husband and I both have (and have always had) good jobs. We make very good money, and while we could "make it" ok in Chicago, we felt like for all the hard work we did and all that we earned, we should be doing more than just "making it". We moved to Florida last year and it's unbelievable how much money we save down here. Just having no state tax alone saves 3.75% (that paid for my husband's teeth implants right off the bat). Then there's the property tax that's much less, the savings on registering and getting city stickers for your cars (down here it's $36.10 per year for your plates and there are NO city stickers - back home we paid $500/yr for plates and city stickers), sales tax is much less and utilities are much less (we had a $13.00 water bill last month, and our house here is 2300 sq ft. vs. the 1700 we had back home and we paid a BIG water bill there). Our natural gas bill back home was off the charts too. No gas bill down here.

Add to that our quality of life is significantly better, and there is literally NO reason to stay in Chicago. Plenty of people I know who have good jobs are considering moving. Why should we keep paying high taxes for what? We get nothing in return. The roads are atrocious, the schools are atrocious. And the taxes are only going to continue to rise, and we weren't government employees with guaranteed huge yearly increases.

Now we can put a lot more of our money into our retirement accounts and give more to things that we care about instead of contributing to the waste and corruption that is Chicago. No thanks. Best move ever.

[Irishtom29]

Originally Posted by Bellamouse

This is simply not true...

A poor rebuttal. Not true in <your> case. You answered an argument about broad trends with an example about one incident about yourself; just because you moved for a different reason than stated in Frank's argument doesn't make his argument invalid, understand?

I moved down here for the weather and to live by the beach, but that doesn't make Frank's views invalid either.

[NealIRC]

While Irishtom29 is absolutely correct about statistical arguments, I think Bellamouse and Frank are still talking about different things.

Frank is talking about cases where people are looking for a job. If somebody is willing to hire you in Chicago, you're willing to relocate. And if you are already in Chicago and someone is willing to hire you elsewhere, you will relocate elsewhere.

And for someone who's about to retire, well the rules on relocating are different aren't they.