Some interesting thoughts . . . (long) (Denver: environment, debt, wages)

[jazzlover]

I was talking to a friend of mine the other day. One of his in-laws had just returned to Colorado’s Front Range from a 2 year assignment working in Mexico. The fellow worked for an American company and he spent time in several locales in Mexico during his tenure there. My friend related the following comments from him—I’ll try to paraphrase.

My friend’s in-law got the conversation going by saying, “If you want to know what Colorado and the Front Range is going to look like pretty soon, you should look at Mexico now.” My friend was intrigued by this comment and pressed his in-law to explain. His explanation went something like this:

Mexico’s basic problem is that its population is expanding at a much greater rate than it has resources or infrastructure available to support it. Water supplies are a serious problem in many of the most populated cities in the country. (Does this sound familiar?) The central government, rife with inefficiency (and corruption) for decades, is no where near up to the task of trying to address the problems the country faces. For decades, the economy has been dominated by foreign companies, with much of the profits of their operations diverted out of the country. Natural resources were often savagely exploited, with little regard to local populations or the natural environment. With many of those resources now depleted, many areas have sunk back into abject poverty. Tourism has become an increasingly important part of the economy, but much of the profits from it leave the country and most of the jobs it provides are at menial wages.

When the discussion turned to transportation, more interesting observations were made. Mexico followed the US’s unwise path, and dismantled its railroad passenger system in the 1990’s. Unlike the US, most middle-class families in Mexico can only afford one car, usually a small sedan or old used American sedan. In rural areas, pickups are common, but again usually one per family. Many, if not most Mexicans in the lower middle class or below can not afford a car. Despite the relative paucity of cars for the Mexico population per capita when compared with the number of cars per capita in the US, the Mexican highway system is totally overwhelmed by traffic in its major and even medium-sized cities—with virtually no hope of the infrastructure ever catching up. Unlike the US, Mexico funds most of its intercity highways by collecting tolls, and those tolls are high—often unaffordable to many Mexicans. With no intercity passenger rail transport and the high cost of driving, Mexico relies on an extensive bus network to transport people about the country.

This transportation system has had profound effects on the economic and social landscape of the country. Populations are concentrated towards city centers—even in smaller communities. Walkable shopping areas within neighborhoods are common. Even “suburbs” tend to have much higher housing densities. A medium-size urban area in Mexico could easily have 5 or 10 times the population density per square mile of a Colorado metro area. This fellow noted that most people living in rural Mexico lived there because they had to in order to make a living. Living “in the country” just for the peace and quiet was reserved for a very few affluent Mexicans (and a few ex-pat Americans). Living conditions away from the metropolitan areas could be quite primitive. Unemployment in the rural areas is severe, and many rural residents would migrate to the over-crowded cities (or north to the US) every year.

Now, anyone who has spent much time in Mexico would have undoubtedly observed all of this. What this fellow was saying is that all of the factors that have been present in Mexico for many decades to make that place what it is are NOW coming into play in places like Colorado: rapidly expanding populations that are taxing resources to the limit—especially water supplies, rapid exploitation of natural resources with little regard to the local population or to the future, over-reliance on tourism as an economic activity, an increasingly unbalanced and unsustainable transportation system, and exploding urban/suburban populations.

This gentleman concluded his conversation with my friend by saying the Mexico is one of the most beautiful and interesting places he had ever been. He also said that many of its locales, especially in the mountainous portions of the country, very much reminded him of Colorado. He was truly both saddened and frightened to see what out-of-control growth—REALLY out-of-control growth, as he put it—could do to a place. He thought it a pretty fair harbinger of what could lie ahead for much of the US Rocky Mountain and Southwest regions if current trends continue.

I throw all of this out here for the sake of discussion. I wish I had been at the table with this fellow when he was talking about all of this--I can think of about a hundred questions I would have liked to ask.

[vegaspilgrim]

So how do you advocate that we stop growth, jazzlover? That we all get a vasectomy?

[Sea Level]

What percentage of the Mexican population has a college education? What percentage of Mexico's population is entreprenurial?

As bad as our politicians are they don't even begin to approach the level of corruption routine in Mexico.

Why is Mexico's infratsructure so bad? Do you see the cause or the effect? There are billions of possible reasons for the problems you report and billions more possible futrues for the United States. In only a tiny portion of those futures do we resemble current day Mexico.

[Katiana]

I agree. Just what is this person's credentials for making this assessment, other than having lived in Mexico?

[Bob from down south]

Although there are some less than happy similarities between front-range growth and growth in Mexico City, there are enough differences that I think this fails as an analog.

Mexico City and Santiago Chile (where I live now), like other large metropoli in Central/South America grew on a sort of economic nucleus model, where the only real benefits of civilization were to be found concentrated in the cities. Denver, and the other front range cities, have origins as frontier outposts along the axis of advance in the expansion west to the Pacific as the U.S. pursued its manifest destiny.

I think that difference in origins...outpost on the way to somewhere else, versus center of an urban vortex...shaped things much differently. You can see it in the highway system, for example, where I-25 and I-70 provide high-volume road networks from Denver to all four compass cardinals...it's a city on the way to somewhere else. There's no need for the kind of concentration we see in the DF and Santiago, as geography does not constrain population growth to an increasing density situation.

There are lots of social differences I see as well...the front range is not largely Catholic, with its social tendencies towards large and unconstrained familiar growth. Propensity to obey laws which form the structure of social order is not nearly as developed in Latin America--in Mexico City and Santiago, people think nothing of tapping into electrical networks for free, crowding onto busses and trains without paying fares, and building without regard for the volumes of building codes that are largely ignored. And don't get me started on the absolute disregard for anything resembling a traffic law down here. People in Latin America tend to do what they want to do without regard to laws or what impact it might have on the guy in the town/house/car next door.

While we are pressing resources in the front range, I think it is our social coherence and (relatively) law-abiding nature that will allow necessary, albeit painful, regulation to manage things in a liveable manner, much better than we have seen in the Distrito Federal or even this somewhat better-groomed capital in the Andes.

Lots of things to worry about...this one doesn't warrant a spot on my list right now.

[jazzlover]

As I said, I just threw this out for discussion. One thing I do disagree with in Bob's reply (and I don't disagree with him often) is concerning Americans' "relatively law-abiding nature." Despite our prosperity of late, there is growing disregard of order and law in many aspects of modern American society. If we enter a protracted period of economic contraction and resource scarcity (particularly oil), I think the petina of law-abiding civility in this country could wear pretty thin in a big hurry. I also think a large reason for disregard for law and authority in many countries, including Mexico, is the widespread perception in those places that government is ineffectual in dealing with the challenges facing much of the general population--the government is no longer perceived as being "relevant." Given the right circumstances, I think that could happen here quite easily.

Bob's assumptions about transportation patterns also deserve some scrutiny. I absolutely agree with him that transportation patterns in the American West grew up around a different model than Mexico's--BUT that US model was based on cheap energy and a highway system built with massive subsidies and taxpayer money--much of it not from the region. What happens when the cheap energy is gone and the pork barrel isn't full to maintain the system. I think the West's transportation system--such as it might be--could start looking like Mexico's real fast when that happens.

Finally, (and I digress off-topic for a moment here) as someone else mentioned--the education issue. It is true that there are a great number of relatively uneducated people in Mexico. Here in the US, we increasingly pretend to semi-educate people, give them a diploma (sometimes even a college diploma) when--in fact--they are barely educated enough to function in society. As an employer, I've seen plenty of "educated" people who couldn't fill out an application, couldn't write a coherent sentence, couldn't solve a simple math problem, or couldn't read even beyond an elementary school level. A teacher I know gave an 8th grade english reading and comprehension test from 1920 to a group of college graduates (some fellow teachers!)--over half of them flunked it! I think our education system has some real problems--when all of those semi-educated folks actually have to compete for jobs in a tightening market and against better-educated people from other countries (that's already happening), we are going to have a big societal problem, too. We ain't the top dog, anymore.

[Bob from down south]

Originally Posted by jazzlover

Despite our prosperity of late, there is growing disregard of order and law in many aspects of modern American society. If we enter a protracted period of economic contraction and resource scarcity (particularly oil), I think the petina of law-abiding civility in this country could wear pretty thin in a big hurry. I also think a large reason for disregard for law and authority in many countries, including Mexico, is the widespread perception in those places that government is ineffectual in dealing with the challenges facing much of the general population--the government is no longer perceived as being "relevant." Given the right circumstances, I think that could happen here quite easily.

I think you're right in that there's an increase in crime, but I still observe that the overwhelming majority of Americans don't steal, ask for or give bribes for everyday services, or run red lights just because they feel like it.

I think it has much more to do with enforcement and justice systems...although I'm no fanboy when it comes to the US courts, I'm dismayed to see criminals being set free almost as fast as the police can catch them by liberal judges down here. Run a red light with a cop on the corner in Anywhere USA, and you're gonna at the very least write out a big check. Here, they blow off the law with impunity...often right in front of the police.

Originally Posted by jazzlover

I absolutely agree with him that transportation patterns in the American West grew up around a different model than Mexico's--BUT that US model was based on cheap energy and a highway system built with massive subsidies and taxpayer money--much of it not from the region. What happens when the cheap energy is gone and the pork barrel isn't full to maintain the system. I think the West's transportation system--such as it might be--could start looking like Mexico's real fast when that happens.

My point, though, is that cities and society were organized based on different paradigms. Although I agree that transportation costs are likely to transform how we organize working/living arrangements in the future--in terms of physical layout--I think we're a long way from seeing the largest cities sucking in huge proportions of the country's population like down here. To put it in perspective, in Chile, over 45% of the country's population lives in the Santiago metro area. Over 80% live in the top five cities. This country is 3,000 nm long. There are enormous expanses of undeveloped open space. The US has a much better developed rural culture...and one that I think may thrive as an alternative way of life as energy supplies dwindle.

Originally Posted by jazzlover

Finally, (and I digress off-topic for a moment here) as someone else mentioned--the education issue. It is true that there are a great number of relatively uneducated people in Mexico. Here in the US, we increasingly pretend to semi-educate people, give them a diploma (sometimes even a college diploma) when--in fact--they are barely educated enough to function in society.

Well, certainly we could--and should--do better educating our children. But I've been all around this planet, and for all its faults, we in the U.S. still have a public education system that's light-years ahead of what's available to the majority of the world's kids. The Chileans are struggling with this now...basically their system of public education isn't well-enough resourced to prepare children to pass college entrance exams. So the rich kids that go to private schools crowd out the children of the lower and middle classes. Two years ago, Chilean parents and students were rioting in the streets for the ability to have just a few of the sorts of opportunities available to any child attending even the worst South Chicago public school.

[jazzlover]

Good points, Bob. One thing that I don't find much comfort in is the fact that we may be better off than many other places, but that we are losing ground against the standards we used to hold for ourselves. That is not a good trend. And, compared to some countries, we are really losing ground. In education, especially, there are numerous countries that are producing educated people that run circles around most Americans. I don't think that it's because we Americans are any less intelligent than anyone else, we've just gotten lazy.

[golfgod]

Just a few random ramblings on this. We humans have a looooong history of "fouling our own nest", and then moving on. Over the next river, mountain or whatever. Due to their (apparently) unlimited supply land and natural resources were used up as quickly as we could do so.

As we've run out of both of these that could not be had for (close to) free by dispossessing the current inhabitants, a lot of regional, national and international tensions have popped up.

Unfortunately we also have a long history of ignoring problems until the become too big. Then we jump into panic mode and demand that "someone" do "something".

I'm of the opinion that we are all "someone". About 2 years ago we began a (to most Americans) draconion water usage habit in our house. Of course in the "normal" American way of charging for resources we were severely penalized for doing so. I notice that the billing system in Colorado where we will be living in another 11 days does not penalize us as badly.

I would like to see some local, state or national politicians stand up and say, "we can't keep doing this", if for no other reason than this severe of international balance of payments deficit is going to turn us into from a debtor nation into a colony of our financial backers.

I suggest everyone get and read "Collapse", by Jared Diamond. Pay particular attention to the differences between Haiti and The Dominican Republic. They share an island but the do not share laws toward the use of natural resources. While the Dominicans may have suffered some short term added costs under their policies the differences between the two nations' standard of living is dramatic.

Let's all start doing something, NOW.

golfgod

[Katiana]

there are numerous countries that are producing educated people that run circles around most Americans.

Which countries are they? Most European countries weed out kids sometime between ages 10-13, and only a select few go to college. India has a college educated group, but lots of poverty. Just a few examples.