[Giesela]

Even more interesting are the links on the right side to other articles

Bridge

[Tyryztoll]

It's a vacation region. There's never going to be bustling industry up there that isn't tied to either that, food service, or the medical field.

I worked at the Petoskey hospital for 7 years. Single when I arrived, married with 4 kids when I left. I miss the area badly, but that hospital was always in dire straits financially, and I knew I could provide better for us with more money plus greater stability in a bigger metro. That's exactly how it's been since. We also left because we wanted our kids to have more/better opportunities available to them locally once they got older.

That said, many of my former co-workers have families, have been more than content to take what they get, and will never leave unless pushed out. Nothing wrong with that. It's a beautiful, safe place to be, but you have to take it for what it is. What it ISN'T is a young persons launching pad toward success, and I don't see that aspect of things changing there.

[Serious Conversation]

I don't see why it doesn't try to capitalize off its outdoors base more. There are a lot of young people going places largely because of the excellent outdoors scene. Michigan doesn't even register for most folks in that regard.

[Giesela]

Honestly I think that article could be written about most rural areas in the country that isn't within a couple hundred miles of the coast or near a big inland city like Minneapolis or Denver. Or maybe near smaller inland cities like Green Bay, of which there are few with hospitals in Michigan. But as usual its just a bit worse in Michigan, partly I think because we are a peninsula. So not only is it far north but you have to go way north or south and around to string along from Madison/Milwaukee to Minneapolis or Omaha or Pittsburgh etc. Canary in the coal mine is the way I look at it. I have been seriously considering retiring in the nothern mitten. This makes me feel stupid. But there you go