Should Phoenix try to encourage hip young professionals to move here? (employment, construction)

[Valley Native]

Originally Posted by BIG CATS

What PHX needs to do is attract big business. Think of companies like Boeing, Meritor, etc. Those are what drive the economy. Those are what put us on the map. Those are the people making a difference in the world. We don't need skinny-jeaned, beanie-wearing, Starbucks-addicted, dreadlock-havin, Goodwill shirt-wearin hipsters peddling their useless junk in once-unique neighborhoods.

We need to be like Chicago or NYC. Keep the ethnic neighborhoods the way they are, unique. Visit them, enjoy the restaurants, soak in the ambience. I LOVED visiting little Warsaw, Chinatown, little Germany, etc, in Chicago. It was so much better than hipster areas like Wicker Park.

Agreed 100%! If Phoenix was more focused on attracting big business and professionals, we would be more nationally and globally recognized in a positive way. Not only that, but the real estate prices would likely increase at a better rate where sellers can make a decent profit. Phoenix can still be a cool, happening place without the so called hipster aspect. I also agree with the various neighborhoods like Little Italy and Chinatown ... they are also a part of what makes a city cultured and unique.

Originally Posted by BIG CATS

I'd rather visit dive joints in Maryvale and eat authentic cuisine made by locals than see hipsters take over and set up yet another lame microbrewery or record store.

Can't agree with this. Generally speaking, Maryvale is an area to stay the hell out of, not visit.

[More Rock]

Hip young professionals are overrated. I saw them **** up San Francisco in the late 90s, and they came back after a few years, and then again after the Great Recession, to further **** it up. Now it's unlivable.

[Burkmere]

Originally Posted by More Rock

Hip young professionals are overrated. I saw them **** up San Francisco in the late 90s, and they came back after a few years, and then again after the Great Recession, to further **** it up. Now it's unlivable.

Yes, indeed it is.

[New Horizons]

Originally Posted by BIG CATS

Don't get me started on hipsters, I could go all day.

You're just like Hank Hill!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x368MUQJg

[Burkmere]

Originally Posted by New Horizons

You're just like Hank Hill!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x368MUQJg

"They walk slowly because they got no place to be man."

Funny. No offense to the hipsters, but it's still funny.

[Thomasaz]

Phoenix will never garner the same interest that big cities have among young professionals. That will never happen. This is more of a place for people to buy affordable housing and live a comfortable life, which is becoming harder to find in more populated and desirable states. Phoenix and it's outer suburbs should try to develop its urban cores to at least accommodate those who do want to live in a more urban environment and to develop some culture. I look at Austin, which is located in an area with abundant land like Phoenix and it's quite possible that there will be a lesser version of that in Central Phoenix. The chances of the rest of the Valley becoming appealing for non-suburban reasons are very slim.

[Thomasaz]

Originally Posted by BIG CATS

Artsy areas are fine... as long as the art is, well, art, and not the minimalistic modern trash that hipsters try to pass off on the sorry suckers who buy it. Sorry, but placing a chair with a brick on it and calling it "art" is pathetic, and that's the kind of junk you see in hipster 'hoods (Ive personally seen it in Chicago). The bulk of the art we see along Roosevelt is rather embarrassing. If one wants a unique artist enclave, look no further than Santa Fe. The gypsy/hippie vibe there is strong, but its dare I say "classy". It attracts people from all over the world. No one from London is going to say "hey, I need to go to Phoenix to see Roosevelt Row!" Why? Because its mainstream, and not really unique at all. Painting murals on walls, putting in more coffee shops, and erecting trendy apartments is seen everywhere these days. It isn't unique to Roosevelt Row at all. Old school interesting neighborhoods are being replaced with this nonsense and it sucks! And all these people moving there are just driving up rent and will soon force out people who cant afford to rent a shoddily-built apartment with paper thin walls with trendy exposed duct work for $2K a month. Another thing I don't understand is the crowd that Roosevelt attracts proclaims they "like diversity", yet they transform entire blocks into white bread garbage that the locals eventually loathe, at times displacing entire minority groups in the process. Going one step further (and even better still) is how you read the reviews on Yelp about places near Roosevelt that hipsters move to, and many complain about the homeless and vandalism, etc, in the area. lololol

I agree with this wholeheartedly. Roosevelt Row is a poor excuse of "revitalization." I expect that area to become increasingly corporate anyway. Not that I have much sympathy for the losers who call themselves "artists" fighting to "preserve" the neighborhood. The only thing they want to preserve is the cheap rent for themselves and the white homogeneous hipster snob society. I doubt they care about the low income minorities that tried to survive in that forgotten area before they invaded it for selfish reasons.

[new2colo]

Originally Posted by BIG CATS

No. We don't want that. I agree with what you wrote, and his observations echo mine.


What we need are business-driven professionals. We need clean cut, educated, forward-thinking individuals. We don't want to attract hipsters, trust me. Here's why...


Hipsters move in to decaying 'hoods. They add their goofy coffee shops, t-shirt stores, art galleries, bad microbreweries, etc, which in turn attract even more hipsters. This drives up rent and housing costs in the area, pushing out the "natives". Now what you're left with is a shiny, new, gleaming few blocks of hipster BS, usually surrounded by run down hoods. It looks bad and make the locals resent them.


Now, one might ask why I'm against hipstervilles and the business they bring in? Because THEY ALL LOOK THE SAME. If you've seen one, you've seen em all. If you've seen one hipster, you've seen em all. There is nothing unique about them or their storefronts. Their "art" isn't art in many peoples' eyes. Their coffee is usually garbage. Their bicycles are overpriced, under engineered pieces of junk (but hey! Its got yellow wheels and a beer holder!!!). Their beers are subpar. Let these hipsters have Austin, Portland, Seattle, etc. They've essentially turned those cities from "weird" to average/goofy.


What PHX needs to do is attract big business. Think of companies like Boeing, Meritor, etc. Those are what drive the economy. Those are what put us on the map. Those are the people making a difference in the world. We don't need skinny-jeaned, beanie-wearing, Starbucks-addicted, dreadlock-havin, Goodwill shirt-wearin hipsters peddling their useless junk in once-unique neighborhoods.


We need to be like Chicago or NYC. Keep the ethnic neighborhoods the way they are, unique. Visit them, enjoy the restaurants, soak in the ambience. I LOVED visiting little Warsaw, Chinatown, little Germany, etc, in Chicago. It was so much better than hipster areas like Wicker Park. I'd rather visit dive joints in Maryvale and eat authentic cuisine made by locals than see hipsters take over and set up yet another lame microbrewery or record store.

Professionals tend to earn higher salaries than the median income for the area, so your whole tangential argument about hipsters driving up housing costs would happen anyway. There will always be a contingent of people who want to live in a more urban environment. They demand high end apartments, which causes gentrification.

Phoenix will never attract a glut of high paying jobs. Too many people here ignore the reputation Arizona has gained over the past handful of decades as a place that's full of retirees, racists, poor schools and people who live here solely for the winter weather and relatively low cost of living. As much as people here might try to refute that the Phoenix area is full of geriatric, angry racists, it's unfortunately the reputation Phoenix holds with a lot of millennials who are not familiar with the area. We are not on an equal playing ground with other cities. Every other major city in the region has a higher GDP per capita than Phoenix. The economy here is not as strong as it should be for a city of this size. Plus, Phoenix is known nationally for cheap labor. Call centers, construction, retail, distribution centers, travel/tourism and fast food seem to be the biggest employment sectors out here.

Phoenix will forever be overshadowed by LA and to a smaller, but still significant extent, Houston, Denver, Austin and Dallas.

[Minntoaz]

Well I hate to be the bearer of bad news but they're coming. It's the last affordable place for Millenials which in essence means our friends the hipsters will also be flocking here as rents increase in their meccas. Seattle.... having just lived there for a year, there is no way a barista could afford a studio apartment let alone ever buy a condo, even. Denver appears to be heading in that direction as well. Also I've certainly seen a LOT more freestanding coffee shops and little hippy type restaurants since moving back. Sorry y'all.

[GSR13]

Originally Posted by Minntoaz

Well I hate to be the bearer of bad news but they're coming. It's the last affordable place for Millenials which in essence means our friends the hipsters will also be flocking here as rents increase in their meccas. Seattle.... having just lived there for a year, there is no way a barista could afford a studio apartment let alone ever buy a condo, even. Denver appears to be heading in that direction as well. Also I've certainly seen a LOT more freestanding coffee shops and little hippy type restaurants since moving back. Sorry y'all.

All the more reason to Don your MAGA gear at these new establishments.