Tag Archives: remote workers

Who is driving newfound Midwestern population growth?

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I wrote in January about the modestly increasing population in the Midwest and this piece from yesterday suggests housing affordability is behind the change. Let’s say this is true and it is more than a one or two year pattern: more people are moving to the Midwest and they are doing so because they can still get good housing for less than $350,000. Who exactly are these movers? Some speculation from yesterday’s piece:

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Take Rockford, the most popular housing market from the Zillow report. Although it’s within easy driving distance of Chicago, the average home value is about $170,000, to Chicago’s $300,000. A hybrid worker could conceivably work from Chicago a day or two a week while paying much less for a house than if they lived in the city. The same goes for Milwaukee, which is also an hour and a half from Chicago…

In addition to proximity to a large city, what distinguishes bright spots such as Columbus and Indianapolis from less desirable midwestern cities is the availability of good-paying jobs. After all, few people can buy a house, even for $300,000, if they can’t find work nearby. According to OSU’s Partridge, the midwestern cities that were less reliant on manufacturing in the 1950s are the ones doing well now. These places were never dependent on factory jobs, so they were better able to weather the steep decline in U.S. manufacturing that began decades ago. “Because they had a more service-oriented composition of businesses, they did much better,” Partridge said. Today, these cities offer plentiful finance, tech, and health-care jobs. JPMorganChase employs 18,000 people in Columbus, for example; the pharmaceutical company Lilly is headquartered in Indianapolis.

Two kinds of people are referenced: people who work remotely at least part-time and those who can access good-paying white collar jobs. This may require certain levels of education and/or job experience.

For years, I have read discussions about how Americans who need cheaper housing could move to places with cheaper housing. Particularly in comparison to the most expensive housing markets, often on the coasts, there is decent housing to be had in other places. This is easier than it looks. People have ties to particular social and family networks as well as places. Additionally, if a lot of people moved to these cheaper places, this drives the prices up.

What might a more accurate version of this story be (and someone must have some data to support or counter this)? Something like: those with some resources and education can move to the Midwest for particular jobs and take advantage of comparatively cheaper housing compared to high-priced housing markets. This means this potential opportunity is not necessarily available to everyone.

Town, gown, and attracting remote workers

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Two universities, Purdue and West Virginia are hoping remote workers might like the community to be found in college towns:

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Universities have long hosted corporate incubators, but the new programs represent another way the pandemic has shifted the way colleges think about who works on campus, and why. Many universities are considering how employees’ desires for remote work will affect their own human-resources policies. These colleges, however, are making a play for other people’s employees, showing that campuses will both influence and be affected by this major shift in where Americans live and work.

Purdue is set to hold a visitors’ weekend for a small group of applicants for a so-called “remote-working community” in the campus’s business-and-research park, which is operated by the university’s research foundation and a development company. These people will uproot their lives — some with a deal-sweetening $5,000 — to move to West Lafayette, Ind. They can live at discounted rates in housing built in the Purdue park and access campus facilities, including the library and a co-working space…

West Virginia University and its state’s tourism agency are teaming up to try to recruit outdoor enthusiasts to Morgantown, Shepherdstown, and Lewisburg. The campus is offering free certifications — in remote work or remote management — through its business school. Other incentives, backed by donors and the state, include $12,000 in cash over two years, the subsidizing of activities like skiing and rafting, and co-working space and social programming…

Remote employees want to be in places with amenities — locations with “substantial infrastructure” and a “built-in community,” said Evan Hock, co-founder of MakeMyMove, which promotes incentive packages for relocations and has listed the offerings of both West Virginia and Purdue. The company and Purdue developed the incentive package together, he said. He expects college towns to hold these employees’ interest, he said. “Ultimately, the bet that the university is making is that more smart people in a region is better.”

This assumes, of course, that colleges will be back to their thriving residential centers this upcoming year and in the near future. During COVID-19, college towns may not have been much better than many other locations in the United States regarding finding community.

Another factor in favor of this idea: with the period of emerging adulthood where college graduates have years after graduation to settle in to college life, more might appreciate being around some of the things they liked about college. This could help the transition by providing access to college energy and activities without the same day-to-day schedule.

However, I do not think it is a surprise that these two schools are featured in this story. How many college graduates, even from these schools, want to stick around in these locations? In contrast, would schools like UCLA or NYU want to offer such programs? The incentives are being offered to attract workers to western Indiana and West Virginia because they are the kinds of places even remote workers might not consider. Remote workers can go a lot of places but they also probably follow popular patterns of where Americans would go if they could.