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raxnbury t1_j9gwzxg wrote

I’m not really clear on what some people want. NH is the second oldest state just behind Maine in median age. There is a decent amount of brain drain as younger people leave the state for college, especially given the cost of UNH.

I’m convinced there’s a block that just wants NH to be a giant retirement community. It appears as though most younger NH citizens prefer denser more populated areas with more to do than your average “New England small town”. What’s the plan if you don’t want people from out of state moving here? Who’s going to fill the jobs or take care of the aging population?

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BlackJesus420 t1_j9haswh wrote

People are largely hostile to anyone from out of state buying homes here. Many also view anyone coming from Mass as another vote for the Dems, though historically Mass has sent us their GOP refugees.

I’m with you though. We’re doing better than the other two northern New England states with some of what you mentioned, but it’s easy to see NH just stagnating as cold Florida.

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-Codfish_Joe t1_j9i434a wrote

>People are largely hostile to anyone from out of state buying homes here.

But they're also hostile to anyone building houses. And somehow they want someone to sell them an iced coffee...

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PutThatOnYourPlate t1_j9jftee wrote

I don’t think the people building or buying houses are doing that off of the salary they make at Dunkin’s.

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-Codfish_Joe t1_j9jhub1 wrote

If they need somewhere to live, they're pushing Dunkin's people out of the market.

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raxnbury t1_j9i5r4h wrote

Well duh, should be high schoolers doing that.

Shit did I need the /s?

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AnythingToAvoidWork t1_j9l3f9a wrote

There's a startlingly large number of people on this sub who unironically support an organization that wants to remove child labor laws, so its better save than sorry to throw the /s lol

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jdkeith t1_j9mcm0z wrote

Unironically yes, but we also need younger people here, but we don't need douche woke younger people here - so it's a balancing act.

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lellololes t1_j9jhosr wrote

Too many people look at someone that lives 20 miles away moving over an imaginary line as if it's terrible or something. It's just normal movement of people and it happens everywhere.

You'd think that the way some people sound, that NH is the fastest growing state in the union or something (plot twist, we aren't, and it's not close)

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jdkeith t1_j9mcx27 wrote

> an imaginary line

It is an imaginary line but it gives people on one side of it imaginary rights like voting in people who have imaginary powers to make imaginary rules which cops enforce with non-imaginary guns.

The problem is the same with any immigration - and one which people on this sub are salty about regarding Free Staters - people who live somewhere want to gatekeep the culture of the area, and I don't think they're wrong to want that.

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AnythingToAvoidWork t1_j9l4sxh wrote

> People are largely hostile to anyone from out of state buying homes here

I wouldn't say I'm hostile to it, but I do find it a little galling that people who have lived here their whole lives are being uprooted for transplants. I'd say people are hostile to wealth gobbling up our homes.

Don't even get me started on short-term rentals, investment properties and vacation homes.

We need to do something that allows NH natives or first time home buyers have a competing chance vs outside wealth.

I don't know what that is, unfortunately.

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Lords_of_Lands t1_j9obe3z wrote

I don't know if anything has changed, but a few years ago homes on the MLS were reserved to first time buyers for a short time before anyone else could submit offers on them.

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General-Silver-4004 t1_j9vj5y9 wrote

Yeah it sucks. It’s the same shit that happened ten years ago because jobs paid better in MA and required in person.

First time homebuyer programs aren’t going to solve the eclipse of wealth being introduced by outsiders. Things are worth what they’re worth and we live in a national / global economy.

So yeah idk the answer or the way the tide will flow or what’s “most just.”

Maybe fthb programs provide a ring on the ladder. Or maybe they set you up for a non preforming loan / poverty. But the difference is more trivial than it’s made out to be.

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draggar t1_j9jky8s wrote

>People are largely hostile to anyone from out of state buying homes here.

I've also seen the opposite - people moving here from out of state being very hostile and pretentious towards the people who grew up here.

Also, more than once I've heard this from someone who moved here from Mass:

I moved here because I don't like the way Mass is run. Also, the state is run the wrong way, it needs to be run like Mass.

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mamercus-sargeras t1_j9hp7qy wrote

I don't really know the right solution to attract more productive young people. A lot of the issue just has to do with the housing stock being inappropriate for what most young people want and can afford, which is a nationwide problem. In our town, we've had one apartment building conversion go well, but the forces of NIMBY defeated another proposed development on the basis that the town needed "more forest." NH's issue isn't necessarily jobs (apart from professional white collar jobs anywhere that isn't the south), but that the housing stock for the productive slices of the population just isn't there.

I moved from NYC about a decade ago and I vote straight GOP every election even when I know the candidate is a criminal, a degenerate, or both.

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lMickNastyl t1_j9hv4vm wrote

Saying that a town in NH needs more forest is like saying the Atlantic needs more water.

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raxnbury t1_j9hvhwt wrote

You’re fighting people that are either independently wealthy or have a really healthy retirement and don’t want any new development to up their cost of living.

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lMickNastyl t1_j9hw146 wrote

Ya the boomer generation really missed the part where you're supposed to set the table for the next generation. We don't want free food but I swear that boomer mentality is all about eating everything on the table and leaving as little as possible.

I've met plenty of generous older folks and many selfish young ones. But that toxic thinking is something you usually see from the retiree crowd.

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MagicalPeanut t1_j9ii6bq wrote

>on't really know the right solution to attract more productive young people. A lot of the issue just has to do with the housing stock being inappropriate for what most young people want and can afford, which is a nationwide problem. In our town, we've had one apartment building conversion go well, but the forces of NIMBY defeated another proposed development on the basis that the town needed

The problem is 100% jobs. The jobs go where the people go, and the people are in cities.

Are you a young college student from MIT looking for an internship? In Boston you're looking at Nvidia, Adobe, Dell, AMD, IBM, and so on. Looking for a tech job in New Hampshire? Good luck. Boston is also packed with hospitals for medical school students. The only noteworthy teaching hospital in New Hampshire is in the middle of nowhere.

Is there a housing problem? Yes, but it's for the people living in New Hampshire and working in New Hampshire. My company can't hire software engineers fast enough, even when starting fresh out of college with 0 experience $90k +$10k singing bonuses. Unfortunately not everyone can can work remotely, but the people that can can outbid 90% in this state—getting those talented young people up here would be no problem if there was work for them.

For scale, I got offered a job for $85k in this state but am making $130k working remotely for a company in Massachusetts (no income tax either btw). I'd probably be around $180k if I wanted to commute but I ain't about that life. So I work for a slave wage because I choose to live and work from up here, but I'm still far better off than most people in NH where I'd be just one of many in Cambridge.

Per the article: I'd like to see a survey from the people choosing to move up here from Massachusetts. Are they remote workers doing what I do? Or are they GOP migrants that are uneducated and couldn't afford to live down there?

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no0bslayer9 t1_j9iiyx9 wrote

You calling 130k a slave wage is the most offensive thing about this thread

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MagicalPeanut t1_j9ijzfc wrote

It's all relative based on where you are, and what field you work in.

Lower-middle class Americans all live like kings if you ask 50% of the rest of the world. Then compare this area to somewhere where $160k base salary + $90k year 1 signing bonus + $80k year 2 signing bonus + $400k worth of RSUs vested over 4 years (5%, 15%, 40%, 40%) is the norm and we are just drops in a bucket. Everything scales. The easiest way to find success post-pandemic is to work for as competitive of a company as you can find while living in the cheapest area they will let you move to.

(btw I meant it kind of half-jokingly but sarcasm doesn't always translate well)

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AnythingToAvoidWork t1_j9l48t9 wrote

If you can quit your job and easily walk into another job within a month and not worry about running out of money it's quite literally not a "slave wage" job.

This is so embarrassingly out of touch. Comparing min/maxing finances with wage slavery is the douchiest thing I've read in a long time.

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stonewallmike t1_j9hh29d wrote

People just don’t think things through. I’m preparing a speech for my town meeting to try to explain that the conclusion of their NIMBYism is insolvency. We can’t control the price of goods and labor. If they want the roads plowed and potholes fixed (which they complain about incessantly on Facebook) they have two choices: higher taxes or more taxpayers.

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raxnbury t1_j9hjskb wrote

I was just reading an article about Warner that was similar. Literally no houses for sale at all. The community is aging and trying to figure out what to do but their zoning laws basically stop any new building. So you get this feedback loop of lifers complaint that they’re on a fixed budget because they’re retired. They also don’t want to leave the place they’ve lived which I get. But if you won’t let people build, and nobody wants to leave, inevitably you’re going to hit a wall.

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Psychological_Yak644 t1_j9hzjsq wrote

A lot of the people pushing back aren’t lifers…. They just hate change. One family who has been here for CENTURIES actually want to find a way to fix it; they understand that a town can’t continue to thrive without change. The irony and hypocrisy of a lot of it is just mind boggling. Join the Warner fb page and you’ll see so much ridiculous vitriol over the smallest nonsense.

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bonanzapineapple t1_j9hzrzt wrote

Yeah, I mean at some point you reach the situation where there are no jobs anywhere near a town, so then no working people want to move there. Like a long of socio economic phenomenons, it's a vicious cycle!

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raxnbury t1_j9i0229 wrote

It’s legit though. I can only afford to be where I am here because I work for a company out of Forth Worth. 100% remote with travel.

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lellololes t1_j9jhy5g wrote

This is happening all over rural Japan, and it's not pretty. All the kids leave, because they literally need to.

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Intru t1_j9ifh9o wrote

I love to read it when your done, this is something I'm also Greatly concerned about.

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bonanzapineapple t1_j9hzjw5 wrote

I mean when referencing "things to do" and denser housing, historically that's how NH been. It's really only been the past 60 years that housing has been so far from jobs and you need a car to get around.

But as a young person I guess I'm proving your point...

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Intru t1_j9ig0cg wrote

This is something that doesn't get talked about enough most our towns where denser until suburbanization rolled in and then closed the development gate behind them while also inexplicable not allowing towns and city center to keep it's density. Then we pretend we lived in the woods but most of us live in suburbs and depend on suburban amenities for goods and services.

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bonanzapineapple t1_j9kj03d wrote

Yep! If you're not a subsistence farmer you need at least a grocery store near you. Single use zoning is far more uncommon than I wish it was in NH

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General-Silver-4004 t1_j9vjne2 wrote

“Pretend we live in the woods” sums up so many of the social and economic problems.

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UncleRicosWig t1_j9hk5t8 wrote

Build the wall

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raxnbury t1_j9hkb4x wrote

That wall to keep people out? Or keep young people in?

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UncleRicosWig t1_j9hlgt7 wrote

I don’t know man, it’s a joke. I don’t always take this place seriously

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raxnbury t1_j9hllpk wrote

I actually laughed cuz it kills 2 birds with one stone!

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UncleRicosWig t1_j9hmg3s wrote

lol I always looked at it keeping flat landers out, but keeping young educated in is a bonus

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raxnbury t1_j9hnk5v wrote

Man, flatlanders are so weird. I was out in the upper Midwest for work a couple weeks ago. Drove from Indianapolis to Columbus and my god is it weird out there. The best was the billboards, “adult superstore!” “Jesus saves” “abortion kills babies” “guns’r’us” just on repeat. Meanwhile every little “town” I drove through half the buildings and houses were boarded up and falling down.

You ever been up to graft on county? Basically the same lol

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CactusCoffee3 t1_j9jkr78 wrote

Basing the Midwest on billboards and small towns eh? Theres so much diversity in the Midwest so summing it up by a drive through cities isn’t fair. The cities are so different from the country there…. It’s like night and day

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raxnbury t1_j9jm5os wrote

I’ve travelled all over the Midwest. The cities are nice and I enjoy visiting. It’s the small dead towns scattered absolutely everywhere that look like they’re stuck 30 years in the past is what I was talking about. I don’t consider the larger city people “flatlanders”.

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Quirky_Butterfly_946 t1_j9jrzhp wrote

NH does not have a lot of businesses beyond small businesses that do not offer any real income or opportunity. Sure there are the trade businesses, but that is not always where people want to go or end up starting their own business. Looking for a new job myself and there is little offered where people can move around a company and get better wages.

IMHO, jobs are male oriented if you want to make a decent living. Either that or you better have a masters/PhD specific career that has jobs here.

However, there is a doubled edge sword with better jobs comes more people.

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soh_amore t1_j9kvy9s wrote

‘Massholes stfu don’t move here in NH’ Also ‘Massholes please visit Nashua and Merrimack and do your shopping here, support us’

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raxnbury t1_j9kwob0 wrote

I think what they really mean is they don’t want to participate in modern society. They want to pretend they’re still living 60 years in the past. That and just generally scared of any kind of change. Don’t forgot part of it is code for “we don’t want more minorities here”. Now people can deny that all they want but seriously just go talk to anyone outside of any of our cities and they are terrified of “others”

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soh_amore t1_j9l5umu wrote

Irony is strong here. Everyone is an ‘other’ at some point. Do they forget that white people come from the Caucasus and not from Franconia?

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