Midwest towns ROAR back as tech jobs, affordable housing COLLIDE

The rust belt finally shaking off that rust. New data shows the Midwest is growing again for the first time in years, adding roughly 16,000 residents from other parts of the country. And cheaper housing is driving that shift, with home prices across parts of the region sitting well below the national median. But the comeback is also about opportunity. Cities that were once stuck in the decline as former manufacturing hubs are now seeing major tech companies bring jobs back. Hello, Cincinnati. I never thought I'd live in the Midwest, but happy to be almost a full-time resident. This is great, but you've gotta, I always encourage people, you have to go, if you wanna own a home, you have to be willing to pick up and move where homes are cheaper. Unfortunately, homes prices have gotten more expensive because there has been that migration, Tiffany. But it's a good thing you said it in the break, Dagan. People are also happy there. You know, in Washington State, unfortunately, I've talked about it on Fox News, you could get shoved in front of a train just standing in midday, or hit in the face with a two-by-four and a nail and lose your eye. Those are real things that are happening in some of these blue cities. So yeah, go to where people are nice, house prices are down, you can raise your family and feel safe. There's something bigger, I think, even politically going on here. These states are technically trifecta states. I think of Washington State, New York, where the governor is a Democrat and holds a state legislature and they have two Democrat senators. There's a mass migration happening in these states, which, coming into the census, could change seats, congressional seats, and really set up dominance for conservative Republican candidates in the future. But people are smart and they want to go where they can have more money in their pocket and feel safe and build for the future. They're getting out of these states that are just going so far, far left and progressive and implementing additional taxes. Washington State now has an income tax. Who wants to stay there? I do think one of the secrets to this, though, because a lot of these towns, they were old industrial towns and they got hollowed out and some of them are making a comeback. Entrepreneurship is really a key. And some of these places have been very friendly to entrepreneurs. So you look at some of the states on this list. South Dakota is one of those, very friendly to entrepreneurs. I would argue Iowa's very friendly. There are parts of Ohio that I would agree are the same way on that. Indiana, others are not. Illinois, I would not put in that camp. But when you create an entrepreneur-friendly environment, then you can take that young family and say there's a reason to come here. It's not just to get away from somebody pushing you into the subway, but there's job opportunities. You can build a business. You can build a family. And that's gonna be the difference maker, I think. I think in the Midwest, it is kind of a mixed bag. Some of these states are doing, some of these states are not doing it. The ones that are, I think, will have a long-term competitive advantage. This is interesting. One of the changes in population is standing out to me. So there are three factors. Domestic moves that we kind of just referenced international migration, and the balance of births and deaths. When you think about what's happening in blue cities, we've talked about it when we talk about Gen Z women and people choosing not to start families. Some will argue that it's too expensive, for example, here in New York. Others say it's the Democrats trying to break up the family unit. They don't want more births happening. I think where there is also a more wholesome sense of life and community, it is attractive to people, and it's fostering this kind of, it's drawing them there. Because you live here, not only could you get a two-by-four in the face, but it's just rough here. It's really rough on people. Well, that's the theme here. I think quality of life is important. I just came back from North Carolina. I was visiting my son who lives down there. And he bought a house in a very nice part of the state, not right on the water, but not in a big city. And it is just the pressure. I know New York, we live in the most pressure-filled environment possible, perhaps in the whole world. Maybe Tokyo's worse, I'm not sure. But it's pretty bad. But you just feel better. You just feel a lot better walking down the street. People are more helpful, et cetera. So the quality of life is such an important. The thing that kills me about New York is when Giuliani came in, and I've referenced this before, not only did he fix the budget deficit and turn it into a surplus, not only did he do it by lowering taxes, not raising them, not only did he hire more police, but he made it a much more pleasant place to live. So you can, it is conceivable to have a New York City with all its pressure, all its craziness, and be able to walk into Central Park at night to go to Shakespeare in the Park and come out again and not worry you were gonna get at least robbed if not killed. That is possible. We had that 10 or 15 years of a golden age in New York during and after Giuliani, that ended about five, well, more than that, when de Blasio came in. But we're going down from here. We're not going up. We will come up again, but I don't think it's gonna be in the next five years. No, I was just gonna say one thing. The people, like the cities and areas that benefited from the migration out of the big, big cities like New York, like places in Florida, Charlotte, North Carolina, there's an article in Axios about Charlotte, America's fastest growing city, has a message, we're full. That those places and cities have become burdened because of the population growth with high home prices, but also the traffic that the roads and the infrastructure haven't kept up with the demand. And it's kind of a nightmare to get around, certainly around Charlotte, like Lake Norman north of Charlotte used to be way out in the country. And now it's feels like it's part of the city. So I digress.