Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up (opens in new tab)

Two sets of assumptions, though:

* The "stay behind" terminology is both evocative and biased. I didn't "stay behind". I moved away several times, thousands of miles, and lived in other places that ambitious people live, and then moved back to within 10 miles of where I grew up because the quality of life is better here. I can afford more, I have cultural amenities like world-class music and art, I'm near family and old friends as well as new friends, and people aren't all totally consumed by their work. The "upwardly mobile ambitious" set can frankly get stultifyingly boring and disconnected. I like having friends in construction, non-profits, pet services, etc.

* Like many Americans who really do "stay behind", I contribute to elder care in my family. A lot of people stay put because they need to care for someone, and America does not make it easy to get vulnerable or ill people services. This is part of what contributes to what you call the "bitterness" -- lack of support for child care, elder care, care for the mentally ill or those struggling with addiction, and in many cases it's a vicious circle: gotta stay in Podunkville to take care of grandma and your cousin 'cause you can't afford to get grandma other help and your cousin doesn't qualify for anything but SSI so he can't afford to move either, but staying in Podunkville you tank your own educational and job prospects, therefore keeping you in Podunkville forever. Sometimes it seems you can only truly be upwardly mobile if you can avoid caregiving responsibilities.

It's strange the level of distrust in the west over institutions that the majority of the world find completely uncontroversial. It takes a village to raise a child, and in a world without villages families are the biggest support system most people have. I have a feeling this is another instance of the minority being louder than the majority.

Part of it, as well, is that a lot of these regions that people moved out of are the suburbs. Many suburbs are not sustainable, and are degrading.

That honestly sounds like a lot of spurious causal assumptions. The Rust Belt and coal mining regions didn't get economically depressed because people left. People left because of the economic collapse. You seem to be saying if all those college kids just moved back to Upstate New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio, the people there wouldn't be mad about their economies being destroyed? Because they still would have been destroyed.

I'm one of the "upwardly mobile" folks who moved out, and I'm a bit shocked at all the comments here treating the headline like it's a bad thing. Having a local and consistent community is an essential part of a "good" city. I know that many of the places we moved away from were... lacking, but simply abandoning everything isn't going to help at all either.

Worse: Because humans have evolved to live in close-knit communities that cooperate and human species have a 'bonding period' in which young adults bond with others in their group in order to create a social group that will collaborate to survive in the future, people leaving not only their early neighborhoods, but also their families creates subconscious anxiety in those who left. They go and live in locations where they don't know other people, changing places multiple times, often way past the early adulthood bonding period. This further isolates them and amps up the subconscious anxiety. The result are societies with psychological problems, or in worse cases like the US, entire societies running on prozac and other medication. Even further exacerbated with the system trying to isolate people more to make them into individual consumers to get maximum profit and work output out of them, pushing them also to compete with each other, further alienating people from each other.

The system uses concepts like "Social mobility" etc, but these are just terms pushed forward to avoid calling it what it is - the system forcing people to do this in order to maximize its profit by not investing where there is no immediate and maximal return, and instead milking economic centers and urban centers that are already highly profitable. For the same reason the US rural areas lack broadband - there isnt immediate, maximal profit for private companies in bringing broadband to those regions, and they also prevent municipalities from starting their own broadband service for their people with the excuse of 'free market'.

While I partially agree with your assessment, it's worth noting that much of the dynamic settlement of the US has been based on commodity booms, which really can't be considered perpetual parts of the economy. People had to leave their homes to go clear the prairie, log virtually all of the US forest, mine the West Virginia coal and then the Wyoming coal after that, etc. Once those resources are used up, there is little left for people to do, regardless of technological advances that require fewer workers for the same output, much less trade deals (how much wood and grain do we import?). The economies oriented around renewable resources (Oregon timber for example) simply can't sustain as many people because the environment can't continually produce the output that it did during the initial exploitation.

This of course affects the downstream, more industrial elements concentrated in cities as well, which process the ore and lumber and make engines and furniture.

You also have the issue of people who move to high cost locales, raise kids and then their kids who especially can't afford it move away (or wait to inherit the house from you).

It's funny how globalised the anti-globalisation populist political movements may be. Yesterday's news included "Reichsbürger" getting busted in Deutschland for conspiring to coup, and it was mentioned the suspects were also pretty QAnon-aligned. However, Reichsbürger are not indigenous, but are derived from US "Sovereign Citizens", who result from an amalgam of nuttery derived from XIX and XX conspiracies wishing to stand athwart history yelling "stop!": from those who thought the 14A is bogus to those who thought the 16A is bogus to those who didn't care for the Civil Rights Act, etc. Anyway, all these conspiracies apparently became more mainstream in the 1970s US because of the many newly embittered people due to the farming policies of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earl_Butz .

(incidentally, our farming policy here is diametrically opposed to both "get big or get out" and "plant fencerow to fencerow", and we still have major political centre parties, as well as left and right wing parties. But that correlation may have no relation to causation...)

Well, wtf is wrong with them that they stay when the economy gets destroyed? Move and make money elsewhere? Do they know there is skills and worker shortage all over the country?

Why do they think their little corner in the world is special? I think it is mix of fear and complacency because when it gets bad, it doesn't get bad enough.

As an adult you are responsible for taking care of yourself and those you love above any other obligation. Not just moving towand and states but people move to different countries and continents primarily out of their obligation and desire to fulfi that duty and lead a better life.

Only fix could be Soviet style registration system right? Where you are tied to the place where you were born unless Party sends you somewhere else? I mean, we are over that phase even on international level. People move countries all the time. Complaining about this being the case within one country is just out of place. And to mitigate enti-globalization populists, just better propaganda is needed. Let's face it: democracy only works when people are brainwashed (or there is a poll tax or other system that lets only well-to-do vote).

I mean, there is definitely a connection between "area is insanely inhospitable to educated youth, who then leave, and as a result those who remain have diminished opportunities," but this formulation feels like blaming those who leave instead of those who created the environment that ran the escapees off.

I grew up in a shitty place. I knew from early childhood I would leave, and I knew this even though I was living a very privileged existence in that place. My parents were upper-middle class; we had new cars and a country club membership and all that shit. And I knew this despite being low-key discouraged from wanting to leave because Family.

It was (and remains) a racist, sexist, homophobic state, and nothing is likely to change that.

There’s a deeper level here. Conforming economic, security, n judicial blocks to geography more strongly maps onto the governance structure for the US. In other words, this is a system that inherently creates and maintains divisions.

I also grew up as a military kid and continued to jump from place to place in adulthood.

A few years ago I started thinking of myself as a "third culture" person. Characteristics like having an expanded worldview and ability to quickly read new cultures are some of the upsides. Unfortunately, I also find myself very misunderstood and I have a lot of trouble with relationships of all kinds. It's heartbreaking to leave people behind, and it's exhausting to spend the years fitting in with new groups of people. Most cultures are protective and cautious of outsiders, and friendships rarely stick. The Curse of the Traveler means that my favorite people and things are never where I am right now, but I'm none the poorer for having known them.

As I've grown older, I've come to appreciate the benefits more and more. I have favorite places to shop, eat, entertain myself all over the world. I'm confident that I see and use much more of cities than most people. Where you live, work, socialize, entertain yourself, seek education, and so on can all be totally different places. My worldview cherry-picks from anything anywhere. I browse the internet of many countries, and read news from all over.

I'm always thinking "wherever you go, there you are" with people around me. My mom visited me while I was living in Tokyo, and she just wanted to go to Disneyland and see fireworks, and mostly wanted to eat American food she found familiar. She found the unfamiliar things intriguing, but didn't know how to ask good questions and put the unfamiliar things to use in her life. People are largely blind to details of new people and places and it takes some real effort to penetrate layers of language and social access.

I wish individuals would reflect on their cultures more. Americans should be outraged over their broken healthcare system and work cultures (even though the pay can be good). Some places might benefit from forgetting a lot of their religious and political history in exchange for some happiness and freedom. Many cultures have surprisingly high tolerances for pollution, poverty, and civil rights restrictions.

I split my childhood between three places, and my adult life between four, many in different countries. The wife and I are planning to move again next year.

It's sometimes hard when you see others with their consistent lives, and roots laid down, but at the same time they'll often say how they envy you.

It's similar to the choice of having or not having kids. The trade off in life experiences is neither better or worse, just different.

had that too, the place my dad retired to became my "hometown"

having said that, as i got older and started having kids, i did move back to that hometown. i honestly did enjoy moving every 1-3 years as a kid, but my wife had a similar experience and did not enjoy it. now my kids have a home town and can see both sets of their grandparents every week or so. its also pretty cool taking my kids to the same restaurants and places that i went to when i was younger. based on how much trouble my 5 year old had with this move its not something i want to subject them to any more times(shes happy about it now and we wanted to get it over with before kindergarden etc starts). people like us who had a positive outcome from moving constantly are the outliers i think, its better to give the kids a sense of continuity.

What are the concrete benefits of such a well-rounded background?

Depends on your definition of success?

I moved to the other side of the world from where I grew up in my early 30s, and I grew up at the other end of the country from where I was born and lived my early years.

I have a great group of mates I met in my early twenties and still speak with daily on WhatsApp.

As you say they meet up regularly, know each others families well, and they have not left their home area and have been friends since primary school.

They’re all jealous that I have lived an “adventurous and exciting” life and I’m jealous that they have amazingly solid roots.

I feel like with remote work, it's possible to have your cake and eat it, too. Depends on your career, but at least in software, it no longer feels like you have to move to a tech hub to make it, for example.

Probably the "move around a lot" people don't talk much with the "don't move around much" people, and vice-versa.

Moving for a job has a huge social cost for most people. You leave behind everyone you know.

That might be worth it for someone who wants to forge a career or explore. But for the average person who pushes paper at a generic office? You can do that anywhere. So why not do it where everyone you know lives?

There is a trade off to never putting down roots.

I'm similar -- 3k miles, but still within the US. My siblings/cousins/family that I grew up less than 10 miles from are now spread between NY, CA, PA, TX, RI, NH, NC, ME, MI.

I was travelling through PA once as well and was at a local dive bar chatting up some folks - and they'd never even left their county either - not even for casual travel.

[Citation required] for almost every sentence in your post - most importantly "it is the backbone driving the most valuable members of our society". What a ridiculous assertion.

I live about an hour away from where I grew up, but my family moved nearby so they’re just a few miles away. Modern economic trends that rip families apart have many downsides. It’s much harder to raise kids without family nearby. Likewise, people who don’t have family close are much more likely to fall through the cracks if they don’t have family around.

I get kind of why you could think this, but honestly I think it's far more important to leave your circle and experience something new as a young adult. It becomes increasingly difficult to move as you age, the longer you stay tied to your familiar environment that you were raised in, the harder it is to take the plunge and explore something different.

I am the only person in my direct family that lives outside of the county (very rural) or neighboring county that I grew up in. I really absolutely cannot fathom living my (probably) only life worrying about social cohesion or economic value of society. I live like 2500 miles from my family, and it used to be a lot further (I lived in east Asia for a while). Despite the distance, technology has allowed for me to keep in close contact with my family.

Taking the chance to explore new cultures and really immerse myself in them, and also live through the crazy Bay Area tech bubble before deciding it wasn't for me, really has provided a lot of excellent life experiences and perspectives. I wouldn't trade these opportunities for anything and strongly encourage younger people to try and leave the nest, at least for a bit, while it's still easy to do so and before they have to decide on things like staying near their parents once they become elderly.

I think we would be better if it was 3 of 10; Americans are too clustered into tribes. Urban people would benefit from understanding rural lifestyles and vice versa.

Yep, I live in Chicago and I'm about 10 miles from my parents' house, as the crow flies. I have at various times in my life regretted not moving around and living in different cities, but I didn't feel the urgency to move a thousand miles away from home since I grew up next to one of the largest cities in the US. I imagine that if I had grown up in a small town, like my wife, moving far away from home would have been the only option.

As someone who has lived in Chicago and the Chicago suburbs, this is completely true

> what is it about some people who seem to be constantly restless while others seem content to staying pretty much exactly where they were born

IMO the main factors would be your economic situation and your relationship with your family. People with little money and tight family ties probably wouldn't be keen to move very far, whereas someone with a bad or indifferent relationship to family and the means to head elsewhere would probably do so.

Ten miles might make a difference in housing or neighborhood quality, but makes little difference in access to job opportunities, higher education, social activities, etc. Especially if one owns a car, as most Americans do.

Here's my 2c (I'm 30 for the record):

I was born in a flyover state. There's ~no coding jobs here, and the ones that are here, pay pittances compared to anywhere not adjacent to a (feed)corn field.

I moved 250 miles away (to the other side of my state... dang is the US huge) to take a tech job that payed closer to what coastal companies will pay.

The next step was probably to move to Seattle or SF and take a "real" tech job there. But two things happened at the same time:

1. remote work really grew up. now I can work from anywhere and (mostly. geo-adjusting etc. luckily that seems to be on the decline.) get paid well.

2. We had our first child. Now suddenly close access to our support network (parents etc) is both logistically important ("hey mom can you watch the kids for a weekend so we can sleep") and emotionally important (grandparents getting to see the kids every weekend or two instead of significantly less often).

So now instead of looking to move an additional 2k miles away, I moved back to be ~2 miles from one set of parents and ~20 miles from the other set.

I'm not really thrilled about the local jobs or local politics etc. But family is incredibly important to have physically close, and so here I am. Thank heavens for remote coding jobs.

> I just can't imagine not wanting to explore a new area and have distance from your parents. I love my parents, we talk a couple times a week, but I don't need them physically close to me. (last couple years being the exception for obvious reasons).

We want to. But between housing prices and student loans, we can't afford to.

I've live many hours away from my parents, and I no consider it insane to do so. When I lived with my parents I could make a few phone calls and have a dozen people on my roof - now if there is a problem I have to pay a crew even though I know how to do the work (since there are things that cannot be done alone) When my wife and I want a date - too bad: there is no babysitter nearby that will work on Friday night that we trust, so we don't have that option. There are many other similar things about being close to family that I miss.

I enjoy exploring the world. However eventually I want to come back home.

It's probably helped by just the difference in scale between urban and rural communities. Most people wouldn't share your feeling to move to an urban city, because most people are already in one.

I did the same thing though and moved away from my family. I moved back during the pandemic and while I know everyone has a different family dynamic, I can't believe what I was missing. The physical, financial, and emotional support system of having family 15 min down the road is hard to quantify.

I left the south and never looked back, too. (Not gay, but I am non-conformist, which didn't play well in an evangelical town with more cows than people.)

In talking to people who got out vs. some who didn't, there seem to be three main, interrelated things that hold people local: money, class and fear.

- Obviously money makes moving to the Big City much easier, and more of it is always better. But below some point, it becomes incredibly hard to make work - if your parents are in the bottom half of the income gradient, first, last + deposit on a San Francisco apartment and a couple $k on moving and move-in is a huge expense.

- Class matters a lot, in that it colors how distant, urban places are perceived. Some members of my family have an almost cartoonishly apocalyptic fantasy vision about what cities are like, and the fact that nobody's sucked the marrow from my bones in 30 years of urban living will never change that.

It also effects the likelihood of knowing people who did move away. If nobody you personally know has done it, it really does become much harder to do for multiple reasons, both psychological and concrete.

- Finally, fear of "not making it", of something Bad happening, and of making a costly choice that you regret, of having to "slink back home" for whatever reason really weigh on people. Of course if you don't know anyone who's ever lived in a major metro, and if the cost of trying is big enough, that fear can massively amplify.

I moved to SF almost 30 years ago. It was a leap of faith - I landed with enough money for food for about two weeks and slept on a friend's floor for a few months while I worked shit jobs to get established. That path is harder now - I wouldn't now be able to get an apartment here now washing dishes and serving drinks. So if anything, I suspect the above is more salient now than it was a generation ago.

It seems insane to me to think about taking to my parents weekly. I know they exist, I don’t need to talk to them.

What seems unimaginable to one of us is not just normal but desirable to the other.

The same is true for deciding where to live.

The differing cultures in the US. I come from an Italian America family in the the NYC suburbs. All of my siblings and extended family live within like at most a 30 minute drive and I have 4 close family members within like a 2 block radius. There was never any idea of having to get out of here to make it because we were already in commuting distance to Manhattan.

Whereas I can't imagine leaving everyone I know, my entire social support structure, to run off to some strange new are where I know nobody and need start all over again.

> Maybe this is because I am gay and I needed out of the south

...well ok, that makes a lot of sense.

Actually after being away from home for 20 years I'd love to go back but wife and kids prefer staying :(.

> It's really too bad that people have to move around for economic and other opportunity.

The article doesn't support your bias. It's mostly those from affluent families that move farther from home, not people looking for work.

"By linking young adults to their parents, we can see that this migration is primarily driven by individuals who grew up in affluent families."

Most Americans live in and around big cities. Ive lived my entire life in commuting distance to Manhattan along with 10s of millions others. There was never any notion from myself or my peers of having to move to "make it". The end goal was always to find a job and get on a bus or train every morning.

Coming from a smaller town (<30,000) I was pretty much taught this. I couldn't go a month without someone wishing I would move away and leave the town behind. I live in a bigger city now and I'm glad but it took effort not to feel ashamed of living in my home town for so long.

Most people in America are born and live in metro areas and I wonder if the same kind of mentality is taught to those people?

> When I was growing up I always thought this was kind of a sign of, like, giving up, so I'm surprised the numbers are so high. I guess not everyone was thinking the same way.

It’s possible that they just gave up earlier than you did. Many people where I grew up never put any effort into anything because they had resolved themselves to being helpless.

Travel is common for the top 10-20% richest people in the world.

For 80% of the world, travel is something that 'other people' do.

> If I had become a doctor or a hotelier I definitely would've stayed in my home town.

According to the study, you would likely have not stayed:

"By linking young adults to their parents, we can see that this migration is primarily driven by individuals who grew up in affluent families."

A low-income family is less likely to send their kid to school to be a doctor or hotelier.

In my experience, moving is related to aspiration. If I stayed where I grew up I’d honestly likely be an opioid statistic and definitely not doing anything worthwhile with my life. I still keep in touch with a few people from youth who didn’t ruin their lives, and I’m the standout success story despite being the socially awkward and poor one.

Moving thousands of miles has changed my life in ways I’d never dream of, staying still was not on the cards: it would have been lethal. I had to upend to get the education I needed, find my person and the tech job I love.