At 8:50 AM on “The “Mega-State” and the Creative Class” post of 18 April by Jim Bacon, Laura said…
“Groveton, Most of your observations about Europe ring true. The one statement that does not, ironically enough, is about the United States. Human settlement patterns in the U.S. are no less an artifact of government intervention than they are in Europe. The only difference is that U.S. government mandates and subsidizes scattered, disconnected, low-density development, while European governments do the opposite.”
What a great statement!
We spend thousands of bites and do not make that point well enough to keep in check the blabbering, whining, filibustering and obfuscation by those trying to over-wash and ridicule advocates of common sense, democracy and market economies.
To put a bit of historical perspective on Laura’s statement:
The original (1775 to 1794) controls, policies, programs and incentives by Agencies (aka, government) favored a Yeoman, agrarian society and was codified in the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. This government sponsored world-view of human settlement might be termed the Jeffersonian Ideal.
The second generation of Agency controls, policies, programs and incentives was ushered in by the Andrew Jackson. Speculative exploitation of the land resource was added to the assumption that the US of A would be a agrarian society forever.
We explore this and the following points in THE USE AND MANAGEMENT OF LAND, forthcoming.
Following the Civil War, as the Industrial Revolution drove the urbanization of First World civilization, various patches (reflecting the insights of U. Sinclair, T. Roosevelt, R. Carson, J. Jacobs and many others) were applied to the Jefferson / Jacksonian framework.
These patches have never addressed urban reality. Witness the failure of The Rule in Dillion’s case, Home Rule, zoning, Corps of Engineers water projects, cotton, sugar, wheat and milk subsidies, REA, urban renewal, the Interstate Highway System (as contrasted with the Inter-regional Highway Plan), annexation moratoria and other well-intended and / or nefarious efforts to shape human settlement based on Myth, Winner-Take-All Economics and now “Supercapitalism.”
For those who understand what Laura is saying, here is a poster for your wall:
“Sub”urban is dysfunctional urban. It is not nonurban and it does not belong in the Countryside.
The Anti Jacksons
EMR