It’s Never Sunny in Philadelphia

 

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Screw Philly, I say.  I know mon ami, Monsieur Le Docteur de Le Fly was at one point contemplating a move to Pennsylvania (aside — I had a brother who matriculated at Villanova who called it “Pennsyltucky” — odd, no?), so I wanted to give him fair warning. 

The tax and spending vortex that is currently sucking the entire state of New York, and more specifically, the grand city of dreams, New York City, down the sewer drain does not contain it’s circling to within the triangular borders of my home state.  No, this is a whirlpool whose edges limn the very borders of Virginia to the south, Quebec to the North and as far as Iowa to the west.  

The whole northeastern and upper midwestern block of the United States is in fiscal trouble brought on by inefficient tax structures, failing demographics, imploding industrial bases and out of control government spending.  Each of these factors are damaging on their own, but taken in concert as they have been these last ten years, they sound a toll of doom for the region. 

The misincentives and ham handedness that have marked this progression are no better illustrated than by the City of Philadelphia (the once great Northeastern city) deciding to assess usage fees on bloggers within their jurisdiction.  What better way to discourage young thinkers and quite possibly entreprenuers than by assessing such a ridiculous lien upon their intellectual output?   What city ever grew by stifling its intellectual corps? 

But this is what these Northeastern and Midwestern cities are slowly but surely doing to their best and brightest, by dint of overtaxing the industrial base, ramping the governmental regulatory juggernaut and making the cost of living insurmountable for those who would seek to start a family in a safe place convenient to their work.  

Great cities are built on capital, both physical and intellectual.   That capital can serve as strong reserve in times like these, but it cannot suffer to be hollowed interminably without eventually realizing great damage upon that city’s historic cultural and economic structures.    We are not such an old country that we have stored the long term capital, many times compounded, of a London, Paris, Rome or Berlin.   Our cultural capitals have not the fuse to survive, should we set alight the same bombs those countries have sparked within their own economies, no matter how much earlier.

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I think we’ll continue to see a bit of a pullback in gold as the dollar makes its last stand here, but nothing to get excited about.  I may throw some more shrimpy calls on the barbie.    I may just eat a sandwich.   My best to you, in either case.

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