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Foreign.
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This is Abby and you are listening to Upzoned. Hey everyone, thanks for listening to another episode of Upzoned, a show where we take a big story from the news each week that touches the strong town's conversation and we upzone it, we talk about it in depth. I'm Abby Newsham, a planner in Kansas City and today I am joined by John Pattinson, the community builder for strong Towns. John, thank you for joining me.
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A
It's great to be here, Abby. Thanks. And you and I just spoke a few weeks ago and so this is nice to be back already.
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B
I know you're like your regular Upzoned co host guest so it's added to your official title Saturday Night Live.
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A
Like after a few episodes of hosting, you get like special jackets. I feel like there needs to be something like that for Upzone. When you have, when you've co hosted three times with Abby, you get some kind of special jacket.
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B
Hey, I would like a special jacket. That would be. That would be awesome.
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A
No, that sounds maybe those strong towns high vis vests that we give local conversation leaders.
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B
Yeah, I'd love that. I could wear it when I record even though we don't post the video.
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A
Yeah, I like it.
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B
Awesome. Well, so we're going to talk about an article that was published in City Lab entitled the Economic Benefits of Paying Workers to Move. So this is about a program that's been running since 2018 in Tulsa called Tulsa Remote. This program offers $10,000 to remote workers to relocate there for at least a year. A study about this program by economist Tim bartik of the W.E. upjohn Institute finds that for every dollar Tulsa space on this program, the city sees about $4.31 in economic benefits. The key findings include that many of the program's participants would not have moved to Tulsa if the incentive hadn't existed. Between 58 and 70% of people are in that category. The influx of remote workers have also boosted local spending, increased tax revenue, led to job creation, and and generally expanded the tax base. In terms of retention, the program has performed pretty well. About 96% of participants remained through that first year and roughly 70% stay. Longer term, there are some potential downsides of a program like this, especially around housing. While the housing stock in Tulsa has mostly kept up with demand, increase in property values and rents can pose some challenges, particularly for households on fixed incomes. But overall, the study suggests that Tulsa Remote is a very cost efficient and beneficial way of bringing people to the city and increasing the economic health of the city than many traditional tax incentive programs such as business tax breaks. And the study argues that people oriented economic development, which is investing and attracting remote workers and integrating them into the community, can pay off in very measurable and sustainable ways. So John, I, I'm curious from a strong town's perspective, if this is an approach to economic development that aligns with, with what you and your team would see as a more resilient and sustainable, sustainable way of approaching economic development.
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A
I feel like I say this every time you and I co host, but I'm torn.
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B
Yeah, I know.
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A
You know, because I think when I first saw this article, my initial reaction was like I was highly skeptical. And then I read it and I was like, okay, I can see some benefits here. And so I am, I am quite torn. I think one of the things about this program that makes it a little bit more palatable for me is that it is not public funds that are being used to lure them. You know, it's a private foundation. And so this really hasn't cost the city, the city anything directly. And so I like that it's an experiment that's being run with foundation dollars rather than tax dollars. Still a part of me is like, if we build great places, like people will want to move there. And so I feel like maybe a more strong towns approach would be to make Tulsa a great place to live for the people who are already there. And then you're just going to like have people who just can't wait to move to Tulsa. But here you hear me equivocating. But maybe people don't know enough about Tulsa to know that it's already a great place to live. And so it's this just like a great advertising campaign. I'm not sure what about like what's your take though, Abby? Help.
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B
Help.
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A
Provide some clarity for me.
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B
I wish I could provide some clarity. Honestly. I agree with you. I think this is a really interesting approach for a philanthropic funding mechanism to take to try to invest in the city and bring workers to a community. I think especially if there's like a particular type of worker that they're looking to attract. I mean it sounds like this is mostly remote workers. There's benefit if it maybe is also linking to job need within the local economy. But you know, when I ran the math on this $10,000, I think it's like $34 million have been in this program. And what's $34 million times $4 roughly. So 136. I'm just looking at Google, which doesn't give me Any commas in their equation. I think it's $136 million is what they're saying their return on investment is. And to be honest with you, I haven't actually gone to the study to read into it. So I would encourage listeners who are interested to go and read that study. And I probably will take a look at that as well. But I mean, I think it's, I think it's interesting as an alternative to economic development tools that really favor real estate projects. We see often cities have programs that are intended to attract like one big employer and give them a lot of tax breaks to oftentimes build a big corporate campus maybe in the middle of nowhere, you know, not integrated into the existing city. And it creates a lot of strain in terms of all that additional infrastructure and the tax breaks associated with it. And of course the argument is, well, we brought all these high paying jobs to the city, and that's usually the argument. But if that employer leaves, which has happened in my city and has happened in many cities, you kind of lose out on all that value that's been brought in by that employer. And also you're on the hook for all that infrastructure that you've built as a city. So I think approaching this in a way that is not about you're not trying to assist in someone's giant real estate project and investing in one company and hoping they don't leave, I think, I think is a more resilient strategy. You're trying to attract people that have remote jobs and bring them into your city. And with that they bring their income, they bring, you know, their, their activity, they probably bring families. So, so I think that, that to me, I'm like, that's, that's a smarter way because you're integrating that money into the existing system rather than trying to attract workers by, by giving tax breaks to new projects to expand the city, which is often in the form of sprawl.
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A
Yeah, I think the article said that those traditional incentive programs to attract large employers, like, they have a ratio of 2 to 1 in terms of like return on investment compared to the 4 to 1 here. And I think a lot of times those. So, yeah, I see what you're saying. I think it is more resilient. I did go back and I looked at an article that City Lab ran in 2020 when Tulsa was first introducing this program. And one of the things that it said was that Tulsa had built all of these amazing amenities. There was like a $465 million park. There was a new Convention center. There was a new arts district, but there. What they realized was there was nobody to enjoy them. And so this was in part a plan to get people to come and see what Tulsa had built. And to me, that does feel like putting the cart before the horse a little bit. And maybe, maybe Tulsa has learned from that. And it won't be because they built it hoping that people would come, but people didn't come. And so now a private foundation is having to pay people to move to Tulsa and enjoy all these good things that. That Tulsa built.
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B
That's really interesting. I actually had not heard about that before, but it kind of makes sense. And they did. They invested in a park near their downtown, or maybe it's in their downtown, but it's. It's an incredible park. Have you ever been to it, John?
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No, but the pictures looked amazing. Have you been in person?
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Yeah, yeah, it's. It's one of the coolest parks that. That I've ever been to in my life. It's really.
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So Is this that $465 million park?
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B
Yeah. Yes, I believe. I believe so. And I think it was privately funded or funded through philanthropic means. I don't think that the city put much into it, if anything.
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A
Yeah, I would hope. I would hope it. I would hope not. Because that's an expensive park.
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B
Yeah, a very expensive park. I mean, there are quite a few cities in the Midwest that I've been seeing more and more like, philanthropic dollars stepping up instead of, like, city dollars to improve placemaking and invest in things like parks and public spaces. And it does make me wonder about just kind of what that means for the future of our cities and what our tax dollars, how our tax dollars were kind of intended to associate with. With nice public places. It's like we've built cities we can't afford, and so we. Therefore, we can't improve our park system. So we're seeing people, philanthropic organizations, step in, which is a little worrying some in terms of thinking through, like, does this. Are they going to provide the support long term, you know, just to fill in for where our tax dollars are not able to afford nice places.
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A
Something else that I didn't appreciate until I was reading this article, and I'd love to hear your take on this as well, is that it turns out that this program, which is called Tulsa Remote, is. Is not alone, that There are about 100 other programs in the United States that have some sort of incentive program program like this and offering incentives to get people to move there. And I looked them up. And they have names like Flourish in Fort Wayne, find your place in Muncie. And so this is becoming more and more common, I think, in places that, you know, are trying to attract people and haven't been able to get on people's radars in other ways.
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B
Well, if you think about it, cities really used to have to rely on attracting employers in order to get people to move to their places. And that can be really, really challenging, especially if you need a particular type of office space to support that kind of business. And there's only so many businesses with the capacity to really transform a city out there. And so cities are kind of left, right. They're competing for that next Moonshot project that's going to bring a bunch of employees. This is interesting because now we're kind of in a new age where there's a lot more opportunities for remot work where you can live anywhere. And so I even think of, like, really small towns that probably will never attract, you know, the big. The big company, but maybe they have some, some kind of attraction that is could be like a really interesting landscape or being in a beautiful setting that they could use to attract remote workers, so long as they have the Internet. So I think it opens up opportunities for some smaller towns to really benef from having more remote workers and not trying to go after big employers that might. That they might strike a deal with that ends up not being in the best interest of the community. This seems like, of course, the devil's in the details always because there's potential to screw up anything. But this at least seems like it's more of a small bet approach to attracting workers and expanding tax base.
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A
Yes. And, you know, maybe the most interesting thing about this program for me is that is. Is the social infrastructure that they built around it. And so there is, you know, they have co working, co working spaces. There are networking events. The article talks about something, you know, somebody that they interviewed, they had a death in the family and like there was a grief counseling group. They have mentors who have gone through the program. So there's all of this other sort of social infrastructure to make it. To make these new Tulsa residents successful. And I think some of those things actually do benefit the people who already live there. And I think it's really interesting that high retention rate of people who stay in Tulsa. I do feel like that maybe this social infrastructure is part of the secret of that success, is we got people here to Tulsa, but now we are introducing them to the types of amenities and clubs and neighbors that will make them want to stay. And I think you could make a case that that benefits the people who are already in Tulsa.
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B
Yeah, I wonder what their landscape is like as far as making friends. And I've never lived in Tulsa and I know certain cities, it's harder to make new friends than others. So I just wonder if TULS is also succeeding because of that social infrastructure piece that people are open and there are ways to kind of integrate yourself into this city in a way that maybe would be more challenging. One thing that I am, I am a little bit skeptical about with these programs is whether or not $10,000 is really enough to attract people and how significant that has been, because I feel like that incentive might cover only part of the cost of moving. It feels kind of more like a moving bonus than like a transformational amount of money that could bring somebody to a place. Because even though $10,000 sounds like a lot, and I'm sure it's useful and it's appreciated for many people with really established lives, like having mortgages or kids or their existing job, it's maybe not enough to cover all relocation costs or to offset the risk of moving, especially for someone who maybe has more assets or networks or responsibilities, that the anchor factor of the place they currently live in might dominate their decision over the incentive. So I am curious about kind of where that $10,000 number came from, what types of people they're attracting with a $10,000 number. If other, if other programs have tried other amounts of money to attract other types of people. I think about Bentonville and this is a different kind of program. But I'm pretty sure Walmart requires every company they do business with to have an office located in northwest Arkansas or Bentonville. And they need to have like high up, you know, high net worth members, like of their C suite located in Bentonville, that it can't just be like, you know, lower paid workers. They want like actual executives from those companies located in Bentonville. And so that's been kind of another approach to bringing different income levels to a city. But this is very different from Tulsa because it seems like this would be more so like I picture, at least, at least this is what I picture when I think about their program is that the demographics are probably relatively young, remote workers that maybe haven't had a family and establish themselves in a place yet. But I'd be curious what the demographic makeup of, of those people are.
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A
Yeah, me too. And I think I did see a stat either in this article or in the one from a few Years ago when the program was just getting started, that a very high percentage of the people that, that were being attracted to this program were in the tech industry like they want. They wanted the tech industry but didn't have the tech workers. And so I think that they wanted to attract the tech workers in order to help develop eventually like a tech industry. And I can't remember what it was, but it was something like a quarter of all of them, of all of the folks who had taken advantage of the program at that point were in the tech industry. And then even the person to your point, like even the person that they had interviewed for the article that we're discussing today, was already looking for a change. So it wasn't luring somebody who had roots somewhere else, but it was somebody who was looking to make a change. And I think, I do think that you're right. Those are probably more likely to be younger folks, maybe folks without kids yet. So yeah, it is one particular demographic and I think that if those are higher wage earners, then are those going to drive up housing costs eventually for existing residents?
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B
Yeah, I would be curious about that, how that does impact the overall housing market. I'm trying to remember how many people they said participated in the program. I believe it was something like it was a few thousand, I believe. So maybe that's not enough to really make a huge impact on the market. Although I could be wrong. I'm not like an economist and I don't have, I don't have any of the numbers for what Tulsa's supply of housing or their, their existing population is in front of me. But I'm curious about whether the number of people that have participated in this program and what their incomes are, what, what the quantifiable impact to the housing market would be.
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Yeah, you're right. And it does say that it was 3400 people have participated so far. And then the paragraph about the tech workers that is in this article and it says an influx of tech talent, 26% of the 2024 class. So not all like of all of the people who participated, but just last year, and I'm sorry, I got that wrong. An influx of tech talent, 26% of the 24 of the 2024 class worked in the industry, creates spillover effects by helping solve what somebody describes as Tulsa's chicken and egg problem. The city couldn't attract high tech jobs without high tech workers and vice versa.
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B
So now that the workers move there, they can presumably advertised to the companies that they have the workforce. So Maybe they, maybe they are then turning around and doing the more traditional economic development program by saying, hey, we have the employment base now. You can go build your office now.
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So maybe Tulsa has solved that age old conundrum of the chicken and the egg.
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Yeah, yeah, that would be, that would be pretty amazing if they have.
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I did look up to see if have we published much about Tulsa on the Strong Town site over the years. And we have published actually two articles just this year about Tulsa because they have like, they're kind of leading the way along with South Bend and a couple other places with pre approved housing plans. And so I think that Tulsa is doing some, some pretty cool strong Townsend kind of things that I think will build long term resilience.
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B
Yeah, Tulsa. I have a really positive connotation of Tulsa. I mean, I've been there probably, I think I was there pre Covid and I spent some time in the Tulsa Arts District and they just have a really cool thing going in that area of town. They have some really interesting museums, really cool old buildings, and the city itself just has really good bones. And I'm sure there's a lot of really neat stuff going on. And yeah, I'm looking right now. And Strong Towns has been covering some stories in Tulsa. So shout out Tulsa and Oklahoma City too. I mean, I've been to both, both cities in the last decade, less than a decade, which by the way, I can't believe I'm old enough now that I'm starting to measure things by the decade. But yeah, I have been there in the last six years to both places and I had very good experience in both places and I hadn't spent a ton of time in Oklahoma before that. So I appreciate what a lot of folks in Oklahoma are doing. I think the one thing I would leave this conversation on is the question of how you retain people who participate in these programs. Because yes, 70% of people have stayed longer term, but there are 30% of people that have moved on. And I'd be curious what the reasoning is for those people who have moved on. You know, like we said before, the people who participate in these programs are probably a little more, you know, open minded to moving to different places. So who knows, Maybe they took $10,000 from the next city and moved on. That might be a pretty good way to get to move to many different places. But I do wonder if it has anything to do with like the culture or the amenities or anything about the place that didn't work out. Did the people go back to where they came from or did they go to a different city? Again, this might be something that's in the report. I should probably go take a look at it. But if not, I would love to understand how they're looking at the retention factor and whether or not there's kind of a phase two of a program like this that is really focused on retention or if the retention issue is not really a concern of theirs. And there's other iterations of this program that. That focus on other aspects that could be improved.
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A
Yeah, I think that you're right. I think that would be really interesting to look deeper into. I think that would help inform other cities that are either already doing this or thinking about doing this, especially funded by foundation dollars.
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B
Yeah, absolutely. Well, I think we can leave it there. But before we finish up, it is time for the down zone, which is the part of the show where we can share any has been on our mind. Anything we've been listening to, reading, watching, anything that has been captivating our time and attention these days. John, I will give it to you.
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Yeah, thank you. I want to recommend a book that I just finished, and that is the book Big Dumb Eyes by the comedian Nate Bergetse. I'm a huge Nate Bergetse fan and I was really looking forward to reading the book. In fact, I listened to it on audio and that was. It was a great experience. It was very, very funny. My favorite parts of the book were at the beginning of the book where he was talking a lot about his childhood and growing up in Tennessee. I wish he would have gotten into a little bit more about what it was like becoming a comedian. But maybe that will be coming up in the second book. But definitely a lot of laugh out loud moments. And I'm a big fan. What about you?
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B
Well, I actually have a book too. So this, this actually comes out of the fact that I. I went to a theater, I think it was last week, and I saw Harry Potter 3. I think that's the one that it was. It was like really scary.
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Yeah. Prisoner of Azkaban.
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Yes. I, I was. We were there with like, kids, like children. And when, when I saw the Dementors, I was like, oh, yeah, this is actually really scary. So I didn't think about that before, but it occurred to me that I had never, like, picked up these books and read through them all. And I decided to start with Harry Potter 4. So the goblet of Fire and I have been listening to it on audiobook. I was at a long drive earlier this week and decided to Download it and start listening to it. And man, these books are really good. And. And also I actually decided to start watching that movie, the, the fourth one. And I can now understand why people complain about the movies because it, the movies really don't have nearly as much detail as the books. It's kind of amazing when you spend some time with the books and then go watch one of the movies, just how strikingly different it is. And just the long backstories that are given to specific characters or instances are not there or just little areas of the plot that get missed out in a movie. And obviously in a movie you just can't capture that level of detail and change in the story. But yeah, it made me really appreciate the frustration of fans even though I'm, you know, about 25 years behind.
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A
Yeah, yeah. I don't know if you know this, but our house, we call our house the Burrow and it's named after the Burrow in the Harry Potter series.
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B
Really?
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Yeah, we love we. And my office is called the Room of Requirement because it's whatever we need it to be. So we're big Harry Potter fans over here.
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B
Oh, that's great. Does it talk about the Burrow in the movies?
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Yeah, but like more in the earlier books. Like it kind of describes it like when he goes there for the first time. I think it's in book two they.
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B
Say to the borough.
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Yeah, it's book two. Like so the borough is where the Weasleys live. And then like it's always a place of refuge for him. And so we love that idea of being a place of refuge and hospitality. There's always a lot of people in our house and so it feels like the Weasley's house. And then even my dog, I'll name my dog's name is Ginny Weasley. So we're. And our chicken coop is like the. Is our address and then three quarters because Harry Potter.
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B
Yeah, well, I didn't realize I'm talking to like a bonafide Harry Potter fan. So much appreciated that we'll have to talk more about this because I'm, you know, now that I'm just getting into it, I have a lot of thoughts. All right, thanks John. I appreciate your time today and thanks everyone for listening to another episode of Upzoned. Thanks John.
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A
Thank you, Abby. Thanks for having me. This episode was produced by Strong Towns, a non profit movement for building financially resilient communities. If what you heard today matters to you, deepen your connection by becoming a Strong towns member@strongtowns.org membership Sam.