Albany

It is not every day that a president of the United States encourages his constituents to abandon a part of the country, but by now we should be used to nutty verbiage from Donald Trump.

One thing, though. When Trump suggested last week that upstate New Yorkers move to where jobs are more plentiful, he wasn't entirely wrong. In fact, that's exactly what many residents have been doing.

Here's what Trump said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal:

"I'm going to start explaining to people, when you have an area that just isn't working like upper New York state, where people are getting very badly hurt, and then you have another area 500 miles away where you can't get people, I'm going to explain, you can leave. It's OK. Don't worry about your house."

Cue the predictable outrage from politicians and the people who are paid to insist everything is dandy in the Land of Cuomo. "We deal in facts — not fake news," the governor's spokesman said in response to Trump's words, before claiming the state's economy is strong.

Well, here's a fact, however inconvenient for the governor's presidential aspirations: New York has a declining population, according to census bureau, despite growth in and around New York City.

That's because the outflow from some parts of upstate is so dramatic. The population of Delaware County, for example, is down 5.1 percent just since 2010, while Hamilton County has seen a 6.2 percent drop.

That might not be Okies fleeing the Dust Bowl, but the outflow reveals serious economic distress and the collapse of once-proud communities.

The problem isn't only rural: Every major upstate metropolitan area save the Capital Region also lost population since 2010. And yes, that includes Buffalo, where a billion or so from state taxpayers has put the economy on an artificial sugar high.

So Trump's advice really wasn't necessary. New Yorkers already know they can load up the U-Haul and flee.

Still, the president's words were an echo of worries heard often from economists and pundits concerned that Americans seem increasingly unwilling to move in search of work.

We have always been an exceptionally mobile people, which makes sense, given that many of us have ancestors who left their native countries to better themselves and their families. Restlessness is almost a national birthright.

But census data shows that Americans are less geographically mobile than at any time since the 1940s, and mobility is generally lowest among those from the most economically depressed places.

It takes money to move, of course. Poverty can trap people in place.

But the statistics nevertheless suggest a fading dynamism and an acceptance of stagnation. An article last year in Mother Jones, the liberal magazine, called the unwillingness to move "almost a conspiracy to give up."

If you live where jobs are rare, it makes sense to move away. Other than a lifetime on welfare, what choice do you really have? You're obligated to find a better life.

And let's be honest: Even those of us who are doing OK might look at our tax burdens and wonder if staying in New York is financially justifiable.

So Trump was not entirely wrong. But neither was he wholly right.

"Don't worry about your house" is something only a rich guy could say, and it shows how out of touch he really is with the working-class folks who put him in office. For most families, their home is their primary asset.

There was a distasteful casualness to Trump's words. It almost sounded as though he was accepting upstate's decline as a given. Isn't he supposed to be the president in upstate New York, too? Isn't he also supposed to fight for this region?

The millions here who voted for him expected that he would be.

Presidents don't usually champion mobility, because there is an painful downside. It separates friends from friends, brothers from sisters, grandparents from grandchildren. It weakens families and communities.

And when too many people "don't worry about" their houses as they walk out the door for the final time, we end up with towns and cities in a death spiral from which they will never recover.

If parts of upstate New York are in that death spiral, it is entirely understandable if many of us aren't willing to admit it. We certainly don't want to hear a president, just eight months into his first term, making it sound as though there's no hope.

Even if he might be right.

More Information Contact columnist Chris Churchill at 518-454-5442 or email cchurchill@timesunion.com See More Collapse

cchurchill@timesunion.com • 518-454-5442 • @chris_churchill