States have been reduced to entities that cater to consumers. The speed at which things have changed isn't manageable. It's why so many nations haven't even figured it out, let alone states that have less power.

Boston is too important to the state and the region. That's not good. You see the same sorts of things with monopolies, and Boston is a monopoly. People are leaving MA for a lot of reasons, but an MA where people don't leave isn't necessarily one where people come to. The region is too crowded. Sorry, but it is. Housing is too spread out and car-dependent. The area has changed even since I was a kid and I was a kid not too long ago. There's no direction other than up for some people.

We need more housing, we need more people, we need more more more. That's not going to work even if everyone's onboard. MA is trying to manage a neoliberal society that's "post" production (really just moved abroad), but these kinds of jobs that follow are weak and ephemeral. How can you build up anywhere when a decade could spell disaster for a whole industry - and when other recessions loom?

MA is no different from so many other places. It's just trying to always play with big dogs, and it's tiresome.

I'm from here, so it's different. Why do people move here, though? Opportunity. They move elsewhere as a secondary option. That means we're constantly trying to keep up with other trends just to say attractive, but attractive to whom? Things were way different decades back, but the economy was totally different too. Are we supposed to want more people here? We can't handle them. Are we supposed to want fewer?

Ideally, the state would make sure that the region were condensed in some parts and that industry were spread out. People should be asking "Boston, Worcester, or Springfield" at a minimum. They don't. It sucks. This is why we have people scrambling for the same things, so that when they can't live in Boston, they often jump states - not even regions within MA.