Checking in from Caledonia and Essex counties where my once isolated hunting camp is now located smack dab in the middle of two major developments. (The 10 acre sub division for mcmansion type of development, not the kind we need)

Out of staters moving here are not displacing native Vermonters. You can trivially debunk this by looking at Vermont's population in the census. From July 2021 to July 2022, Vermont's population increased by less than 100 people. Even the pandemic's migration that VTDigger called an "explosion" (in my opinion, irresponsibly so) was only a .7% population increase. That is absolutely tiny. Before that, we were seeing a net migration out of the state.

Everyone has a story about the house their buddy wanted to buy but some out of stater bought it in all cash sight unseen. Those are investments or vacation homes, not people moving here. It is exceedingly rare for regular families to buy houses in cash sight-unseen. Meanwhile, investors are buying ~25% of all SFH on the market. This is an international phenomenon, affecting people from huge cities like London and Vancouver to our tiny state. As wealth inequality reaches increasingly unsustainable levels, the wealthy, from individual landlords to large investment firms, are looking for more places to deploy their ever-increasing capital, and they are moving more and more of their money into buying property, making housing increasingly unaffordable for regular people.

Rich people, most of which are from out of state, are buying up the entire world's housing, most of which is also out of state. Trying to understand the problem as in-state vs out of state only obscures the reality that we are an inconsequential backwater. Our housing is being devoured by forces way bigger than "flatlanders" with remote jobs.

What if, and I'm just spitballing here, the economic disparity that puts Vermonters at a disadvantage isn't the fault of those dreaded outsiders but our own decisions for generations?

Or is it just easier to blame others for your disadvantage?

Idk I bitch a lot about transplants ruining the Vermont I love. In my mind it’s not a problem on the individual level as it is we are watching a pretty rapid change of the industries and values that used to be what being from Vermont was all about, and it’s easy to blame the voter base change, as well as the amount of not native Vermonters running for office. So I get your sentiment but idk, I think this post is a little bit hyperbole.

1. Labor strikes. Not going to happen.

2 refusal of services. Go for it if you want to. My transplant customers are great, and I see bringing them onto my farm and engaging in conversations a lot more effective at getting them to understand the culture of Vermont than it would be to refuse them as clients.

3. State electoral college. Eh. No. That’s a little absurd. We get to vote on town and county levels for all sorts of important stuff. Go to town meeting day, get involved, run for something!

4. This is the only one I’ll agree with you on. I would love, love, to see a residency requirement for a certain period of time. I think 10 years is extreme, but I’m not a big fan of the amount of people that move here and immediately run for office.

The end of your post is a little hard to completely understand. You’re not drumming up a revolution, and nobodies trying to have this removed, they’ll just downvote it to hell.

[deleted]

You too! And maybe go get some more of that good old schooln!

Have a nice day!!!

The poor, working class urban neighborhoods of rural Orange County?

I don't have an education. What you making? I am pulling $80k.

Idk. Can chime in on that. Rural Orange County has been heavily gentrified.

Native Vermonters are getting priced out of the state; this is a fact. Native Vermonters are just not on the same playing field as new Vermonters. There are incentives for New Vermonters to move here and work remote, the housing market is priced way out of bounds for nearly any family to live here. The focus of tourism and bringing in outside money has been to the detriment of the local economy and I am glad OP is at least writing about it, and suggesting things even if said things are dog shit.

Perhaps the real solution is to create equity - every remote worker that moves here and receives the benefit should see a tax hike of 1% on their income and property taxes for a min of 5 years. That money should be paid to the Natives or be a benefit to the natives that are having issues of housing security.

Now before anyone calls me racist or xenophobic - my family has real roots here! Not just white anglo roots either. While a good amount of my family is white and culturally french, you cannot ignore the fact that my father's maternal family were descendants of indigenous people. We have just as much rights to here as anyone else, but it would be heart breaking to see yet another descendant of indigenous people being pushed away from their home land wouldn't it? Frankly, that part of my family history is not the reason I champion for the native Vermonter to receive equity - but I ask this because the very culture and heritage of Vermont is at stake. Made in Vermont doesn't mean shit without us, we are Vermont - the good, the bad and even the ugly. Shit our statesman was a redneck who got drunk and rounded up his extended family to publicly whip a judge for invalidating his land grants - that is the very spirit of Vermont in a nutshell.

While most of us have not been welcoming of "flatlanders", we simply need to detox from their money and figure out a better solution for our economy that does NOT involve tourism and affords quality exports made from resources we have here.

How old are you? And your unoriginal right wing trolling is tired. Yawwwn.

But seriously how old are you? it will put your experience in context.

So you have a degree paid off your debt and lived the American dream yet you're here on reddit making anti Trans jokes?

A society that only rewards MBAs, software engineers, and investment bankers can’t exist. Your “solution” fails to acknowledge we’re all dependent on the “uneducated” and “bad” jobs you’re implicitly shitting on and expecting everyone to wave a magic wand and free themselves from. Who’s picking up your trash in your myopic utopia?

Lol I graduated with over 100k in student loans, no one paid my way. My first job didn’t pay much but I didn’t quit and the second one paid more and the third one more than that, ect. If you’re not willing to invest time and effort into your future you’ll just stay here, arguing with me in the comments :)

Meanwhile in another post you trash the education system.

College takes money and jobs don't pay.

Your simple troll comment is lacking the reality of the situation completely.

Cool anecdote bro.

I can only recommend what worked for me. Your much more likely to be able to improve your situation by putting the work in on your own life than holding out for some fabulous legislative solution that likely will never happen.

So what information is this post trying to find?

lolwut

> Rama seems to have a pretty clear agenda

indeed.

/u/RamaSchneider - y u do dis bb?

Ok

> But I’d definitely hesitate to call the cops in many situations if I wasn’t.

We don't. Shit the mrs got pulled over last night for having a head light out, no registration or insurance on hand and they didn't even ticket her! St. Albans police at that! She just has to get the problem fixed and send her missing information to the PD.

This happened to me once, although not super late at night. I snapped a photo and texted my neighbor to see if there was someone supposed to be working on her house and it turned out to be the pest removal dudes she hired.

I’m white. But I’d definitely hesitate to call the cops in many situations if I wasn’t.

There's always one of you.