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Comment by cft | Hacker News Reader

In the hinterland there are many (relatively poor) owners (of small businesses, farms, shops). In the centers, there are salaried employees that are often richer than the hinterland's owners and very rich mega-owners, that are few. The divisions of interest of these classes are roughly represented in the blue/red map of the US.

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> The divisions of interest of these classes are roughly represented in the blue/red map of the US.

Real interests, or perceived affiliative values?

Example: for several things "hinterland" areas are generally underserved by markets alone (hospital/medicine, broadband, delivery). Currently, the party generally stronger in those areas, though, seems more interested in eroding public solutions to those problems rather than building them out...

I think it's condescending to point out to people what their real interests are. People have agency.

It's a fact that human beings make choices other than those that optimize or even satisfy their personal self-interest. Sometimes we do it because we value something else more highly than our own self interest, sometimes we do it because we're mistaken or even defrauded. In the former case, maybe that's even laudable, in the latter case, it's human.

Perhaps you're correct those on the rural side of the urban/rural divide know their business very well. Maybe you're even right that some would consider it even more important to avoid affronting anyone's status by suggesting any other possibility -- though of course if that's true, it says something about the place that status as a value has in the discussion versus, say, actually articulating the picture of the business that they know very well.

Either way, no one seems to have challenged the fact that rural areas are poorly served in areas like medicine by the policies of the political faction they appear to support. Which people are free to do, naturally, but speculating about why doesn't make for condescension by itself.

> no one seems to have challenged the fact that rural areas are poorly served in areas like medicine by the policies of the political faction they appear to support.

Rural areas are poorly served, in almost exactly the same ways, no matter which (of the two) political faction(s) they decide to support, which is why they overwhelmingly support politicians who promise to dismantle the status quo. This is one of the qualities that both candidate Obama and candidate Trump shared. The actions of both in government ended up following the Reagan orthodoxy, though their rhetoric was different.

I don't think that a lot of these people take elections seriously anymore as a method for accomplishing change (with good reason[1]), and now are just voting for the person whom the most complacent like the least.

[1] https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-poli...

I think that can be true, but people can be wrong about their own interests or who or what will actually help them.

I live near a lake side villa in India. It's spread in 21000sq feet.

Very sparsely populated.

It has a few shops and hospitals within a kilometre.

Ofc, there is no way I can afford same land in middle of city but a lot of people don't have choice between living in a city Vs living somewhere peaceful / scenic.

Their jobs are in city so they can't just move to somewhere clean and beautiful.

There are things in city which is mostly services available at walking distance.

I am YouTuber - I need the land my channel and also don't really need extra services which city offers.

Once a month, I take the truck to city and hall all the stuff I need for channel.

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