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Comment by jedberg | Hacker News Reader

As my friend who works in British Government put it: If you remove London, the UK is about on par with Mississippi in terms of income and quality of life. People outside of London are poor.

London banking and to some extent every other industry in London is basically carrying the entire country.

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There's a fine line between "carrying the country" and "dominating things to the detriment of literally every other industry people could generate wealth from"

The problem with mean averages is things like financial centres and kings pervert the data. Once you remove the outliers, the per-head domestic product is actually pretty level across the UK's regions.

Now I'm not saying that finance isn't an important industry for us, but it could be anywhere. It's only inertia that keeps it in London. If it left, London would be the same as any other county.

But the average Londoner isn't a banker. They aren't obscenely rich. Any wage benefit is lost to higher costs. Unless you're a property owner, you're no better off than somebody outside London.

> but it could be anywhere. > It's only inertia that keeps it in London

Not at all!

Over a decade in banking, I have witnessed this argument resurface time and again in the context of the US. Indeed, it's true that two of the nation's largest banks, Wells Fargo and Bank of America, are headquartered in Charlotte. Hedge funds predominantly anchor themselves in Greenwich. GS has relocated its back-office operations to Salt Lake City. JPMorgan conducts risk analytics out of Columbus. CC processing is entirely Wilmington, commodities desk entirely Chicago.

However, despite these geographic shifts in various financial functions, the heart of the financial world remains unmistakably tethered to Wall Street. For the foreseeable future, the nexus of global finance will continue to pulse through New York City. To suggest otherwise is a fundamental misreading of the industry's deeply entrenched culture. Just as in London, where finance is inextricably woven into the fabric of the city, New York represents more than just a place—it is the embodiment of finance itself. The gravitational center of this world does not and will not shift to places like Utah, Ohio, Delaware or North Carolina. It is, and will remain, rooted in global financial hubs such as New York, London, Mumbai, and Hong Kong. To imagine otherwise is an exercise in futility.

> Not at all!

Well give them a reason to overcome that inertia (like Brexit and its regulatory mismatches) and they flee. New Financial's estimate is 10% of the sector has gone, mostly to Dublin, Frankfurt and Paris. And there's definitely a cost-driven pull towards the north of the UK too. Insurance more than banking has diversified.

But that's slightly beside the point that, these are rich companies, and a few rich people. London is not Monaco, Geneva. Just 2% of London's population are liquid-millionaires (vs 35%, 15%). Other UK cities can probably beat it millionaires per capita if that's what's important.

As soon as you look at median salaries, London does attract a premium, but £5k does not offset the insane costs.

The goal of finance jobs is that if you are any good, you won’t stagnate at that median salary for long. You make do with the 5k for a decade, pay your dues, then work your way upto the 7 figure club. Atleast that’s what my predecessors did. Don’t know what the scene is like nowadays. Am not sure what it is you are proposing. London getting rid of finance is a quick shortcut to the poorhouse. At that point, you become a giant museum like the rest of europe. Wait for the cruise ships to offload 1000s of visitors to those castles everyday, then squirt them with water pistols because there are too many tourists. Finance is the only thing holding that place up.

Mississippi's GDP per capital in 2024 is 50k, and the UK's is 51k. They're nearly the same, even with London included. For reference, the EU's average is 42k.

I wouldn't be surprised if this was true for most countries/states on this planet, also in the USA. Especially when the countries are as centralized as England and France. England without London loses like 20% of its population and probably even a higher percentage of its jobs.

What is Mississippi if you remove 20% of it's population that lives in high-density urban areas?

It's not rural England that's poor, it's the non-London high-density urban areas.

This is not true for England https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_regions_of_the_United_...

And it's not true for Mississippi: https://mdes.ms.gov/media/8639/pci.pdf

http://www.usa.com/rank/mississippi-state--population-densit...

Relatively easy to disprove. The misinformation just fits the narrative better.

Urban areas like Manchester are showing up as poor on the list.

Unless you are working and mingling with people in City - quality of life is London is just awful. Go beyond zone 3 and it feels you are third world country.

Its a first class city with a second rate country attached to it. The problem is that outside of the London and the South East the rest of the country has a very begging bowl mentality. Its all about what government can give to them.

It's attitudes like this why the UK is the way it is today. Shame on you.

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