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Nobel Peace Laureate <keyword id="83501" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Muhammad-Yunus">Muhammad Yunus</keyword> on Saturday said building rural economy is important to stop migration amid the challenges caused due to coronavirus pandemic. "Micro credit is about building rural economy. Corona crisis has given the industry an opportunity to aid in creating a strong rural economy. Creating a strong independent rural economy will not only halt rural to urban migration but in the years to come, the migration will be urban to rural," Yunus said at a webinar by <keyword id="477100" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="20" keywordseo="microfinance-industry">microfinance industry</keyword>. <br /><br />Microfinance institutions should create programmes like venture capital to create entrepreneurs in rural India, he said. <br /><br />There is a need for creating a national disaster fund for the sector and managed by the sector in India, Yunus said while speaking in the webinar organised by Sa-Dhan, a self regulatory organisation for the industry. <br /><br />Notably, India has been witnessing reverse migration of labourers and workers to their home states as lockdown imposed due to coronavirus pandemic affected them badly economically alongside huge number of job losses as well.<br /><br /><strong>SEE ALSO:<br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/with-233-fresh-cases-bihars-covid-19-tally-rises-to-4831/articleshow/76238545.cms">Bihar registers 233 new coronavirus cases with its overall tally rising to 4.831</a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/noida-21-new-covid-19-cases-tally-591/articleshow/76238339.cms">Noida’s total coronavirus cases hit 591 with 21 new cases detected in the past 24 hours</a><br /><br /></strong><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/342-new-coronavirus-cases-in-pune-district-six-deaths/articleshow/76239001.cms"><strong>Six more people die of coronavirus in Pune with 342 fresh cases</strong></a><br />

Nobel Peace Laureate Muhammad Yunus says building the rural economy is the key to halt migration

<p>"I can't even say it, let alone live in it."</p><p>When Miranda Hobbes told Carrie Bradshaw she was considering a move to <keyword id="12079580" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="brooklyn" source="Orion">Brooklyn</keyword> back in 2004, her confession was met with horror. "Even cabs won't go there."</p><p>This was the "Sex and the City" heyday of the late '90s and early aughts, when Manhattan ruled the New York City zeitgeist. Fast-forward nearly 20 years, two recessions, two "Sex and the City" movies, and a reboot of the show later, and <keyword id="12095049" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="millennial" source="Orion">millennial</keyword> New Yorkers have made Brooklyn, the borough once snubbed by Manhattanites, so popular that its <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/brooklyn-manhattan-apartment-rent-gap-history-comparison-2021-4">median rent is nearly as high as Manhattan's</a>.</p><p>It's the outcome of a slow and steady rise that's ultimately solidified Brooklyn, not Manhattan, as the center of New York City's millennial <keyword id="11921347" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="wealth" source="Orion">wealth</keyword> and culture, according to census and property data, real-estate experts, and historians. As the borough's incomes, housing prices, professional opportunities, and cachet rise, so does the <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12111-020-09499-y">displacement</a> of those who can no longer afford it. The coronavirus pandemic only accelerated those trends, mostly by millennials who, raised in the image of Carrie Bradshaw, have reached Henry status — an acronym for "high earner, not rich yet." Experts told Insider it would result in an even more expensive — and divided — Brooklyn.</p><p>"Brownstone Brooklyn is going to continue to go in the direction of the West Village," Thomas Campanella, a professor of urban studies and planning at Cornell University who wrote "Brooklyn: The Once and Future City," told Insider. The West Village is one of New York's most expensive and exclusive neighborhoods, with <a href="https://www.propertyshark.com/Real-Estate-Reports/2016/06/22/west-village/">PropertyShark dubbing it</a> the epitome of Manhattan <keyword id="12198336" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="gentrification" source="Orion">gentrification</keyword>.</p><p>That sounds like a trend Carrie could get behind, but it took two recessions and uprooting the many waves of people who <a href="https://www.brownstoner.com/brooklyn-life/brooklyns-history-of-immigrants/">first developed the borough's modern economy</a> and build its cultural scene, from the Irish and Italian working class to Latin American and Southern Black migrants. </p><h2><strong>Moving to Brooklyn has always been a milestone for the young New Yorker</strong></h2><p>When Shermin Lakha, 32, moved from the Flatiron neighborhood of Manhattan to Williamsburg, Brooklyn, in February 2021, she was searching for a place where she could see herself living for the long term.</p><p>After a decade, she and her friends had decided Manhattan wasn't it. They wanted more of a community feel and separation from the city. Williamsburg offered that, plus a short commute to the workspace where she works two days a week running the law firm she founded.</p><p>"It really comes down to being in a place we feel like is a home," she told Insider. "Not just those shitty apartments that I was living in when I was younger."</p><p>Lakha was just one of the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/new-york-city-exodus-florida-temporary-move-migration-manhattan-brooklyn-2021-4">20,000 New Yorkers</a> who relocated across the East River in the first year of the pandemic, per US Postal Service data. Looking for an escape and unshackled from the office, these Manhattanites aren't so different from their 1960s counterparts who drove the first wave of gentrification in Brooklyn — intellectuals, artists, and writers also seeking community in the chaos of the Vietnam War.</p><p>"It was part of the counterculture movement of the time, the Woodstock generation who wanted something other than corporate America," Campanella, who was born and raised in Brooklyn, said.</p><p>These boomer migrants were doing their <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-pandemic-shaped-millennials-adulthood-growing-up-2021-3">own version of adulting</a>, "buying up old buildings and putting their sweat equity into restoring them," Campanella said.</p><div type="image" title="brownstone row brooklyn" height="1634" width="2178" msid="90761919" hostid="261"></div><p>That's because, at the time, "brownstones sold for peanuts," he added — but he meant peanuts for middle-class New Yorkers. Consider the couple who <a href="https://www.brownstoner.com/history/brownstone-brooklyn-carroll-gardens-12-2nd-place-thor-jane-rinden-diy-renovation-brownstoning/">bought a brownstone for $28,000</a> in 1968 in Brooklyn's Carroll Gardens — that's about <a href="https://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm">$230,000 in today's dollars</a>, which is still way less than the <a href="https://therealdeal.com/2021/11/29/brownstones-rule-brooklyns-luxury-market-thanksgiving-week/">$6.75 million</a> that a nearby Carroll Gardens brownstone went under contract for late last year. </p><p>These "brownstoners" displaced working-class immigrants and people of color, who had already built economies of their own in Brooklyn. It was the beginning of the borough's status as the poster-child for gentrification in America.</p><p>"Nobody foresaw the extent to which Brownstone Brooklyn would become a phenom," he said. "Once the artists go in, the culture vultures follow soon after, and that's the cycle we've seen happen again and again."</p><p>The trend stuck around through the 1990s, when "yuppies" fueled a revitalization in the borough that <a href="https://catalyst.independent.org/2020/01/29/what-actually-caused-gentrification-in-brooklyn/">tripled home prices</a> over 30 years.</p><p>But brownstone prices had yet to truly skyrocket, Campanella said: "Even at the peak of the yuppie boom, you could still afford a brownstone for way less than they cost now."</p><h2><strong>Henrys make Brooklyn a global brand</strong></h2><p>Before Miranda made her disdainful cross-borough move, Manhattan had been a center of art, culture, and finance for decades. By the turn of the 21st century, it had benefited more than any other borough in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/24/nyregion/manhattanites-fared-best-in-new-york-city-in-1990-s.html">household-income gains</a>, and rents were soaring — studios cost <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2000/04/02/realestate/in-all-5-boroughs-high-goes-higher.html">31% more in 2000</a> than they did a year prior. Across the East River, Brooklyn saw one of the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/24/nyregion/manhattanites-fared-best-in-new-york-city-in-1990-s.html">biggest declines</a> in median household incomes in the state of New York.</p><p>But as older millennials reached home-buying age after the Great Recession, Brooklyn's appeal started going mainstream.</p><p>These young Henrys were ready to buy. But buying in Manhattan meant a postage-stamp-size apartment that most likely had co-op fees and strict requirements. Saddled with student debt and lacking liquid assets, they turned to Brooklyn, Nicole Beauchamp, a luxury global real-estate advisor at Engel &amp; Volkers, told Insider. </p><p>"It was easier for them to buy a condo in Brooklyn and have a decent amount of space," she said, explaining that the co-ops of Manhattan also often required a larger down payment.</p><div type="image" title="high rise buildings" height="1628" width="2178" msid="90761921" hostid="261"></div><p>More jobs appealing to the college-educated also sprang up across the East River thanks to companies that put roots down in the borough a decade prior. It became home to growing startups such as Etsy and Kickstarter, and the millennial-focused media firm Vice Media moved its headquarters there. </p><p>Real-estate developers responded with a boom in new high-rise luxury buildings. Rents started growing at a much faster rate than in Manhattan from 2013 to 2015, the StreetEasy economist Nancy Wu told Insider.</p><p>"Williamsburg was popping off," she said, adding that downtown Brooklyn had gone from being fairly affordable to all luxury in the past five years. Data from the real-estate firm MNS indicates that the mean Brooklyn studio in 2012 rented for $1,812 a month. By 2019, it had climbed to $2,323.</p><div type="image" title="Brooklyn Map" height="982" width="831" msid="90761923" hostid="261"></div><p>As Brooklyn's skyline and waterfront changed, so did its culture. The borough became a stereotype for the bearded, flannel-wearing hipster downing an IPA at a craft brewery as much as it did for "<a href="https://www.thecut.com/2014/04/15-years-of-brooklyn-fashion-mecca-bird.html">bougie boho</a>" Park Slope moms in their No. 6 clogs fighting for spots in <a href="https://www.thecut.com/2019/07/grace-church-school-brooklyn.html">thousand-dollar nursery schools</a>. Instead of slamming the borough, TV shows began to romanticize the life of the young professional Brooklynite à la "Girls," which premiered in 2012. Brooklyn had become a global brand, with new luxury hotels like The Williamsburg Hotel and The William Vale catering to tourists trading in shopping on Fifth for eating at Smorgasburg.</p><p>Young Brooklyn residents of a certain set also got wealthier. From 2000 to 2019, Brooklyn's top 20% of earners age 20 to 30 saw their incomes increase to $70,000 from $55,200 (in 2019 dollars), based on Insider calculations using Census data from the <a href="https://usa.ipums.org/usa/index.shtml">University of Minnesota's IPUMS</a>.</p><p>But as college grads and young families shuffled in, some neighborhoods <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/29/nyregion/gentrification-in-a-brooklyn-neighborhood-forces-residents-to-move-on.html">like Crown Heights</a>, which used to be predominantly Black and West Indian, continued to lose members of their immigrant populations. In 2000, <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12111-020-09499-y">most</a> of the neighborhoods in Brooklyn's northwestern region, including Clinton Hill and Prospect Heights, were inhabited by a predominantly Black population, according to census data. By 2013, the majority of the area was white for the first time in nearly 60 years. Even those of the Woodstock generation who were <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/24/realestate/moving-out-of-brooklyn-because-of-high-prices.html">part of the original 1960s wave of gentrification</a> found themselves priced out of buying by the mid-2000s and moved away.</p><h2><strong>Space is a status symbol in New York — especially during a pandemic </strong></h2><p>As of July 2021, Brooklyn had <a href="https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/popest/2020s-counties-total.html#par_textimage_242301767">2.6 million residents</a> compared to Manhattan's 1.6 million. But most offices are in Manhattan, making it the logical starting point for young professionals. Beauchamp said clients used to choose locations to live based on the easiest commute. But remote work <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/remote-work-made-cities-bigger-nyc-san-francisco-metro-areas-2021-9">opened up Brooklyn</a> for more Manhattanites. Even Brooklyn residents moved farther out into the borough, she said.</p><p>Clients would say, "'If I'm not coming into my office in Midtown, I don't need to live downtown — I only need to go to the park,'" she said, referring to Brooklyn's Prospect Park.</p><p>Consider Lakha, whose hybrid work routine enabled her to find the neighborhood feel she wanted in Brooklyn. Plunging rents and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/millennials-upgrading-luxury-apartments-new-york-city-low-rents-pandemic-2021-3#:~:text=Millennial%20New%20Yorkers%20are%20piling,Brooklyn%20and%20Queens%2C%20per%20StreetEasy.">pandemic discounts on luxury apartments</a> made it all that much easier for her peers to do the same. But <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/brooklyn-real-estate-demand-prices-statistics-coronavirus-recovery-2021-1">Brooklyn was in such high demand</a> that landlords didn't need to offer much of a discount. StreetEasy data found that by August of last year, the median asking rent in Brooklyn had nearly returned to a pre-pandemic high: $2,600 compared with about $2,700 in summer 2019.</p><div type="image" title="brooklyn parents" height="1732" width="2309" msid="90761925" hostid="261"></div><p>Brooklyn also led the housing sales recovery, according to data provided to Insider by the real-estate insight firm Urbandigs. Homes were on the market for less time in Brooklyn, and the number of deals signed nearly doubled 2019's pre-pandemic pace. Manhattan was slower to catch up. Brooklyn was the one New York City market that "didn't miss a beat" despite lockdown, per the firm.</p><p>"It's always been a hot market, but in 2021, it really became the default market for a home" for first-time homeowners, StreetEasy's Wu said. </p><p>The wealthy millennials who made Brooklyn the hot spot of New York City over the past decade ultimately made the borough rich in new money. According to data StreetEasy provided Insider, the number of contracts signed in Brooklyn grew by 316% from August 2010 to August 2021, compared with Manhattan's 105% growth. In the same time frame, the cost of rent for Brooklyn's luxury units (deemed the top fifth of the market) grew by 33%, more than Manhattan's 18%.</p><h2><strong>The future of Brooklyn is divided — and even more expensive </strong></h2><p>Campanella anticipates Brownstone Brooklyn will become even more expensive, exclusive, and sought-after.</p><p>"The great bifurcation of Brooklyn between the northern half and the southern half will persist," Campanella said, adding that the "glamorous Brooklyn where people drop $7 million" lies north of Prospect Park, and the "not-sexy Brooklyn" lies south of it. "If anything," he said, the "gentrification machinery" will embed itself further into places like Crown Heights.</p><p>Wu doesn't think Brooklyn prices will fully reach those of Manhattan, though. Manhattan still draws investors who want to buy a home as a status symbol, she said, and will always be popular for its association with the historic and financial parts of New York. A <a href="https://propertyclub.nyc/article/brooklyn-make-way-manhattan-s-financial-district-is-nyc-s-millennial-hotbed">2019 PropertyClub analysis of US census data</a> found that while Brooklyn was home to almost a third of the city's 3 million millennials, Manhattan's Financial District boasted the largest share per neighborhood. </p><div type="image" title="alexander mcqueen brooklyn" height="1732" width="2309" msid="90761928" hostid="261"></div><p>But as Lakha points out, Brooklyn draws everyone from families to single entrepreneurs. "There's more of a chance to really get to know people here," she said.</p><p>One might say Brooklyn's popularity has made it the new Manhattan, but Beauchamp doesn't think that's the case. She thinks saying Brooklyn is the new Manhattan questions whether Brooklyn was enough in the first place. "In the course of the last 15 years, I think it's opened people's eyes," she said. "People very much used to always think of New York City and only think of Manhattan. And there's so much more to New York city besides Manhattan."</p>

Winning the pandemic made Brooklyn bigger, richer, and more exclusive. Wealthy millennials are leading the charge.

<ul class="summary-list"><li><keyword id="1362260" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Palm-Beach-County">Palm Beach County</keyword>'s grew twice as fast as the US average over the past decade.</li><li>This has accelerated during the pandemic as remote workers sought a sunnier climate during lockdown.</li><li>Three locals explained why both people and businesses are flocking to the county.</li></ul><p><keyword id="6357385" type="LOCATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="florida">Florida</keyword> has been one of the few states to see real economic progress during the pandemic.</p><p><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/florida-growth-jobs-economy-population-new-york-pandemic-employment-miami-2021-4">Both businesses and companies have flocked to the US' third-largest state</a> over the past year because of its pro-business environment, including a lack of personal-income tax, alongside its sunny climate that made it an alluring place to spend lockdown.</p><p>And <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/wealthy-move-to-vacation-towns-long-term-during-pandemic-2021-2">Palm Beach County</a>, located just north of Miami, has stood out. Elliott Management is planning on moving its headquarters there, Citadel Securities based its trading-floor's COVID-19 bubble at a hotel there, and hundreds of families have relocated to the county.</p><p><em><strong>Read more: </strong><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ibm-new-york-city-agile-office-remote-work-hybrid-2021-4">IBM is hunting for a smaller NYC office now that 80% of its employees won't come in every day. It's a sign of the times.</a></em></p><p>Insider spoke to parties involved in the local <keyword id="34412" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="100" keywordseo="economy">economy</keyword>, including the mayors of <keyword id="398561" type="CITY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Boca-Raton">Boca Raton</keyword>, <keyword id="332058" type="CITY" weightage="60" keywordseo="West-Palm-Beach">West Palm Beach</keyword>, and <keyword id="89445" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Palm-Beach">Palm Beach</keyword> town, to understand what's driving people to move to the area.</p><h2>'We punch above our weight in terms of business strength'</h2><p>Palm Beach County has been working to drive a <keyword id="56025" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="Migration">migration</keyword> of businesses for around 10 years, Kelly Smallridge, CEO of the county's Business Development Board (BDB), told Insider.</p><div type="image" title="West Palm Beach" height="1060" width="2121" msid="82655712" hostid="261"></div><p>The county realized that executives were buying second houses or coming for vacations in Florida, but owned a large business in another state. So the BDB approached them about bringing their business to Florida, Smallridge said.</p><p>"That initiative has turned out to be the most lucrative economic development initiative in the last 40 years," Smallridge said.</p><p>The BDB isn't the only group actively recruiting businesses to move to the county. West Palm Beach mayor Keith James told Insider that the city had been reaching out to financial-services companies for years - not just in <keyword id="6355838" type="LOCATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="new-york">New York</keyword> but in other Northeast states including Vermont and Connecticut, alongside some companies as far afield as California.</p><p>"We've seen tremendous interest in companies relocating to Boca Raton," Scott Singer, the mayor of Boca Raton, told Insider.</p><p>He said the city had been fielding "plenty" of inbound calls, but that it had also launched targeted advertising in the New York, Chicago, and San Francisco markets, including promoting its technology business hub.</p><p>The three mayors told Insider they had especially noticed increasing levels of interest from venture capital, private equity, hedge fund, and financial-services companies, feeding into a state-wide trend.</p><div type="image" title="360 rosemary related companies office building west palm beach" height="1999" width="2666" msid="82655714" hostid="261"></div><p>Hedge fund <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/miami-florida-office-space-demand-leasing-microsoft-citadel-elliott-management-2021-1">Elliott Management</a> is in final-stage talks to move its headquarters from Manhattan to West Palm Beach, while Maryland-based mortgage company <a href="https://www.bdb.org/index.php?src=pages&amp;ref=financialservicesices">New Day USA</a> is leasing 50,000 square feet of office space as a second headquarters in the city.</p><p>And <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/citadel-remote-summer-internship-wisconsin-resort-palm-beach-2020-8">Ken Griffin's Citadel Securities</a> chose Palm Beach's Four Seasons as the location for its trading floor's COVID-19 bubble in April 2020.</p><p>Almost 2,500 financial-service firms have offices in the county, employing 37,000 people in total, according to the <a href="https://www.bdb.org/index.php?src=pages&amp;ref=financialservicesices">BDB</a>.</p><p>But other industries are growing, too. <a href="https://www.wpb.org/home/showpublisheddocument/569/637194293849430000">West Palm Beach</a> is targeting the marine and medical industries for future growth, while Singer said that Bacon Raton has been a tech hub for decades, noting that <a href="https://www.bocahistory.org/our-history-ibm/">IBM</a> developed the first personal computer there in 1981.</p><div type="image" title="Palm Beach's marina" height="1060" width="2121" msid="82655715" hostid="261"></div><p>Singer said Boca Raton had the number of corporate headquarters you'd expect from a city of four or five times its size. These include the headquarters of The Office Depot, ADT, and Bluegreen Vacations.</p><p>"We punch above our weight in terms of business strength," Singer said.</p><div type="image" title="ADT's HQ" height="863" width="1727" msid="82655716" hostid="261"></div><p>The county also has a <a href="https://www.pbconventioncenter.com/">350,000 square foot convention center</a> with 19 meeting rooms for businesses to hold events, conferences, and trade shows.</p><div type="image" title="Palm Beach County Convention Center" height="400" width="800" msid="82655718" hostid="261"></div><p><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/florida-growth-jobs-economy-population-new-york-pandemic-employment-miami-2021-4">Florida doesn't have a personal-income tax</a> but it has a variety of other business benefits, too, Troy McLellan, CEO of Boca Raton's Chamber of Commerce, said.</p><p>He said Boca Raton has a "rich entrepreneurial environment" and "an ecosystem that supports business and entrepreneurs," in part thanks to actions of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. He also points to the collaboration between groups such as the Palm Beach's BDB, the regional Chamber, and Enterprise Florida.</p><p>Boca Raton alone has three college campus that create a pipeline of intellectual capital for businesses relocating to the area, McLellan said.</p><div type="image" title="Florida Atlantic University campus" height="1065" width="1420" msid="82655723" hostid="261"></div><p>There are a lot of transport developments either in place or in the pipeline for Palm Beach County, too.</p><p>The county has an international airport, which more than six million passengers pass through each year. Even the most northern part of the county, Jupiter, is located just 90 minutes' drive from Miami and Fort Lauderdale airports for a wider range of long-haul flights.</p><p>Boca Raton also has its own general aviation airport, while West Palm Beach is planning to launch a study into the feasibility of direct flights from the city to the Caribbean to benefit its marine sector.</p><p>And traveling from West Palm Beach to the rest of Florida is getting easier after it was connected to Miami through <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/virgin-trains-investor-wes-edens-interview-brightline-florida-passenger-rail-2019-4">Brightline</a>, a rail system with investments from Richard Branson's Virgin, John Boyd of the Boyd Company said. The route will be expanded to include Orlando and its airport as well as Tampa, too.</p><div type="image" title="Brightline train" height="1900" width="3800" msid="82655724" hostid="261"></div><p>This transport network is luring both businesses and people to the county.</p><p>Singer said there had been "tremendous interest" from executives with businesses overseas, who wanted to open offices or even locate to Boca Raton because of its transport links. Meanwhile, West Palm Beach <a href="https://www.wpb.org/government/development-services/economic-development/why-west-palm-beach">says</a> it has "one of Florida's most walkable central business districts," reducing the need to commute.</p><h2><strong>People were already migrating - but the pandemic sped this up</strong></h2><p>Not only have businesses been moving to the county but people have flocked there, too.</p><p>Palm Beach County's population grew by around 14.2% over the past decade, according to estimates from the <a href="https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/popest/technical-documentation/research/evaluation-estimates/2020-evaluation-estimates/2010s-counties-total.html">US Census Bureau. </a>This is almost double the rate of overall US population growth. Its population sits at around 1.5 million, making it Florida's third-largest county by population and second-largest by size.</p><p>This growth isn't just because of the natural population increases that you would expect over time. There has also been soaring rates of both domestic and international migration. The county's net migration was around 11,500 in 2020, according to US Census Bureau estimates - compared to a net migration loss of 23,625 for New York County, which has a similar population.</p><div type="image" title="West Palm Beach" height="1833" width="2444" msid="82655725" hostid="261"></div><p>Florida is traditionally <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/best-cities-achieve-early-retirement-2020-11">associated with retirees</a> but McLellan said this trend <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/wealthy-move-to-vacation-towns-long-term-during-pandemic-2021-2">seems to be fading as more</a> and more families and young high-flyers move to the area.</p><p>Many of these migrants are coming from the Northeast. Around two in five people moving to Palm Beach County come from the New York City area, per a <a href="https://f.hubspotusercontent20.net/hubfs/2931123/Emerging%20Areas%20in%20SE%20Florida%20(2).pdf">report by Unacast</a>. But some also come from cities like Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco, or even from countries like India and Brazil, Boyd said.</p><p><a href="https://www.forbes.com/assets/billionaires/billionaires-2020-map/?v=5">Forbes</a> identifies Palm Beach County as Florida's billionaire hub. The 2,600-square-mile county has around 44 billionaires, Smallridge said. This is roughly as many as there are in the entirety of Los Angeles, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/where-do-billionaires-live-top-cities-worldwide-ranked-2019-5">according to Wealth-X's 2020 Billionaire Census</a>, and includes Interactive Brokers founder Thomas Peterffy, hedge-fund manager David Tepper, and food-and-drink entrepreneur Jude Reyes, per <a href="https://www.forbes.com/assets/billionaires/billionaires-2020-map/?v=5">Forbes</a>.</p><p>It's also the home of <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/inside-trump-mar-a-lago-club-photos-2018-1">Mar-a-Lago</a>, the US's second-largest mansion, owned by former President Donald Trump.</p><div type="image" title="Mar a Lago better" height="2000" width="2666" msid="82655727" hostid="261"></div><p>The county also has around 71,000 millionaire households, Smallridge said. <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/larry-ellison-tearing-down-palm-beach-mansion-staying-in-hawaii-2021-4">Oracle Founder Larry Ellison</a> recently bought an $80 million house in the county, though he plans to stay living in Hawaii full-time, and fashion designer <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/a-list-of-all-the-powerful-people-moving-to-florida-right-now-2021-1#tommy-hilfiger-9">Tommy Hilfiger</a> sold his house in Greenwich, Connecticut to move to Palm Beach.</p><p>Danielle Moore, the mayor of the town of Palm Beach, said it had a reputation as "the hometown of 'captains of industry,'" which she said motivated even more people to move there.</p><p>People had already been migrating to the county before the pandemic but COVID-19 forced people to address their work-life balance, alongside the deterioration of office culture, the mayors said.</p><p>Alongside companies opening up offices in the city, the rise in remote working during the pandemic has led to digital nomads flocking to the county.</p><p>Moore said the town of Palm Beach was experiencing the lowest inventory of available homes "in decades," and house prices across the county have gone up <a href="https://www.zillow.com/palm-beach-county-fl/home-values/">around 10%</a> over the past year as more and more people relocate.</p><div type="image" title="West Palm Beach housing" height="2016" width="3024" msid="82655730" hostid="261"></div><p>Some of these people are incredibly wealthy. Sales of million-dollar single-family homes in Palm Beach County increased by more than 140% year over year, according to the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/wealthy-move-to-vacation-towns-long-term-during-pandemic-2021-2">2021 Luxury Outlook report by Sotheby's International Realty</a>.</p><p>Florida has remained largely open during the pandemic compared to other states. This led to people choosing to make Florida their primary residence for the pandemic.</p><p>"People can work from anywhere, so why not work from paradise?" Singer said.</p><p>"That trend is likely to continue because <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ibm-ceo-on-return-to-work-and-hybrid-remote-plans-think-2021-5">the office environment of New York City</a> is not what it was," he said. He added that <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/new-york-income-tax-wealthy-florida-cuomo-miami-budget-2021-4">New York State was also hiking its taxes</a>.</p><p>"When they were closed down, we had plenty of recreation space and great weather year-round, and people are understanding more and more that this is where they want to be," he added.</p><div type="image" title="West Palm Beach marina" height="1060" width="2121" msid="82655733" hostid="261"></div><p>Alongside retirees, Florida is also associated with seasonal residents who move to the state for the colder winter months, and Moore said that the town of Palm Beach's population more than doubles during the peak season.</p><p>But when people relocated to Florida, many started enrolling their children at nearby schools, and soon found themselves settled down in the state, Smallridge said.</p><p>Palm Beach County's median age is 43.6, "and that number is probably going to stay steady even as we all age because younger people are being born and coming here every day," Singer said.</p><p>The climate has attracted people, too. The county has an average temperature of 75 degrees Fahrenheit, compared to 53 degrees Fahrenheit for <a href="https://en.climate-data.org/north-america/united-states-of-america/new-york/new-york-1091/">New York State</a>, <a href="https://discover.pbcgov.org/pages/pbc_facts.aspx">hasn't had snow since 1978</a>, and has <a href="https://discover.pbcgov.org/pages/pbc_facts.aspx">around 47 miles of coastline</a>.</p><div type="image" title="Palm Beach" height="1155" width="2310" msid="82655734" hostid="261"></div><p>"Most executives will go take a swim in the beach before they even go to work," Smallridge said. "They never have to shovel snow and they don't have to ride with the subway."</p><p>But even as more people migrate to the county, some to work remotely while others to work for the companies opening new offices in the area, this trend is ultimately creating more employment opportunities for local residents, James said. He added that West Palm Beach has offered financial incentives to companies moving to the city based on the number of jobs they create, including <a href="https://www.wpb.org/home/showpublisheddocument/569/637194293849430000">expedited permit reviews and tax exemptions</a>.</p><p>McLellan, meanwhile, said Boca Raton was trying to create a pipeline of future talent for businesses in the area, and that the Chamber was working to discourage residents from migrating away from the city.</p><p>Ultimately Palm Beach County is positioning itself as not just a major financial-services hub, but also a destination for families, young graduates, and high-flying execs to move to.</p><p>This is perhaps best summed up by West Palm Beach's tagline: "business, life, balanced."</p>

Palm Beach County has around 44 billionaires. The super-rich are flocking there for business opportunities, convenient transport links, and a chance to live in 'paradise.'

<ul class="summary-list"><li>People are flocking back to <keyword id="6355838" type="LOCATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="new-york">New York</keyword> and staying away from <keyword id="6357722" type="LOCATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="silicon-valley">Silicon Valley</keyword>, Jefferies analysts said.</li><li>USPS mail-forwarding data shows New York's occupancy growing with finance giants reopening offices.</li><li>Big Tech's delayed office return is likely driving population declines in the Bay Area, Jefferies said.</li></ul><p>The second stage of pandemic-era <keyword id="56025" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="Migration">migration</keyword> has begun in the US.</p><p>The pandemic and related lockdowns sparked a mass exodus from densely populated cities, as millions of Americans moved throughout the crisis, with many fleeing metropolitan areas. The vaccine-led reopening is far along enough now that some of these trends are reversing course.</p><p>Mail forwarding data from USPS suggests Americans are returning to major <keyword id="127185" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="East-coast">East Coast</keyword> cities, Jefferies analysts led by Jonathan Petersen said in a note this week. Manhattan saw 4.3% of households move out during the pandemic but regained 0.31% of occupancy through May and June. That sum should increase, the team said, as "all indications point to further acceleration into July."</p><p>The moves could be linked to financial services giants encouraging employees to return to offices, Jefferies said. The messaging sparked "a scramble for apartments" as those who left at the start of the pandemic flocked back to New York.</p><p><em><strong>Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/wall-street-bankers-back-to-office-happy-hours-dining-dealmakers-2021-5" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Dealmaker dinners are back, and interns are ready to hit up the bars. Wall Street's appetite is returning, and New York City restaurants are gearing up for a rush.</a></strong></em></p><p>Boston has similarly seen move-ins accelerate into the summer, the note said, while that city's population is lower than during the period just before the pandemic.</p><div type="image" title="JEFFERIES" height="807" width="1172" msid="84871917" hostid="261"></div><p>Northern California, on the other hand, is struggling to rebound. Occupancy change was flat in San Francisco in May and June, Jefferies said, and the total population remains about 3.4% lower than that seen in March 2020. Declines in Silicon Valley held at roughly 0.2% each month. The lack of a population surge could be explained by tech companies pushing back their return-to-work dates into the second half of the year, the analysts said.</p><p>Sun Belt cities such as Raleigh, Jacksonville, Charlotte, and Austin remain the clear winners of the pandemic <keyword id="55350" type="CITY" weightage="60" keywordseo="moving">moving</keyword> cycle. Strong population growth continued through the second quarter, and many of these cities have seen occupancy rise more than 1% through the pandemic.</p><p>Every market that enjoyed net in-migration in the second quarter was either in Texas or the Southeast, Jefferies said. Four of the top five fastest-growing cities were in the major Florida hubs of Orlando, Miami, Jacksonville, and Tampa, the firm added.</p><div type="image" title="Jefferies" height="730" width="1375" msid="84871918" hostid="261"></div><p>USPS data also suggests the city-to-suburbs exodus wasn't nearly as large as early narratives suggested.</p><p>Rural areas benefitted most from lockdown-related migration, with population growth shooting higher in early 2020 and only falling slightly over the following year. And while urban populations have started to rebound as the US reopens, suburban occupancy has been essentially unchanged.</p><p>The city-to-rural shift is likely powered by Americans moving to second homes in the countryside, Jefferies said. Those expecting to telecommute indefinitely also likely played a role in the <keyword id="11750559" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="population-shift">population shift</keyword>, the team added. That means the urban comeback could be even bigger in the months to come, especially on the east coast.</p>

People are moving back to NYC, but not to San Francisco - and the migration to the Sun Belt looks permanent

<ul class="summary-list"><li><keyword id="6357385" type="LOCATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="florida">Florida</keyword>'s population grew by 14.6% in the last decade - and the pandemic has accelerated this.</li><li>The state famously has no personal-income tax, and its banking and finance industries are booming.</li><li>But the rise in remote working, its lack of lockdown, and attractive house prices are also drawing people in.</li></ul><p>More and more workers are moving to Florida during the pandemic - and the sunny climate isn't the only reason why.</p><p>Top companies are opening new offices in the state, and the rise in remote working is giving staff more freedom to choose where they want to live.</p><p>Florida's population grew by 2.7 million - or 14.6% - between 2010 and 2020, according to <a href="https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/dec/popchange-data-text.html">US Census data</a>. This is double the rate of overall US population growth.</p><p><em><strong>Read more: </strong><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/wall-street-move-florida-goldman-sachs-elliott-real-estate-2020-12">Is Florida the new Wall Street?</a></em></p><p>"It's not just retirees - it's tech workers leaving San Francisco," John Boyd, the CEO of The Boyd Company, said.</p><h2>Businesses are flocking to Florida</h2><p>"Florida certainly has a winning formula for business attraction," Boyd told Insider.</p><p>In particular, Florida is becoming a hotspot for banking and financial services, while <keyword id="15641" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Miami">Miami</keyword> is as emerging as "one of the hottest new tech hubs in North America today," he said.</p><p>Hedge fund <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-21/singer-s-41-billion-hedge-fund-moving-headquarters-to-florida">Elliott Management</a> is moving its headquarters to West <keyword id="89445" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Palm-Beach">Palm Beach</keyword>, private-equity firm <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-get-hired-blackstone-private-equity-jobs-interview-questions-2020-10?utm_source=markets&amp;utm_medium=ingestgest" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Blackstone</a> plans to open an office in Miami, and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/goldman-sachs-reportedly-considers-moving-asset-management-to-florida-2020-12">Goldman Sachs</a> is considering the state for its asset management division. Even <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/subway-moves-jobs-from-connecticut-headquarters-to-miami-2021-3">Subway is shifting some business units to Miami</a>.</p><div type="image" title="360 rosemary related companies office building west palm beach" height="1999" width="2666" msid="82833315" hostid="261"></div><p>Software company Civix and Sonesta International Hotels are opening new offices in <keyword id="67774" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Orlando">Orlando</keyword>, too.</p><p><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/palm-beach-county-florida-migration-businesses-financial-services-new-york-2021-4">Boca Raton's Mayor Scott Singer</a> said there had been "tremendous interest" from companies in relocating to the city, through a combination of both inbound calls and targeted advertising in the <keyword id="6355838" type="LOCATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="new-york">New York</keyword>, Chicago, and San Francisco markets. Singer added that there had also been interest from executives with businesses overseas wanting to open offices or even relocate to Boca Raton.</p><p>Deloitte has invested $63 million in Orlando since 2014, while KPMG chose Orlando for its $450 million global training center, the largest capital investment in KPMG history, according to Casey Barnes, vice president of business development at the Orlando Economic Partnership.</p><p>Colliers previously told <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/hedge-funds-florida-office-space-commercial-real-estate-2020-12?r=US&amp;IR=TIR=T">Insider</a> that interest from out-of-state firms in South Florida <keyword id="6354553" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="real-estate">real estate</keyword> is "torrential" - and they're looking for much bigger officers than before, too.</p><h2>Average salaries are climbing</h2><p>As these businesses open offices in Florida, the job-market in the state is booming, too. And though more workers are moving to Florida, local residents are also benefiting from this job creation, too, West Palm Beach Mayor Keith James said.</p><p>Andrew Hunter, co-founder of job search engine <a href="https://u7061146.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=4tNED-2FM8iDZJQyQ53jATUcWyXiKAAK5HX77EGAKkF9U-3DKawb_cAthpJulO9NLVvdXWXCrp6FfYHUA2w0BLsoUdzG7B08TEFarxttvDzXtafzCSNKANC7LJUv7S7PHf-2FrNlVaftZUUywn4-2BWcwH-2FJDOhj0TCm-2FPNeNUMyYLL-2BPOsYgV240ZtVd9GeyfVloOKFcjUtev6lEOfF-2FPYlj-2FolgGjTZFY7O9sFK2P7A3cq7BMxvQ-2BKz7uk1yxjW0mvOersVT85LjMwBW6yoHCwv9TvlbVXbUpPVxtt9CejLw3-2FYvGsgNZaQQnZlDVaWbSk914Jf-2BQVb0Y4dM47DFQPXbs-2Bcxd0JmBlliaITtdL32Mm83qPL9IxOJT21bE4csU7T3kwutxv0nTvGwkeknQkDC6tRKBAuXxQ-3D" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Adzuna</a>, told Insider Florida's job vacancies are back at pre-pandemic levels and the number of unemployed is reaching record lows while average city salaries are climbing.</p><p>The number of financial-services employees in Florida has almost returned to pre-pandemic levels with nearly 600,000 people working in the sector. New York, on the other hand, is rebounding much slower, and still has around 30,000 fewer employees in the sector than it did in early 2020, according to data from the <a href="https://www.bls.gov/regions/new-york-new-jersey/new_york.htm#eag">US Bureau of Labor Statistics</a>.</p><p>In Orlando alone, Deloitte has created more than 2,200 new jobs since 2014, Barnes said.</p><p>Adzuna said that tech company Oracle is the top company hiring in Florida on its site. Boyd said that financial services and tech workers are leaving cities like Boston, Chicago, and New York to move to Florida, but some are coming from overseas in India and Brazil, too.</p><p>And billionaires including <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/wall-street-move-florida-goldman-sachs-elliott-real-estate-2020-12?utm_source=markets&amp;utm_medium=ingestgest" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Charles Schwab</a>, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/a-list-of-all-the-powerful-people-moving-to-florida-right-now-2021-1">Carl Icahn</a>, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/a-list-of-all-the-powerful-people-moving-to-florida-right-now-2021-1">Tom Brady</a>, and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/peter-thiel-bought-miami-estate-featured-on-the-real-world-2021-1">Peter Thiel</a> have all bought homes in the state. Palm Beach County alone has around 44 billionaires, Smallridge told Insider.</p><div type="image" title="carl icahn billionaire miami" height="1371" width="1828" msid="82354611" hostid="261"></div><p>The state is encouraging companies to create new jobs for local workers alongside relocating their existing workforce. James said that <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/palm-beach-county-florida-migration-businesses-financial-services-new-york-2021-4">West Palm Beach has offered financial incentives</a> to companies moving to the city based on the number of jobs they create, including expedited permit reviews and tax exemptions.</p><p>And it's not just finance and tech workers who are benefitting from Florida's growing <keyword id="34412" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="100" keywordseo="economy">economy</keyword>. The state is also <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/florida-minimum-wage-rise-vote-amendment-15-tipped-employees-workers-2020-11">hiking up its minimum wage to $15 per hour</a> by 2026, too.</p><h2>Working remotely gives people more freedom</h2><p>Florida is traditionally <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/best-cities-achieve-early-retirement-2020-11">associated with retirees</a> but Troy McLellan, CEO of the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/palm-beach-county-florida-migration-businesses-financial-services-new-york-2021-4">Boca Chamber</a>, said this trend seems to be fading as more and more families and young high-flyers move to the area.</p><p>The rise of remote working has made it easier for workers to relocate independently of their employers.</p><p>Boyd said that the pandemic has created "a time of historic mobility for both companies and people." Companies are increasingly letting staff work from home on a permanent basis, which allows them to save on real estate costs, he said.</p><p>"The <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ibm-ceo-on-return-to-work-and-hybrid-remote-plans-think-2021-5">office environment of New York City</a> is not what it was," <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/palm-beach-county-florida-migration-businesses-financial-services-new-york-2021-4">Boca Raton Mayor Scott Singer</a> told Insider.</p><p>There is growing momentum for companies to let employees <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/workers-want-hybrid-model-to-see-work-friends-survey-finds-2021-3">work from home permanently</a>. <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-staff-work-from-home-after-coronavirus-pandemic-twitter-2021-4">Facebook</a>, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-tells-employees-they-can-work-from-home-permanently-2020-5">Twitter</a>, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/salesforce-employees-can-work-from-home-permanently-2021-2">Salesforce</a>, and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ford-general-motors-toyota-remote-work-home-pandemic-coronavirus-office-2021-3">Ford</a> have said their employees can remotely post-pandemic, and some companies are <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/salesforce-cancels-san-francisco-office-space-report-2021-3">canceling office leases</a>.</p><p>"Orlando was an ideal place to live, work, and play prior<em> </em>to COVID-19, and the region's offerings will only be more valuable to professionals in the pandemic's wake," Barnes told Insider.</p><div type="image" title="West Palm Beach" height="1060" width="2121" msid="82833316" hostid="261"></div><p>This was something Alexandra Scherbich, global head of B2B marketing at Tenth Revolution Group, found when she relocated to Tampa from London in April 2019. She told Insider that managing her colleagues in the UK could be challenging from abroad because of the time zone differences, but that she is able to now dedicate her afternoons to meetings with clients on the West Coast, which would have been much harder in the UK because of the eight-hour time difference.</p><p>"People can work from anywhere, so why not work from paradise?" <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/palm-beach-county-florida-migration-businesses-financial-services-new-york-2021-4">Singer</a> said.</p><h2>Florida has a pro-business environment</h2><p>Though business <keyword id="56025" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="Migration">migration</keyword> to Florida has accelerated during the pandemic, this was already a well-established trend pre-COVID.</p><p>Florida famously doesn't have a personal income tax, and this is one of the major motivators for migration, Boyd told Insider. He added that many people moving to the state come from high-tax states that don't have such a pro-business environment, like Connecticut and New Jersey, as well as <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/new-york-income-tax-wealthy-florida-cuomo-miami-budget-2021-4">New York</a>, which recently announced plans to <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/new-york-income-tax-wealthy-florida-cuomo-miami-budget-2021-4">bump up its income-tax rates</a> for its wealthiest residents.</p><p>"And the other part of all this is, you know, economic development really comes down to leadership at the end of the day," Boyd said.</p><p>"Governor DeSantis is a good salesman-in-chief of the state of Florida," he said. He added that Miami Mayor Francis Suarez was positioning the city as a major tech market.</p><div type="image" title="ron desantis florida vaccine 60 minutes" height="1638" width="2184" msid="82354613" hostid="261"></div><p>Troy McLellan, CEO of the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/palm-beach-county-florida-migration-businesses-financial-services-new-york-2021-4">Boca Raton</a> Chamber, told Insider that the city has three college campuses and was trying to create a pipeline of future talent for businesses.</p><h2>Florida has sun, sea, and no lockdown</h2><p>Florida has also remained largely open during the pandemic compared to other states. This led to people choosing to make Florida their primary residence for the pandemic, Kelly Smallridge, CEO of the Business Development Board (BDB) of Palm Beach County, told Insider.</p><p>"When [states like New York were] closed down, we had plenty of recreation space and great weather year-round, and people are understanding more and more that this is where they want to be," Singer said.</p><p>When people relocated to Florida, they started enrolling their children at nearby schools, and soon found themselves settled down in the state, Smallridge said.</p><p>Barnes said that many companies are choosing to expand in or relocate to Florida because "they see it as a destination that will attract workers and their families."</p><div type="image" title="miami florida" height="1414" width="1885" msid="82354615" hostid="261"></div><p><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/palm-beach-county-florida-migration-businesses-financial-services-new-york-2021-4">Palm Beach County</a>, for example, has an average temperature of 75 degrees Fahrenheit, compared to 53 degrees Fahrenheit for <a href="https://en.climate-data.org/north-america/united-states-of-america/new-york/new-york-1091/">New York State</a>, <a href="https://discover.pbcgov.org/pages/pbc_facts.aspx">hasn't had snow since 1978</a>, and has <a href="https://discover.pbcgov.org/pages/pbc_facts.aspx">around 47 miles of coastline</a>.</p><p>"Most executives will go take a swim in the beach before they even go to work," the BDB's Smallridge said. "And, you know, they never have to shovel snow and they don't have to ride with the subway."</p><div type="image" title="West Palm Beach" height="1060" width="2121" msid="82833320" hostid="261"></div><p>Scherbich said that, alongside work opportunities, the climate was part of her reason for migrating. She added that she's settled into the city well and that it has a large UK expatriate community.</p><h2>Housing and living costs are lower than New York</h2><p>House prices have gone up <a href="https://www.zillow.com/palm-beach-county-fl/home-values/">around 10%</a> over the past year as more people move to the state, but Florida still has a "very attractive" real-estate market compared to some other major markets in the US, Boyd said, adding that there are affordable housing options "in virtually all parts of Florida."</p><p>The average price for a house in Florida is $277,429, rising to $323,094 in Palm Beach County and $407,245 in Miami, according to <a href="https://www.zillow.com/palm-beach-county-fl/home-values/">data from Zillow</a>. In New York, in comparison, average house prices are $323,094 for the state and $649,490 for the city.</p><p>And it isn't just houses that cost less in the Sunshine Site. Overall living costs in Orlando are 6% lower than the US average, Barnes said.</p><p>But this migration is having an impact on the availability of property in the area.</p><p>Sales of million-dollar single-family homes in Palm Beach County increased by more than 140% year over year, according to the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/wealthy-move-to-vacation-towns-long-term-during-pandemic-2021-2">2021 Luxury Outlook report by Sotheby's International Realty</a>, while Jay Boodheshwar, Palm Beach's deputy town manager, said that <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/palm-beach-county-florida-migration-businesses-financial-services-new-york-2021-4">the town of Palm Beach</a> was experiencing the lowest inventory of available homes "in decades."</p><h2>Florida's transport networks are growing</h2><p>There are a lot of transport developments in the pipeline for Florida, too, Boyd said. This includes <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/virgin-trains-investor-wes-edens-interview-brightline-florida-passenger-rail-2019-4">Brightline</a>, a rail system with investments from Richard Branson's Virgin, which connects Miami to West Palm Beach, with expansion plans Orlando and Tampa.</p><div type="image" title="Boring company los angeles" height="1334" width="1778" msid="82354617" hostid="261"></div><p>And North Miami Beach official told <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/north-miami-beach-says-early-talks-elon-musk-boring-company-2021-3">Insider's Grace Kay</a> the city is in early talks with Elon Musk's The Boring Company over a possible plan to build a one- to two-mile tunnel to tackle congestion.</p><p>The state has more than 100 public airports, and Tampa's direct flights to London were part of Scherbich's decision to relocate to the city.</p><p>Orlando in particular bills itself as the "tomorrowland of transportation," Barnes said. This includes serving as a hub for one of the world's first <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/florida-getting-all-electric-flying-taxis-hubs-2021-1">jet-powered flying taxis</a>, which will depart from more than 10 locations across Florida. The aircrafts by German startup Lilium will be based at Orlando's Lake Nona, which Barnes said it "a growing testbed" for smart city technology.</p><p>"The signal is really ahead of the curve," Boyd said.</p><p><em>Have you relocated to Florida? Got a story you want to tell? Email this reporter at gdean@insider.com.</em></p>

Tech jobs, sun, and no income tax: experts explain why Florida is poised to keep growing even after the pandemic

<ul class="summary-list"><li>As conservatives flee Blue State hostility and lockdowns, South <keyword id="6357385" type="LOCATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="florida">Florida</keyword> has become a GOP power base.</li><li>The GOP social calendar orbits <keyword id="6354862" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="trump">Trump</keyword>'s <keyword id="3285762" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Mar-a-Lago">Mar-a-Lago</keyword>, while revelers party mask-free at swank house parties and penthouses. </li><li>Greater <keyword id="15641" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Miami">Miami</keyword> has lured California tech and right-wing <keyword id="6355005" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="news">news</keyword>. Florida's <keyword id="6358883" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="politics">politics</keyword> is meanwhile shifting Red.</li></ul><p>Brittney Reed needed to get in front of Donald Trump and it had to happen fast.</p><p>It was the eve of two special elections in Louisiana, and Reed--the head of the Louisiana GOP--knew an endorsement from Trump could make the difference. So, she had secured a last-minute ticket for a fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago and flew to Palm Beach to make her case in person.</p><p>It was mid-March, and Mar-a-Lago had <a href="https://apnews.com/article/mar-a-lago-partially-closed-covid-19-outbreak-32a7a9694c1f738eef6af6d3fc6e5aa1">partially closed</a> a section of the club after several workers tested positive for COVID-19. But Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who became a national figure for loosening coronavirus restrictions, had booked the club for the evening and his event went on as planned. </p><p>When DeSantis and Trump finished their remarks, Reed made a beeline for the former president to discuss the two Republicans she wanted in Congress: Julia Letlow, the widow of congressman-elect Luke Letlow, who had died from COVID complications, and Claston Bernard, a former LSU track star.</p><p>Trump turned to DeSantis and others around him.</p><p>"Ron, what do you think of this race here?" Trump said, according to sources with knowledge of the event. (Representatives for Trump, DeSantis, and Bernard did not respond to Insider's questions about the encounter.) "Is it possible, what do you think?"</p><p>The crowd agreed that Letlow was a good bet, while DeSantis said Bernard's seat "wasn't winnable" because the district was heavily Democratic. Trump had <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/542674-trump-endorses-widow-of-rep-elect-luke-letlow-in-louisiana-house-race">praised </a>Letlow before, but it wasn't widely known his removal from social media platforms had silenced the former president's preferred megaphone. "How am I going to do this endorsement if I do it?" Trump asked.</p><div type="image" title="Mar a Lago better" height="2000" width="3000" msid="82006946" hostid="261"></div><p>"Put a press release out. We'll get it everywhere," Reed said.</p><p>The following day, Trump released a statement <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/544146-trump-boosts-julia-letlow-ahead-of-louisiana-special-election">promoting</a> Letlow's candidacy. She <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2021/03/20/julia-letlow-special-election-louisiana-477350">won</a> easily.</p><h2><strong>Mar-a-La-Go-Go</strong></h2><p>South Florida has long been a haven for those fleeing frigid winters and high taxes. Once the pandemic began, a jet set of monied Manhattanites, tech entrepreneurs, and untethered influencers restless from Blue State lockdowns flocked to Miami en masse -- helping turn Greater Miami into a <keyword id="58815" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="conservative">conservative</keyword> power base.</p><p>Once Mar-a-Lago went from being Trump's "Winter White House" to full-time residence, the <keyword id="155317" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="Republican">Republican</keyword> Party's social calendar has increasingly orbited his beachfront Xanadu. </p><p>"Republicans used to go to the Upper East Side to raise money but most of those people aren't even in New York anymore. They're in their second home in South Florida," said Adam Weiss, a Miami-based public relations executive. "Now that New York completely shut down, that drove a whole new group of people to come down here." </p><p>So far this year, Trump's members-only resort has hosted high-dollar soirees for DeSantis, Utah Senator Mike Lee, South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, Arkansas gubernatorial candidate Sarah Huckabee Sanders, and Alabama Senate candidate Lynda Blanchard. </p><p>"I have to say, I'm getting calls from senators, they all want our endorsement and I'm being very selective," Trump said at the Noem gathering, which donors <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2021/02/23/kristi-noem-trump-fundraiser-471159">paid</a> $4,000 to attend. </p><p>Party honchos even relocated their confabs to South Florida to ensure a Trump appearance.</p><p>The American Conservative Union <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/cpac-2021-speakers-trump-pence-orlando-republican-conservative-2021-2">switched</a> its annual CPAC event from suburban Maryland to Orlando in February to avoid limits on large indoor gatherings. It was there that Trump made his first public remarks since leaving office. </p><div type="image" title="Trump won" height="3581" width="5249" msid="82006949" hostid="261"></div><p>The Republican National Committee picked Palm Beach for its spring donor retreat in April and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-rnc-mar-a-lago/2021/03/08/0b693fce-8051-11eb-bb5a-ad9a91faa4ef_story.html">set</a> a portion of the weekend at Mar-a-Lago to appease Trump after officials <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-cease-and-desist-name-likeness-republican-fundraising-rnc-2021-3">angered</a> the former president by using his image in its fundraisers.</p><p>When Air Force One touched down in West Palm Beach on Jan. 20, hundreds of MAGA-hatted faithful lined Southern Boulevard gripping blue "Trump 2020" flags and hand painted "Trump Won" signs as the former president's motorcade whizzed by.</p><p>It was a far friendlier atmosphere than he had lately experienced in Manhattan, where raucous protesters would pack Fifth Avenue, at the foot of Trump Tower, whenever Trump returned from Washington. </p><p>"It's a wealthy place and there's not many places where there are so many heavy hitters who are Republican," Weiss said.</p><div type="image" title="Arrest Trump 2 " height="2334" width="3500" msid="82006954" hostid="261"></div><h2><strong>"Isn't it so nice that Miami is open?"</strong></h2><p>Power lunches in Palm Beach still <a href="https://pagesix.com/2021/02/19/upper-east-side-power-dining-scene-relocates-to-palm-beach/">reign</a> among Trump's inner circle. Rudy Giuliani is known to hold court at The Breakers and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has been seen dining at La Bilboquet, a Worth Avenue outpost of a high-end Manhattan eatery that opened in February. The afterparty crowd for Mar-a-Lago events often hits Cucina Palm Beach where Kimberly Guilfoyle, who <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9436083/Donald-Melania-Trump-attend-Easter-service-spending-day-Mar-Lago-grandkids.html">purchased</a> a $9.7 million mansion with her boyfriend Don Jr. in nearby Jupiter, has been spotted dancing on the tables. </p><p>The love for Trump spreads 70 miles south of Mar-a-Lago to Miami, a city that never sleeps thanks to many coronavirus restrictions lifting months ago.</p><p>They pack into Carbone, one of the restaurants dotting Collins Avenue in South Beach. Or Socialista, a swanky lounge attached to Cipriani Restaurant, where transplants from San Francisco start-ups rub shoulders with maskless models and the occasional conservative influencer, before moving on to an all-night <a href="https://pagesix.com/2021/01/25/former-real-housewives-star-fined-for-wild-house-parties-in-miami/">party</a> at a South Beach penthouse or at the Star Island mansion of plastic surgeon Leonard Hochstein and "Real Housewives of Miami" star Lisa Hochstein.  </p><p>"Isn't it so nice that Miami is open?" one tech founder, who called himself a COVID refugee, said. "I'm so over COVID."</p><p>But the hottest reservation in Biscayne Bay is Joia Beach, a Mykonos-inspired beach club with views of megayachts and the Miami skyline. </p><p>There's currently a three-month wait on Open Table but VIPs like Akon, Maluma, Adriana Lima, hedge fund manager Dan Loeb, and Tiffany Trump have snagged tables to nibble on Tasmanian trout crudo ($20), Turkish octopus ($30), and winter fennel and crab salad ($28). </p><p>It helps to be on a texting basis with one of the restaurant's partners. Others have tried more unusual measures.</p><p>"People have swam in," Marko Gojanovic, a Joia Beach partner and real estate agent, said. "There are people who have tried to pull jet skis in areas we can't see. People have paddled up to us. Thank God we have security."  </p><div type="image" title="Ron and Kim" height="2738" width="4107" msid="82006957" hostid="261"></div><p>Coronavirus is still raging in Florida a year after the pandemic began. The state has had more than <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/us/florida-covid-cases.html">2 million</a> cases and 33,000 deaths, with a quarter of the state's total occurring in Miami-Dade County alone. But South Floridians--old timers and new arrivals alike--have largely shed their coronavirus concerns like a chunky sweater at the beach.</p><p>No one shames people for forgoing masks at hotels and restaurants or packing house parties. Mar-a-Lago remains a mask-free zone.</p><p>Contrast that to what happened in the northeast last winter, when a video of a Queens Republican club's Christmas party, featuring a maskless conga line, gained <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/12/30/951267532/multiple-coronavirus-cases-after-republican-christmas-party-in-new-york">3.7 million views</a> online and drew torrents of condemnation. Manhattan Young Republicans were so spooked by the media they <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/03/nyregion/young-republicans-club-party.html">held</a> their winter gala at a secret location in New Jersey.</p><p>Washington has become less hospitable to Trump-friendly conservatives too. American Conservative Union chairman Matt Schlapp said he's had several hostile encounters with progressives in public. He and his wife, former White House communications aide Mercedes Schlapp, are eyeing a move south.</p><p>"I was eating a salad last weekend at a restaurant in Old Town Alexandria and was berated by a woman who called me an 'a--hole,'" Schlapp said. "Usually you have to cut someone off in traffic to earn that kind of title but here you just have to be someone recognized for being a Republican."</p><h2><strong>The Great Republican Migration</strong></h2><p>South Florida has been beckoning conservatives for years, but locals say the influx has accelerated since Trump took office in 2017. </p><div type="image" title="Thank U Trump" height="2849" width="4273" msid="82006960" hostid="261"></div><p>Fox News is still headquartered in Manhattan but other right-wing outlets have proliferated along the Gold Coast. <a href="https://www.insider.com/newsmax-anchor-greg-kelly-defends-trump-but-who-is-he-2021-1">Newsmax</a>, the Boca Raton-based cable channel, is <a href="https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/elections/fl-ne-newsmax-expansion-news-bureaus-biden-trump-20201210-fzi24y7isvax3ovspxonyazr7m-story.html">adding a news bureau</a> in Miami later this year. Conservative radio host and Palm City resident Dan Bongino is one of several commentators trying out for the slot that <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/sandra-fluke-says-shes-countering-the-hatred-rush-limbaugh-sowed-2021-2">Rush Limbaugh</a> anchored from Palm Beach until his death earlier this year. Far-right podcaster Bill Mitchell has been broadcasting his <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/bill-mitchell-donald-trump-supporter-move-to-miami_n_5d5302a0e4b05fa9df05df82">YourVoice America</a> program from Miami since 2019. And MAGA influencer Maggie Vandenberghe fled California for Palm Beach this winter.</p><p>The party's donor class soon followed. Billionaires fleeing Blue State progressivism decamped to Miami's most exclusive islands. Palantir co-founder and Republican <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/29/peter-thiel-gives-six-figures-to-republican-national-committee.html">megadonor</a> Peter Thiel plunked down <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/miami-real-estate-ford-ceo-compound-photos-2020-10">$18 million</a> in September for a Venetian Islands chateau where MTV's "The Real World: Miami" was filmed. Founders Fund partner Keith Rabois <a href="https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/tech-icon-criticizes-San-Francisco-Keith-Rabois-15746116.php">chided</a> San Francisco for being "massively improperly run and managed" before dropping <a href="https://www.google.com/search?sxsrf=ALeKk02RYavWOystY0_hegTogRU1vMXOzA%3A1615496508614&amp;ei=PIVKYJL5JJXPtQa8irbYBg&amp;q=keith+rabois+miami&amp;oq=keith+rabois+miami&amp;gs_lcp=Cgdnd3Mtd2l6EAMyBAgjECcyBAgAEEMyAggAMgYIABAWEB5Q4MkTWODJE2C5zRNoAnAAeACAAW-IAdsBkgEDMC4ymAEAoAEBqgEHZ3dzLXdpesABAQ&amp;sclient=gws-wiz&amp;ved=0ahUKEwiSh6C8kanvAhWVZ80KHTyFDWsQ4dUDCA0&amp;uact=50KHTyFDWsQ4dUDCA0&amp;uact=5">$29 million</a> on an estate near Thiel in December, while Blumberg Capital's David Blumberg blamed "<a href="https://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2020/12/01/prominent-venture-capitalist-joins-bay-area-exodus.html">poor governance</a>" in California before making his cross-country journey. </p><p>"Miami should be the easiest and cheapest city in the country for somebody to start a business," Miami Mayor Francis Suarez said. "I want to make sure everyone around the country knows that Miami is here to help you grow, not keep you from growing."</p><h2>A political shift is underway   </h2><p>Florida's transformation from swingy purple to deeper red would have been unthinkable two decades ago when George W. Bush won the state and the presidency by a minuscule 537 votes. Southeast Florida swelled more than a million people since 2000 but it is far less of a Democratic stronghold than it used to be. </p><div type="image" title="Trump and FL GOP " height="3432" width="5228" msid="82006965" hostid="261"></div><p>President Barack Obama won Palm Beach County by 24 points and Miami-Dade by 16 points in 2008 en route to statewide victories during both presidential campaigns. But Trump won twice by making up ground in Democratic <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/results-florida-president.html">counties</a>. </p><p>Florida Republicans knocked doors for months <a href="https://www.wmfe.org/republicans-in-florida-are-knocking-on-doors-to-shore-up-candidates/164091">boosting turnout</a> while the Biden curtailed canvassing during the health crisis. The Trump campaign also accused Democrats of supporting socialist policies -- a message that resonated among Cuban and Venezuelan immigrants who fled brutal left-wing regimes.</p><p>"Democrats were flat-footed in dealing with accusations of socialism in commercials where people had lived under the boot of socialism," Dan Gelber, Democratic mayor of South Beach, said. "I don't think we responded aggressively enough."</p><p>Latino voters in Miami-Dade also <a href="https://www.axios.com/trump-data-latino-support-49a0f0ed-b244-4b27-86b3-ee022e21f8c1.html">feared</a> economic damage from school and business closures more than getting sick, according to voter data Equis <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/20537484-equis_post-mortem_part_one__public_deck_">analyzed</a>.</p><div type="image" title="miami volleyball" height="2844" width="3956" msid="82006968" hostid="261"></div><p>"As bad as the coronavirus pandemic was in terms of caseloads and deaths, apparently a lot more Floridians were concerned with the economy and that certainly helped Trump," Aubrey Jewett, University of Central Florida political science professor, said.</p><p>Trump's presence in Florida has benefited the state's ambitious officeholders. Ron DeSantis has become a 2024 frontrunner in <a href="https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/politics/2021/02/28/cpac-straw-poll-increases-buzz-ron-desantis-2024-presidential-run/6862699002/">several</a> <a href="https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2021/03/05/desantis-and-pence-tied-in-new-poll-of-trump-voters-1366958">polls</a> after being one of the first governors to reopen his state. Marco Rubio has a clear shot at re-election and is again seen as a likely presidential candidate.</p><p>While the coronavirus has sped up the conservative influx, it's not clear what will happen once the pandemic recedes. New arrivals could stay in South Florida now that remote work has become more prevalent and there's less of a need for face-to-face meetings.</p><p>There's always been a stigma about Miami but people told me in their New York circles that stigma has been lifted," said Reid Heidenry, a Sotheby's agent who sold over $100 million in real estate in the past year, said. "In the business world, it's now socially acceptable to live in a place like Miami Beach."</p><p>Whether a COVID refugee or long-time fixture of Miami Beach, there's one thing that's indisputable across party lines.</p><p>"Freedom tastes pretty good," Zangrillo said at a house party.</p>

The Great GOP Migration: How South Florida became a shadow capital for Trump conservatives

New Delhi, Mar 28 () Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Saturday asked industry and trade associations to not allow en-masse migration of workers, as they are not only their assets but could become potential carrier of COVID-19.<p>Goyal has told the industry and trade associations to take care of their employees and workers in this hour of crisis and distress.</p><p>He said this in a meeting through video conference. It was held with the associations to assess the impact of COVID-19 and lockdown in the country, and get their feedback as well as suggestions.</p><p>"They are not only their assets and resources, but also could become potential carrier of COVID-19, if they are allowed to migrate en-masse throughout the country and countryside, during this pandemic," an official statement said quoting the minister.</p><p>Minister of State for Chemicals and fertilizers and Shipping Mansukh Mandaviya, who was also present, stressed on retaining the workers and labourers on the payroll and at the same place.</p><p>He said that their movement will jeopardize the nationwide lockdown, and also affect the early normalisation in the post-COVID period.</p><p>Goyal called upon them to spread the message about the steps taken by the government in containing the menace of COVID-19, with the help of their stakeholders.</p><p>He said that they should also engage with various society influencers, including the leaders of different religions and faiths, to propagate all preventive measures, like washing of hands, maintaining social distance, and other health precautions.</p><p>Responding to the various issues raised in the conference, the commerce minister said the instructions issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs make it clear that goods movement of any type will not be curtailed in the country.</p><p>He also said that many issues raised by the associations relating to other ministries and agencies, will be expeditiously taken up by the ministry.</p><p>The situation would lead to more "Make in India" for the country and the world, he added.</p><p>The associations narrated their assessment of impact of the lockdown and pandemic on their activities and businesses, and made a range of suggestions.</p><p>It was attended by the representatives from CII, FICCI, ASSOCHAM, PHD Chamber of Commerce, Laghu Udyog Bharati, Eastern Chamber of Commerce, CAIT, South Indian Chamber of Commerce, IMC, NASSCOM, SIAM, IMTMA, IEMA, FISME, IEEMA, and ICC.</p>Thousands of migrant workers and daily wagers have been stranded in Ghazipur which lies at the border of Delhi and Uttar Pradesh.  RR  BALBAL

Workers are assets, but en-masse migration could make them potential COVID-19 carriers: Goyal

<ul class="summary-list"><li>The crackdown by social media giants following the siege of the US Capitol building has prompted some of Trump's followers to migrate to new 'free speech' platforms.</li><li>BitChute, a video-sharing website, is one of the websites that pro-Trump supporters are increasingly viewing as a suitable alternative to YouTube.</li><li>Despite guidelines existing, it appears that BitChute is doing little to remove hateful content.</li><li>On the websites, Trump supporters coalesce with video makers and their followers, calling COVID-19 a hoax, denying the Holocaust, and even promoting white supremacist terrorist groups. </li><li>Terrorist groups are actively recruiting members on these video-sharing platforms, experts told Insider.</li></ul><p>Many of President <keyword id="6354484" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Donald-Trump">Donald Trump</keyword>'s supporters have been searching for a new home online ever since major social media platforms banished the president and cracked down on violent content.</p><p>With <keyword id="9465142" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="parler">Parler</keyword> unavailable and YouTube inhospitable to them, a growing number are choosing to migrate to smaller 'free-speech' platforms that do little to moderate hateful and sometimes criminal videos.</p><h2>Why Trump's most extreme followers are migrating to other websites</h2><p>The search for a new digital home was accelerated by the events of last week's <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/capitol-siege-module">siege of the US Capitol building</a> when social media giants responded to the chaos and violence by <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/people-banned-social-media-platforms-after-capitol-riots-2021-1">suspending President Donald Trump's accounts</a>.</p><p><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-suspended-president-donald-trumps-account-permanently-2021-1">Twitter</a> banned Trump permanently, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-has-blocked-president-trump-indefinitely-2021-1">Facebook</a> followed suit, and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/snapchat-bans-trump-permanently-snap-inc-january-20-2021-1">Snapchat</a> also cut ties with the president.</p><p>In solidarity, many of his supporters announced that they too, would leave these platforms. #GoodbyeTwitter, for example, was a trending topic on the platform on the day of his suspension.</p><p>It was then rumored, in the immediate aftermath of the social media crackdown was then rumored that <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-join-parler-person-x-account-john-matze-2021-1">Trump was considering signing up to Parler</a> - a social media app long been popular with his followers.</p><p>Some of the president's supporters, pre-empting Trump's possible appearance on the app, shared their plans to <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/top-conservatives-moving-to-parler-after-trumps-ban-from-twitter-2021-1">move to Parler.</a></p><p>Parler reported a <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/parler-social-media-experience-outage-users-report-2021-1">surge in downloads</a>, indicating that the app was the preferred destination for those on the right choosing to shun major social media platforms.</p><p>Parler's growth, however, was short-lived. <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/parler-offline-outage-amazon-servers-2021-1">Amazon</a> kicked the app off its web-hosting servers, forcing the site to go dark.</p><p>Then YouTube, the last major platform to remove Trump, announced steps to crack down on content that might incite violence. It removed content that violated the platform's guidelines and banned Trump from posting new videos for a "minimum" of a week.</p><p><em><strong>Read more:</strong> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/big-tech-was-wrong-to-ban-trump-vcs-say-2021-1">VCs warn that Twitter and Facebook will face backlash on all fronts from banning Trump: Tech 'dictatorships' are over</a></em></p><p>Trump's most ardent followers, now digitally homeless, began to look for new platforms to populate.</p><h2>YouTube's far-right alternatives are more popular than ever</h2><p>"The migration to other websites has existed for a while. We've seen a lot of content splitting off into smaller channels as a result of previous crackdowns that were happening on YouTube from as early as 2019," Dr. Andre Oboler - CEO  of the Online Hate Prevention Institute - told Insider.</p><p>Last week's suspensions, however, have sped up the process. "The far-right's gravitation towards these platforms for has now certainly been accelerated," Oboler said.</p><p>BitChute, a British video hosting website founded in 2017,  has drawn in those suspicious of YouTube's moderation policies for over three years. Recently, however, it has seen a massive spike in interest.</p><div type="image" title="bitchute google trends" height="418" width="1208" msid="80315725" hostid="261"></div><p>BitChute reached its peak popularity in the immediate aftermath of the attempted coup in Washington DC and Trump's subsequent social media exile.</p><p><a href="https://trends.google.com/trends/">Google Trends</a>, a tool monitoring search queries, shows that BitChute is currently being searched for more than at any other point in its history.</p><p>The peak period was the week of January 10, 2021 - immediately following Trump's ban from Twitter and suspension from YouTube.</p><p>"Growth is strong and traffic has doubled this week," a BitChute spokesperson told Insider.</p><p><em><strong>Read more:</strong> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-facebook-problematic-social-media-informing-educating-public-2021-1">Author of book on how Trump's Twitter presidency ushered in white rage says social media companies must be held accountable for not taking action sooner</a></em></p><p>Pro-Trump Twitter users advertised it as the preferred alternative to YouTube. Users of the unencrypted services <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/telegram-hits-500-million-users-after-whatsapp-backlash-2021-1">Telegram</a> and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-discord">Discord</a> also recommended BitChute in group chats, cybersecurity experts told Insider.</p><p>Other video hubs, less well established than BitChute, have also drawn in those looking to view and post content without the fear of censorship.</p><p>BrandNewTube, a platform that advertises itself as one which "wouldn't suppress your opinions," has seen a boost in recent weeks.</p><div type="image" title="BrandNewTube Google Trends" height="429" width="1215" msid="80315726" hostid="261"></div>The video-sharing site, launched in May 2020, has seen a peak in popularity since last month, according to Google Trends.<p>Other websites, such as WorldTruthVideos - a site popular with anti-vaxxers and climate change skeptics, have also launched and promoted themselves to the far-right in the past year.</p><p>Dr. Ben Horne, assistant professor of Information Studies at the University of Tennessee Knoxville, said: "We're seeing a bunch of people attempting to create alternative sites to YouTube and seeing which ones stick." </p><h2>What is BitChute?</h2><p>BitChute allows users to upload content that might otherwise be banned on mainstream platforms.</p><p>The platform advertises itself as "a service that they [creators] can use to flourish and express their ideas freely."</p><p>Based on the videos published on the platform, it is evident that BitChute is popular with Trump supporters, members of the far-right, and followers of QAnon.</p><p>It hosts several far-right conspiracy theorists who had previously been banished from YouTube, most notably InfoWars' <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-bans-alex-jones-infowars-milo-yiannopoulos-far-right-figures-2019-5">Alex Jones</a>.</p><p>InfoWars, infamous for promoting 9/11 conspiracy theories and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/infowars-founder-who-claimed-sandy-hook-shooting-was-a-hoax-ordered-to-pay-100000-2020-1">alleging that Sandy Hook Elementary School's shooting was a hoax</a>, has over 100,000 subscribers on BitChute.</p><div type="image" title="bitchute home page" height="1400" width="2718" msid="80315727" hostid="261"></div><p>The website also hosts videos dismissing COVID-19 as fake, supporting white supremacy, and promoting terrorist acts.</p><p>"The content is very extreme and the only videos that get any sort of engagement are very, very extreme," Dr. Ben Horne told Insider.</p><p>A quick search of 'Holocaust' on BitChute's browser reveals thousands of videos falsely alleging that the Holocaust did not happen or was exaggerated. Similarly, 'Holohoax' brings up more than 1,500 videos.</p><div type="image" title="Holohaux Bitchute search" height="1394" width="2712" msid="80315728" hostid="261"></div><p>Propaganda videos for terrorist organizations are also relatively easy to find. </p><p>Searching 'Atomwaffen'  - the name of a sinister neo-Nazi terrorist network - immediately reveals a video glorifying the group.</p><p>According to a 2020 <a href="https://www.hopenothate.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/BitChute-Report_2020-07-v2.pdf">study</a> by charity Hope Not Hate, 114 videos supporting proscribed terrorist groups on BitChute - including 23 videos supporting National Action and 86 videos promoting ISIS - were available on the website.</p><p>"There are still plenty of videos that are glorifying terrorists and calling for people to do similar things. Atomwaffen and similar groups in Europe use these sites to promote propaganda videos," the charity's researcher Patrik Hermansson told Insider.</p><p>Dr. Ben Horne said that these videos actively recruit on the website. "We have found very explicit videos of terrorist groups recruiting with encrypted email links urging people to join them," he said.</p><p>Some of the videos are also disturbingly graphic. "The videos we have seen on BitChute include videos of actual terrorist attacks filmed by the terrorists themselves," Dave Rich of the Community Security Trust (CST) - a British charity that combats antisemitism - told Insider.</p><div type="image" title="Atomwaffen terrorist Bitchute" height="1378" width="1960" msid="80315729" hostid="261"></div><h2>There is very little moderation on BitChute</h2><p>Despite many of these videos breaching laws in numerous countries, it appears that BitChute is doing little to remove them.</p><p>BitChute's CEO Ray Vahey told Insider: "Our guidelines are intended to prohibit illegal content and unacceptable behavior that leads to oppression and incitement. We endeavor to enforce our guidelines in a way that is fair, transparent, and does not infringe on the right to freedom of expression or the ability to hold power to account."</p><p>Experts strongly dispute that these guidelines are enforced.</p><p><em><strong>Read more:</strong> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/mewe-is-forced-to-moderate-extremist-hoards-coming-from-parler-2021-1">MeWe doesn't want to be the next Parler. But extremist hordes are coming to the social-media site anyway.</a></em></p><p>Hope Not Hate's Patrick Hermansson told Insider: "They could argue that they just haven't seen the dangerous content but, in reality, it is on their front page. They must look at their front page sometimes."</p><p>The CST echoes this view.</p><p>Dave Rich, the organization's head of policy, said:  "It's a site that is disproportionately used by extremists to post really disgusting, hateful, violent, and racist stuff, and BitChute seems to be doing the bare minimum to discourage or remove this material."</p><h2>Many advertise that they are 'banned on YouTube and Facebook'</h2><p>BrandNewTube is another site that has seen a rise in popularity over the past month.</p><p>It is a honeypot for conspiracy theorists claiming the COVID-19 pandemic is orchestrated by a shadowy world government.</p><p>The website's most popular videos are anti-vaxxer films, many proudly advertising that they are "now banned on YouTube and Facebook."</p><div type="image" title="BrandNewTube's homepage" height="1362" width="2672" msid="80315731" hostid="261"></div><p>The most popular creator, Dr. Vernon Coleman, shares videos that wrongly suggest that COVID-19 vaccines and national lockdowns are a form of population control and that the coronavirus is not real.</p><p>Inevitably, Holocaust denial videos and clips praising Adolf Hitler are also available on the website.</p><div type="image" title="A video on BrandNewTube's website." height="415" width="554" msid="80315732" hostid="261"></div><p>WorldTruthVideos, a new site with a relatively small following, is also a hotbed of conspiracy theories and anti-Black racism.</p><div type="image" title="Video WorldTruthVideos racist" height="334" width="446" msid="80315733" hostid="261"></div><p>One video, which was published four months ago, threatens to "annihilate" Black people when the "race war" breaks out. The rest of the website is littered with uses of the N-word and images of lynching.</p><p>"It is the Wild West on these websites where anything goes," said Dr. Ben Horne. </p><h2>Sanctuary for the far-right</h2><p>Horne told Insider: "There isn't anything indicating that this isn't a long-term trend. The biggest barrier to entry is if these platforms have server space."</p><p>Parler's CEO has said that the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ceo-john-matze-parler-may-never-get-back-online-amazon-2021-1">app may never go back online</a> after Amazon removed it from its web-hosting service for violating its terms and conditions.</p><p>BitChute, however, uses Epik, a web hosting company that is famously hospitable to controversial websites. </p><p><em><strong>Read more:</strong> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/parler-ban-aws-amazon-web-services-cloud-2021-1">Parler reportedly spent $300,000 a month on Amazon's cloud before it got banned, and it's a sign that it won't be so easy for the far-right social app to come back online.</a></em></p><p>The web hosting company was described as a "safe haven for the extreme right" by <a href="https://www.vice.com/en/article/gy4yg9/the-far-right-has-found-a-web-host-savior">Vice</a> magazine. It has historically not responded to reports of illegal activity on its websites, according to <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/how-right-wing-social-media-site-gab-got-back-online/">WIRED</a>.</p><p>Epik's reputation as a far-right online sanctuary has resulted in Parler joining Epik, according to <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/parler-domain-new-host-service-epik-1560880">Newsweek</a>.</p><h2>The consequences of de-platforming and the rise of 'splinter' websites</h2><p>While some have <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/sacha-baron-cohen-youtube-donald-trump-google-2021-1">celebrated the de-platforming of the far-right</a> by Big Tech, the splintering into websites like BitChute, BrandNewTube, and WorldTruthVideos present new challenges.</p><p>"Pushing extremists off mainstream platforms decreases the number of people that they can radicalize," Dr. Andre Oboler told Insider. "But on the other hand, these new splinter websites give their audience an echo chamber where there isn't any opposition, discussion, or debate."</p><p>He continued: "We need to make sure that these new platforms, who refuse to moderate content that crosses into <keyword id="6358165" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="terrorism">terrorism</keyword>, are cut off by their suppliers or held accountable by their relevant governments."</p><p>Oboler then explained why, after the insurrection at the Capitol, this action is needed urgently: "America has woken up to find out that when freedom of speech crosses a line, it has real-world consequences."</p>

Following Trump's YouTube ban, it is feared his supporters are migrating to a 'Wild West' of video-sharing, mingling with far-right and neo-Nazis terror groups

Ahmedabad, Apr 18 () The Gujarat Cooperative MilkMarketing Federation (GCMMF), the owner of 'Amul' brand,said on Saturday that it is procuring 15 per cent more milkthan year ago at 255-260 lakh litres per day.<p>While the sale of milk pouches, flavoured milk and icecream was down due to lockdown, milk procurement had increasedbecause it was also buying milk from private milk producers,the federation said.</p><p>The sale of paneer and ghee had also increased, itadded.</p><p>The quantity of milk sold in pouches has fallen from140 lakh litres per day in March 2020 to 125 lakh litres inApril, mainly because hotels and catering firms have closed,GCMMF said in a release.</p><p>Migration of urban population to rural areas has alsoaffected the sale of pouched milk, it said.</p><p>The sale of ice cream and flavoured milk has decreasedby as much as 85 and 70 per cent, respectively, compared tothe same period last year, it said.</p><p>On the other hand, sale of paneer, ghee, butter andmilk sold in tetrapack has gone up by 15-50 per cent, theGCMMF said. </p><p>"Milk procurement at around 255-260 lakh litres perday is around 15 per cent more compared to the same month lastyear," the release said.</p><p>"Amul milk cooperatives are also procuring milk fromprivate milk producers as per the direction of the government.Collection has also increased as private businesses and sweetshops cannot run their operations during lockdown," it said.</p><p>To handle increased supply, the GCMMF has rented milkprocessing plants outside Gujarat, it said.</p><p>It has asked its member milk farmers to takeprecautions to avoid coronavirus infection, the federationsaid.  </p>GCMMF's member cooperatives have donated Rs 15 croreto the CM's and PM's relief funds, it said.  KA PDKRK   KRK

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