Editor’s note: This commentary is by Dante DiBiase, 19, a beardless anti-hipster originally from Pennsylvania, and currently living in poverty in the Rutland area. He spends his money-production time working at a popular local haven for snowboarders.
[Y]oung people are leaving Vermont, and not by the dozens — by the droves. There is a social tide beginning, a merciless sweeping undertow that sucks any independence out to the deep and away from environments that foster true creativity and genuine artistry. Budding young artists and craftsmen lie in wait, eager to bring their ideas to the world and full of fresh energy that galvanizes social fabric and rejuvenates aging ideals.
Teens and new generations of thinkers and doers that long to eclipse the unending flow of Millennial gentrification, the micro-brewery rhetoric and craft-poporn culture, are being pulled into the wave of assimilation. And its effects are visible on a massive scale. Unless you live in a college town, such as Middlebury or Castleton, whose legal Vermont residents above 40 years still outnumber those of less than half their age, you will be hard-pressed to locate inventive youth. With a median population age of 42.3, the highest in the nation (eight years higher than the U.S. average) and a declining birth rate, it’s not hard to imagine that Vermont has begun to see the effects of the social exclusion that is being perpetrated on its young adults.
The citizens of Vermont seem to enjoy the expulsion of a culture that’s deemed “rowdy” and rambunctious by the retirees that make up much of the population in Vermont. They enjoy plopping their double-wide onto some unsuspecting piece of land, and then integrating themselves into the politics of their towns and molding their adopted home to themselves. Setting up an economy for a well-established group, replete with abundant monetary resources and capital inflow, is a tried and true business. However, not all people in Vermont fit this bill. Catering to a wealthy population means raising prices across the board, from food to lumber, because, well, you can. The health food movements that began to offer the impoverished and common individual in a community the chance to enjoy nutritious food have now gone and decided to cater to the affluent college professors and migrated business owners.
This leaves little chance for anyone making under $20,000 a year to purchase anything other that Cheerios and ramen noodles.
And this accidental discrimination does not end with food, but extends into all aspects of life. Rents in Vermont are among some of the highest in the nation, even with the minimum wage being in that same category. It’s not that we should enforce employers to pay more, but just that what you can get with your dollar in Vermont seems only to be the bare minimum if you work in the untouchable sector of commerce, sweeping floors and flipping patties like the majority of people my age (I’m 19, by the way).
People are getting by in Vermont though, and sadly they seem to be the ones that make the decisions for the rest of us. Nothing is tailored to any age group other than the middle-class retiree, government worker or imported college student. Town politics revolve around monumental business decisions, like the installation of solar farms, wastewater improvements and the fresh laying of asphalt. These work out well for the individuals who have an established residence, can pay the bills and would rather not have their Teslas rocked to pieces on the motorways. And this can be good, but why is this the first choice for spending? Public spaces used for the congregation of us so-called “youngsters” don’t exist. There are no clubs we can find ourselves in, dancing, expressing, loving. There are no parks, no cafes within arms reach that provide anything other than tourist culture and affluent mandated prices. There is no juvenile anarchy!
Europe, the continent we set our sights upon as an example, whether flawlessly or not, provides space for its early stage of life population, and they are the better for it. Depression is at record lows, young adults flock to the cities in droves, and they live satisfied lives, even though on the fringes, because their leaders and community guiders recognize that we long for ways to experience ourselves. Not everything needs to be a pay-to-win experience, like most would think. And what are Vermonters outside of Burlington doing? Cutting down trees, widening roads, making public parks into model displays to show how progressive and outdoorsy they are and putting a premium on all livable space.
Vermont has ceased to be the land of the bud-smoking hippie, and become the land of the Prius yuppie. With the majority of the population reaching the halfway marks in their lives, installing solar panels and turning their thoughts to retirement, the minorities, the youth and the impoverished wonder how this beleaguered state will turn out. Especially for them. And, as the prices climb, more leave this wooded state in pursuit of lives uninhibited by skyrocketing prices and a culture of flatulence. And they take their originality, creativity and personality with them.
