The old gears are grinding and probably need oil

The old gears are grinding and probably need oil. I'm talking about the wheels and gears in my head when I'm trying to understand more than I have capacity to fully grasp. What I'm trying to figure out is this: Is economic growth always a good thing? Or, could it be bad?

I suppose my mind wrestles with the topic because of where I lived and worked for years before moving to northwest Arkansas. It was an area of northwest Kansas with a declining population and a declining business base largely because it was an agricultural area with ever-bigger farms and less people needed to manage and work those farms. It was an area where one could walk or drive down a county road and maybe never meet another soul for hours.

I recall once locking my keys in my pickup truck along the road when I stopped to take a photo. I walked 3 1/2 miles down the road to get back home to get a second set of keys and met no one along the way. In the years I worked as a sheriff's deputy, I could sometimes drive for miles down a U.S. highway at night and never meet another car. And truck driving in the region was sometimes the same way -- traveling miles across the prairie and meeting no one and seeing few houses or yard lights.

Well, it's certainly not that way in northwest Arkansas. If I stop anywhere to take a photo, someone will be along. If I drive a little slower to look around and enjoy the beautiful sights, there will always be another car or two on my back bumper and ready to push me back up to five or 10 miles over the speed limit. Yep, rubbernecking is just impossible! I've offered to take Mrs. Griz "parking" just to talk, of course, but I have no idea where we could have more than a minute or two of privacy. It's actually safest to just park in my driveway because backing out onto the street is often a challenge.

All this leads me to wonder how much growth is a good thing and when too much growth can make life miserable. Everyone seems to want growth; but me, I am not so sure. Perhaps I've spent too much time off by myself. Maybe I still have a plainsman or truck driving mentality. Maybe I just value having a little "elbow room," if you recall the meaning of those words spoken by Daniel Boone.

Growth is usually good for business, and most cities and towns have a chamber of commerce to encourage growth and attract new businesses and new residents. States, too, offer incentives to attract business and industry to create jobs and increase tax revenue. Even the federal government is controlled by big businesses and guided by groups like the Council on Foreign Relations to increase trade and economic development worldwide and protect the interests of big banks and corporations around the globe.

But back to that question which is making the gears in my brain grind: Is it possible to be too growth minded and to sacrifice quality of life for the sake of economic growth? Most of our communities boast of a small, hometown atmosphere but yet we ambitiously seek to attract more businesses, more housing developments and, yes, more tax dollars so we can build more amenities and attract more people and businesses and grow bigger and ... the cycle goes on. But if we continue to build and grow and build and grow, what will happen to that small-town atmosphere we all love? We could easily and quickly become just another big metropolis where people don't know their own neighbors and just driving to the corner drug store or grocery store is a major ordeal -- I know what that's like from my years in the Los Angeles area in my younger days.

What I'm trying to say is that some of the things we have locally which make living here very attractive could be lost if we make it our primary goal to attract more and more and become bigger and bigger. Growth needs to be tempered by maintaining the quality of life we treasure -- perhaps an impossible thing to do because almost everyone is seeking to better themselves economically with their land, their business, their work.

The gears are really grinding now and it seems there is no solution. Growth is coming and individuals, businesses, cities, towns, states and even the federal government will do what they can to capitalize on it. It may bring boosts to the local economy but we'll all have to pay for it in higher costs for such things as housing, utilities, food and transportation. And, yes, there will be a need for increased taxes to pay for the infrastructure and amenities to accommodate more growth.

If more growth means more taxes and a higher cost of living, how are we better off than when we made a little less money but paid less in taxes, less for housing and had more peace and quiet and enough "elbow room" to enjoy life?

Randy Moll is the managing editor of the Westside Eagle Observer. He may be contacted by email at [email protected]. Opinions expressed are those of the author.