Can New England affordto keep young families away?
Peter Francese's long-range forecast for New England is as gloomy as the weather.
Francese is a New Hampshire demographer who sells his services to advertising agency Ogilvy & Mather and to the New England Economic Partnership, a research group. In the latter capacity, he has been looking at the region's demographic trends. He doesn't like what he sees.
Specifically, he doesn't see enough young people in our future -- especially young adults with children. We drive them away, said Francese, with our high housing prices, which are high, in part, because we refuse to build affordable housing suitable for young families. ''Our wounds are self-inflicted," he said.
A few relevant facts. With a median age of 38 -- the US average is 36 -- New England is the nation's oldest region. Maine, median age 40.6, is the oldest state in the country. Over the next 10 years, according to Census Bureau projections, the number of people between the ages of 35 and 44 in the three southern New England states will fall 18 percent, compared to a 6 percent decline in the nation as a whole.
Young families leave New England for a variety of reasons. The weather isn't great and the past two recessions have been brutal. But housing prices are a factor. A.D. Makepeace, a developer based in Wareham, recently conducted a poll that asked people in Massachusetts how difficult they thought it was for young families to buy a house. More than 40 percent answered ''very difficult;" another 27 percent said ''nearly impossible."
New England home prices go up, but relatively little new housing gets built to satisfy the demand. Francese puts the blame for that lack of production squarely on the shoulders of a cherished New England institution -- the fiercely independent town.
Towns don't want to build houses because houses contain children who will have to go to school, which will cost taxpayers in the town money. ''The last thing anyone wants is school kids," said Francese.
Francese saw the story play out recently in his own backyard. A developer in Newfields, N.H., (population 1,650) proposed putting up 89 homes on a 340-acre parcel of land. Alarmed, the town raised $7.5 million, a blend of town money and government funds, to buy the land from the developer and preserve it as open space. The town was delighted with the outcome. Francese had a different reaction. ''It's nuts," he said. ''Outside of New England this never would happen."
Blocking affordable development may make sense for an individual town, said Francese, but for the region it is a huge economic negative. ''What kind of message are we sending to employers? he asked. ''We want you to hire people and create jobs, but we are not going to create housing for your employees. How silly is that?"
Frederick Breimyer believes Francese has put his finger on a critical matter. Breimyer is an economist and the president of the New England Economic Project. He was around in the 1980s when Massachusetts' high taxes were considered a drag on the economy.
''Back then the view was we had a government that was too expensive," said Breimyer. ''Now we have housing that is too expensive."
Are these folks painting too bleak a picture? My hunch is they are. New England has long been expensive, slow-growing, and not terribly welcoming to newcomers. But it is also rich. Connecticut has the highest per capita income in the nation. Massachusetts last year passed New Jersey to move into second place. The region has a critical mass of knowledge industries -- technology, healthcare, education -- that pay above-average salaries. It is a formula that has allowed New England to prosper, despite its many handicaps.
Peter Francese isn't impressed by this argument. ''We may be rich and think we are insulated," he said, ''but there are plenty of examples of areas that were wealthy and then went into decline. If we stagnate, our incomes could fall hard."
The bottom line: Don't say you haven't been warned.
Charles Stein is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at stein@globe.com. 
