| Which definition of efficiency are you using here? I don't think it matches the one in the comment that you are responding to. Urban areas are more efficient for resources because people generally use far less of them, per person, to accomplish the same economic activity. That "bottleneck" of space is also equivalent to much greater access to all sorts of goods, because it is so much more efficient that what would basically be impossible in rural areas in terms of shipping and communication are extremely efficient in these spaces. Efficiency is not the same thing as prices. Prices are high in urban areas because access to that space allows so much more economic activity; people are able to pay a lot more because they also have access to a lot more economic activity. That's economic efficiency. If you're talking about needing a lot of a particular type of resource, like land, then yes it can be more efficient to put the jobs elsewhere. If you're looking for workers that don't have access to higher paying jobs, then yes, take those jobs out to rural areas. As a person with children, I object heartily to the idea that it's more efficient to raise children in rural areas. I grew up in a rural area, but my child will not, because it is far more efficient to have access to more humans, more services, more education, more everything that urban areas provide. |