[lovich]

It does not change the fact that the area is becoming unliveable without massive investment.

Why should the rest of the country subsidize these people lifestyle choices to live in an inhospitable area?

I’d be willing to support subsidizing moving them to a new location that’s better suited to living in, but I have no interest in helping pay for people to spit in reality’s eye so they can live in a place they have emotional/cultural ties to

[PaulDavisThe1st]

1. "the area" is not homogenous. the northern parts of AZ and NM (even CA) to some extent are climactically and geologically quite unlike the southern parts.

2. humans have lived in the area for thousands of years. Yes, it doesn't fit into a northern European notion of "the kind of place humans should live", but it fits entirely into the southern European, north African and Arabic culture and living patterns. These cultures (along with the native Americans ones that flourished here for millenia) have developed sophisticated ways of living in this sort of climate and landscape.

3. it's not unlivable, it's just unfarmable (note that this is different from subsistence ag. or gardening).

[lovich]

> “the area" is not homogenous. the northern parts of AZ and NM (even CA) to some extent are climactically and geologically quite unlike the southern parts

Well then it sounds like they have a local solution to the issue and don’t need to bother us

> humans have lived in the area for thousands of years.

And then humans changed the environment.

> it's not unlivable

If it’s not unliveable then they should be able to support themselves, no?

[PaulDavisThe1st]

What are you talking about?

[brewdad]

Move Phoenix and Tucson to Flagstaff.

Problem solved?

[bagels]

Unfortunately this thinking applies to many places in the US when it comes to weather and climate disasters.

Midwest river flooding, hurricanes all through the gulf coast, rising sea levels, tornadoes, New York was flooded from a hurricane, and Texas was pretty ravaged by some cold weather recently.

What place is so perfect for people to live in that doesn't face any challenges from climate change?

[lovich]

Probably no where permanent. They’ll have to move to the locations that fit their current needs much as I and many other economic migrants.

If they do not have the resources to make the move, I have complete empathy for them and am willing to vote for politicians who will allocate my tax dollars towards helping those people out of their current issue.

If, however, they refuse to move because of some non economic reason then that is a lifestyle choice they will have to shoulder the burden of. If one of my representative politicians tries to use my tax dollars to help them continue their untenable lifestyle choices I will vote for their competitor.

Also

> Midwest river flooding, hurricanes all through the gulf coast, rising sea levels, tornadoes, New York was flooded from a hurricane, and Texas was pretty ravaged by some cold weather recently

Don’t include Texas in that. The other groups have had weather systems of increasing severity that are massively expensive to build against. Texas had weather they declared was unforseeable when they had hit the temperature multiple times in the previous 20-30 years and refused to spend a relatively small amount of money to winterize their generators and mitigate the problem.