How the 'Yellowstone effect' transformed one rugged western American city

Grandmother Sara Folger sits in the kitchen of her single-wide trailer, the Rocky Mountains looming in the distance, and remembers the Bozeman, Montana she fell in love with decades ago. Back then, Folger says, the rural western outpost was filled with "back-to-the-land hippies, college students, cowboys and ski bums". But nowadays, the formerly sleepy streets are awash with diggers, orange construction cones and out-of-state licence plates. Since the pandemic, Bozeman's population has grown by about 20% - a huge jump for a town that had fewer than 50,000 people in 2019. The influx was fuelled by a unique set of drivers. The state had for years been drawing in conservatives from around the country, who were attracted to the state's historic emphasis on rugged individualism and self-reliance - as well as its lack of sales, luxury and inheritance taxes. Their numbers increased exponentially as droves began "fleeing the Covid mess … on the East Coast and West Coast," says Mark Corner, president of Southwest Montana Realtors. And that made housing prices soar. Many are choosing to pack and leave their hometown, while developers from elsewhere have gotten rich. A recent rent strike by t