At the NY Times, Michael Wines and Jess Bidgood must have studied some economics. They playfully recast Tiebout "Voting with your Feet" for Cod saying that these fish "Vote with their Fins" as the fish seek out cooler water. Climate change has heated up the local waters and reduced the catch of local fishermen. How good are the Cod at adapting to the new Ocean temperature? That's the job of marine biologists to study this. The NY Times focuses on place based fishermen and their concerns given their human capital and their place based investments in local mortgages, and their boats and their children's schooling and social network where they live.
How many workers in the Modern U.S economy face such "endogenous migration costs" such that they have locked in to a location specific industry (cod fishing) and a specific housing market whose prices would decline if the local fishermen earn less money? Let's think about the broader urban economics issue here.
Contrast Portland Maine with Los Angeles. Los Angeles is a diversified local economy. If one industry collapses (perhaps because of climate change reducing the supply of natural resources to harvest), there are other industries to move to. This transition will be easier for workers with general human capital. How many of the Cod Fishermen went to college? Home prices in LA will not decline if "Cod Fishing in LA" (I realize nobody works in this non-existence industry) collapses because LA is a diversified local economy. Again, do you see my point. The problem that the Cod Fishermen face in adapting to climate change is that they made a risky gamble as they invested their human capital in an industry whose productivity is a function of climate shocks and they bought a home and planted roots in a community whose value hinges on Cod being abundant.
I have been to Portland Maine. If the tourist industry can attract enough business then a collapse of Cod Fishing in the region would have less of an impact on local home prices. This raises the issue of what economic activities can the local areas substitute to if their old "bread and butter" industry no longer offers a daily living.
Young workers will see these changes to the local economy and will not move there. The economic incidence of the new news (i.e the Cod swimming away) is borne by local land owners and those middle aged guys who have invested their human capital in this declining industry. Note that this is a short term effect because younger guys will not enter the industry.