A public service announcement from the DC-based blogging community:
This is indeed true, but on the other hand, actual usable deposits of rare earths aren’t super common either. More here in the Brad Plumer post that Ezra links above.
Far more fascinating, though, is that not one, not two, not three, but four rare earth elements are named in various fashion after the tiny Swedish village of Ytterby. Even famous scientists and Greek gods don’t have so many elements named after them. More here. Local weather in Ytterby is here. It looks like it’s starting to get chilly there.