Do you really 'need' a long growing season?

When discussing growing food people keep talking about the length of growing season. In saying that X region has too short a growing season.

Now among varieties of annual crops there are varieties that may need a longer growing season, but there are also varieties that will have shorter growing seasons. Corn is a good example of that.

Most of my food crops are perennials, they are not annuals. If a plant grows for 40 years and will start producing food on year 3, how long the growing season is, makes no difference.

I am in Maine, we are fine with annual crops that require 110 to 120 days. But anything longer than that will not do here.

The real difference that I have seen is that some crops need much hotter mid-day temps. And that is something nobody is discussing. Tomatoes need hot days to ripen quickly and to avoid end rot.

I have gardened in the South and now in the North. The real difference I have seen is not in how many days plants grow, but in how hot it gets mid-day.

In my mind, so long as local farmers can support their families, everywhere has a good growing season.

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Do you really 'need' a long growing season?