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Started 2 years ago by Walker
Latest reply from Snarf

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ChrisSunami
King-Lincoln District
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rus wrote >>
Thought that was the point of revitalization.

It's the most common approach. However, I think some communities have had some real success with mixed income neighborhoods --that takes a lot of planning and commitment however.

I realize your comment is probably just a glib quip, but it does have a real undertone of "if I get mine, who cares what happens to others".

WalkerI think the real reason we see lower-income demographics gravitating toward suburban communities is two-fold: 1) They're following jobs. 2) They're chasing the same "American Dream" that everyone else is.

I'm sure that's true, but chasing doesn't mean finding. I think a lot of the qualities that people find attractive about the suburbs --safe neighborhoods, good schools, etc --will leave along with the money.

Posted 1 year ago #
rus

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ChrisSunami wrote >>

rus wrote >>
Thought that was the point of revitalization.

It's the most common approach. However, I think some communities have had some real success with mixed income neighborhoods --that takes a lot of planning and commitment however.
I realize your comment is probably just a glib quip, but it does have a real undertone of "if I get mine, who cares what happens to others".

That would presume I'm revitalizing a neighborhood. I'm not.

Posted 1 year ago #
gramarye
In Exile
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ChrisSunami wrote >>

rus wrote >>
Thought that was the point of revitalization.

It's the most common approach. However, I think some communities have had some real success with mixed income neighborhoods --that takes a lot of planning and commitment however.

Often, it takes a some less flattering qualities and actions than that; often, it means ramming lower-income housing into an area where the market would support higher quality residential stock, and often where the residents actively oppose the "planning" and "commitment" of whoever is planning to put lower-income housing into their area to make the neighborhood "mixed." (These developers can often make good money on government affordable housing grants while living nowhere near the development themselves, allowing others to deal with any negative social externalities from the project.)

I think we tend to get mixed neighborhoods without any planning--it's just that which neighborhoods are mixed are always changing, since the mixed neighborhoods at any given time are the ones in transition, which by definition are always changing. The Short North, Italian Village, and Victorian Village were heavily mixed for quite a long time, and indeed, there are still places in the area where you can rent fairly cheaply. (Not sure so much about buying.) Olde Towne East has some genuine mansions, a few fixed-up areas with midsized middle-class homes, and then some areas that are still definitely lower-class.

Posted 1 year ago #
Walker
The KLD / Downtown
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The new poor: Analysis finds US suburbs bearing brunt of near-historic increases in poverty
HOPE YEN
Associated Press Writer
October 7, 2010

The American suburb is no longer a refuge from poverty in cities.

A pair of analyses by the nonprofit Brookings Institution paints a bleak economic picture for the 100 largest metropolitan areas over the past decade and in coming years, and finds that suburbs now are home to one-third of the nation's poor, and rising.

The study of census data finds that since 2000, the number of poor people in the suburbs jumped by 37.4 percent to 13.7 million. The growth rate of suburban poverty is more than double that of cities and higher than the national rate of 26.5 percent.

READ MORE: http://www.latimes.com/business/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-us-impoverished-suburbs,0,216684.story

Posted 1 year ago #
JonMyers
HCMC ✈
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Ironic when viewed through the lens of the past, but I'm not surprised by the data when viewing it through the lens of the present.

Posted 1 year ago #
gramarye
In Exile
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I think part of the reason is simply that many older suburbs are just that--old now, and getting older. If I had to take a guess where poverty is increasing fastest in the Greater Columbus area, I wouldn't guess Columbus proper, because it has as many rising as declining neighborhoods (if not moreso), and because much of the damage in the genuinely bad neighborhoods in Columbus was already done years ago, so the delta isn't likely to be much.

Instead, I'd look to Reynoldsburg, Whitehall, Groveport, Galloway, and even Grove City, Hilliard, and Gahanna as likely places to find increases (not necessarily high absolute levels, though that, too, in some of those places) in poverty. I still doubt you'll find much in Dublin or Upper Arlington.

Also, keep in mind that the federal government defines poverty in terms of income (see, e.g., here. It does not define it in terms of wealth. That means that someone with a $40,000 income with a family of four is by definition not in poverty--even if they're in hock on a $225,000 mortgage on a house that would sell at auction today for $150,000 or less. This can make a company that isn't technically poor feel poor, which can influence a great deal (politically and culturally as well as economically). The official figures on the rise in technical poverty don't necessarily take these kinds of things into account. The foreclosure figures reflect it, though, at least as an echo: many people with homes in foreclosure actually have incomes a reasonable distance above the poverty line.

Posted 1 year ago #
GW_Justice
Grandview Hts.
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In the Inequality thread, there was some discussion of what that growing imbalance will cause. I mentioned riots, which may yet be in the future.

A more concrete example is poverty in the suburbs, a result of inequality in the country and the loss of the middle class. There are still jobs, but they pay lower wages, and I don't see a reversal in the trend.

A good book on the subject: Aftershock: The Next Economy and America's Future, by Robert Reich. This discussion is worth reading.

Posted 1 year ago #
gramarye
In Exile
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I do not trust Robert Reich as a neutral voice or even a fair advocate on economic issues. He is the very definition of a tax-and-spend liberal ... the archetype against which the backlash of the tea party gathered. He also takes significant liberties with history, of the kind that can only exist in the mind of one who believes that history essentially began with the election of FDR. (That whole notion about the "basic bargain," for example, has very little basis; the more accurate narrative of our history is that we have been a nation of competitive, independent achievers cooperating to further our own self-interest, not out of some general collective goodwill.)

His proposals are viable only in an environment in which the bond market remains benign notwithstanding the fact that his proposals, in toto, would highly agitate that very market. The one thing I do give him credit for his specificity--he very frequently ties his rhetoric into specific policy proposals, which I respect even if I disagree with those proposals. Specifics are invariably more thought-provoking than generalities.

He simply does not grasp the negative consequences on growth and employment of excess government spending, whether that spending is financed through debt or current taxes. One might look at his proposals to have a "reverse income tax" that adds to middle-class incomes rather than subtracting from them as a potential palliative for suburban poverty, but that begs the question, who is middle class? At what point do you shift from middle to upper class, and how fast do your taxes change at that point? If the entire burden of the federal income tax today is to be shifted onto the top 5 or 10%, and then increased so that those individuals must not only carry the entire federal income tax burden but also provide a "reverse income tax" to everyone else, then the slope of the tax brackets would have to be extremely steep at some point, very likely enough to convince many potentially high earners to either take a substantial amount of their income in non-cash compensation, to source it overseas, or to do any number of other things to reduce their tax exposure. Reich never gives so much as a ballpark range for what he considers to be either the dividing line between "middle class" and "upper class" or the rate that should be levied upon the upper class. Even at 90%, he probably wouldn't realize enough to make his tax-and-spend fantasy a reality.

Also, trying to cure the poverty in the suburbs by making a tax and regulatory environment so hostile that jobs never come back is not going to help people over the long run.

Posted 1 year ago #
jungaroo
Italian Village
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Last year at CRP, we did a Data Byte focused on foreclosures in the suburban parts of Franklin County. It's not poverty but definitely another sign of economic hardship. As gramarye noted, there are differences depending on which suburb you're talking about. However, we did find that in 2007-2008, it was the wealthier suburbs that were starting to experience greater percentage increases in foreclosures.

More generally, our State of Poverty research for the Ohio Association of Community Action Agencies in 2008 and 2010 has emphasized the spread of poverty.

Posted 1 year ago #
GW_Justice
Grandview Hts.
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gramarye wrote >>
I do not trust Robert Reich as a neutral voice or even a fair advocate on economic issues. ... He also takes significant liberties with history, of the kind that can only exist in the mind of one who believes that history essentially began with the election of FDR.

The history of the expanding and dominate middle class does begin with FDR. No distortion of the past there.

And our country didn't have a long history of policies for the general collective goodwill? What? I understand you don't like it, but that doesn't allow you to deny it.

Posted 1 year ago #
gramarye
In Exile
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GW_Justice wrote >>

gramarye wrote >>
I do not trust Robert Reich as a neutral voice or even a fair advocate on economic issues. ... He also takes significant liberties with history, of the kind that can only exist in the mind of one who believes that history essentially began with the election of FDR.

The history of the expanding and dominate middle class does begin with FDR. No distortion of the past there.
And our country didn't have a long history of policies for the general collective goodwill? What? I understand you don't like it, but that doesn't allow you to deny it.

Steep income redistribution, which is clearly what he means when he talks about that "basic bargain" of ~"shared prosperity," basically lasted from the 1930s to the 1970s. It is not an immutable part of our culture and certainly isn't something that needs to be in place for America to be America.

Posted 1 year ago #
GW_Justice
Grandview Hts.
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Gram, I wish libertarians like you would take over the Republican party and say out loud what you just wrote above (I think a lot of Rs believe what you said, they just don't say it).

Then we could dismiss the Rs as a fringe group that would never hold a majority ever again.

Posted 1 year ago #
rus

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GW_Justice wrote >>
Gram, I wish libertarians like you would take over the Republican party and say out loud what you just wrote above (I think a lot of Rs believe what you said, they just don't say it).
Then we could dismiss the Rs as a fringe group that would never hold a majority ever again.

Wait... what?

Posted 1 year ago #
Analogue Kid
5th by West-Northwest
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jungaroo wrote >>
However, we did find that in 2007-2008, it was the wealthier suburbs that were starting to experience greater percentage increases in foreclosures.

I bet there were a lot of people who moved into Dublin and New Albany who stretched themselves too much to get there. It certainly wasn't difficult when somebody making $30k/year could get a $350,000 loan.

Posted 1 year ago #
Walker
The KLD / Downtown
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Poverty rising in suburban schools
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
BY RITA PRICE
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Suburban school districts more known for their affluence are seeing double- and triple-digit increases in the percentage of students considered to be economically disadvantaged.

A report to be released this week by KidsOhio, a Columbus-based education nonprofit organization, found that nearly half of the disadvantaged students in Franklin County now are enrolled in a suburban school district.

READ MORE: http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2010/11/17/poverty-rising-in-suburban-schools.html?sid=101

Posted 1 year ago #
berdawn
near that stretch of N. High Street in the Short North
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gramarye wrote >>

GW_Justice wrote >>

gramarye wrote >>
I do not trust Robert Reich as a neutral voice or even a fair advocate on economic issues. ... He also takes significant liberties with history, of the kind that can only exist in the mind of one who believes that history essentially began with the election of FDR.

The history of the expanding and dominate middle class does begin with FDR. No distortion of the past there.
And our country didn't have a long history of policies for the general collective goodwill? What? I understand you don't like it, but that doesn't allow you to deny it.

Steep income redistribution, which is clearly what he means when he talks about that "basic bargain" of ~"shared prosperity," basically lasted from the 1930s to the 1970s. It is not an immutable part of our culture and certainly isn't something that needs to be in place for America to be America.

nope, just what we need to have a middle class.

Posted 1 year ago #
HeySquare
German Village
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rus wrote >>

myliftkk wrote >>
"tony" suburbs

the what?

tony adj \Ã‹Ë†tÃ…Â-nÃ„â€œ\
tonÃ‚Â·iÃ‚Â·er tonÃ‚Â·iÃ‚Â·est
Definition of TONY
: marked by an aristocratic or high-toned manner or style <tony private schools>

Posted 1 year ago #
Mercurius
First Avenue
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Walker wrote >>
Poverty rising in suburban schools
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
BY RITA PRICE
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Suburban school districts more known for their affluence are seeing double- and triple-digit increases in the percentage of students considered to be economically disadvantaged.
A report to be released this week by KidsOhio, a Columbus-based education nonprofit organization, found that nearly half of the disadvantaged students in Franklin County now are enrolled in a suburban school district.
READ MORE: http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2010/11/17/poverty-rising-in-suburban-schools.html?sid=101

Interesting article -- but poverty rose in Columbus Public Schools by 11% too. A better title would have been, "Poverty Rising Everywhere"

Posted 1 year ago #
Walker
The KLD / Downtown
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School-lunch aid up in Ohio, local suburbs
Sunday, February 13, 2011
BY CATHERINE CANDISKY
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Although the program has long been a staple in urban and rural districts, some of the largest spikes in recent years can be seen in suburban schools surrounding Columbus, not often seen as the front lines of poverty.

READ MORE: http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2011/02/13/school-lunch-aid-up-inohiolocalsuburbs.html?sid=101

Posted 1 year ago #
Walker
The KLD / Downtown
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Housing vouchers a golden ticket to pricey suburbs
By Stephanie McCrummen, Published: June 25

A steadily dropping homeownership rate, 5 million to 11 million more foreclosures in the pipeline, and a raft of investors buying them up have led to a proliferation of rentals in the land of lawns and cul-de-sacs.

But as housing prices keep slipping and the economy remains shaky, thereÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s been another shift as more landlords view the approximately 2 million American families with a Section 8 voucher Ã¢â‚¬â€ which essentially subsidizes fair-market rent for people who canÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t afford it Ã¢â‚¬â€ as among the best ways to fill an empty house.

READ MORE: http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/housing-vouchers-a-golden-ticket-to-pricey-suburbs/2011/06/23/AGDNc7kH_story.html

Posted 11 months ago #