The Downfall of Detroit: White Flight and the 1967 Race Riots | husseinbazzi
The 1967 Detroit riot, also known as the 12th Street riot, was a civil disturbance in Detroit, Michigan that began in the early morning hours of Sunday, July 23, 1967. The precipitating event was a police raid of an unlicensed, after-hours bar then known as a blind pig, on the corner of 12th (today Rosa Parks Boulevard) and Clairmount streets on the city’s Near West Side. Police confrontations with patrons and observers on the street evolved into one of the deadliest and most destructive riots in United States history, lasting five days and surpassing the violence and property destruction of Detroit’s 1943 race riot, which occurred 24 years earlier. The events of 1967 were not spontaneous; they had substance for both blacks and whites. The result of “white flight” around America was the unequal social conditions and relative disparities between races, particularly in communities of color such as Detroit. Works Cited Blakeslee, Jan. “”White Flight” to the Suburbs: Demographic Approach.”
Detroit: Why Bankruptcy? Why Bankruptcy Now? | Journal of Applied Research in Economic Development
City of Detroit Like it or not, the Detroit bankruptcy filing is a page turner. What insights and lessons might an economic developer glean from it? The ever-reticent Krugman, for example, blames job sprawl and suburbs, and a ton of media folk blame the decline on the auto industry or they resuscitate age-old deindustrialization woes. What the Curmudgeon proposes is simply to step back a bit and subject some of these “causes of bankruptcy” to a review. Right off the reader might appreciate the Curmudgeon “take” on the bankruptcy filing. Economic and population decline has not been a stranger to Detroit over the last half century. In our view, the immediate trigger, and prime cause, of the bankruptcy filing is (political agendas aside) unfunded pensions and retiree health care benefits. In any case, in the sections below, we shall pose several questions, hopefully pertinent to economic developers. Did Detroit’s political leadership stand idly by and watch the city decline? 1.
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IT WAS inevitable that the rights of creditors and pensioners would come into conflict, especially in places that suffer from high debts, sluggish growth and an ageing population. Admittedly Detroit, where a bankruptcy plan proposes deep cuts to the wealth of both bondholders and retirees, is an extreme example. But it does point to where future battle lines will be drawn. The city, which filed for bankruptcy last year, has an estimated $18 billion of debt and has seen its population fall by more than half since 1950. There are no easy solutions. Retired workers will face an immediate 34% cut in their income, although police and firemen will only suffer a 10% hit; these reductions will be trimmed if they agree to a quick deal. It does not seem unreasonable that retired workers should be treated more generously in bankruptcy than unsecured bondholders (although that may drive up borrowing costs for other cities). Once a worker has retired, it is very hard to replace lost income.
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DETROIT may be one of the only cities in the rich world where it is possible for someone on a fairly modest income to buy a street. At the edges of Boston-Edison, a historic district of gorgeous old houses built as one of the city’s first wealthy suburbs between about 1900 and 1930, so low has the cost of housing fallen that fairly grand houses can be acquired simply for the cost of back property taxes. A local reporter who showed me around is in the middle of building his own empire—buying up abandoned homes and renovating them. Copying him was extremely tempting. But the cost of such attractive housing is so low because people don’t want it. And one of the things I simply had not appreciated about struggling cities like Detroit before visiting is that a lot of the reason why housing is so cheap is because in other respects, life is surprisingly expensive. Chief among the costs that are higher in Detroit is transport. And all this is just the financial cost.
Troubles of the U.S. "Big 3" in Detroit: What About their European Rivals?
In the months-long run-up to the bailout in Detroit, little was said about foreign competition. But the concern was always there. In announcing the 17.4 billion dollar loan, a White House official stipulated to the Washington Post that, “The companies will have to restructure their wage and benefit agreements so that by the end of 2009 they are competitive with foreign automakers that have plants in the U.S.” Already in the U.S. car market, many European and Japanese car-makers are gaining market share on the strength of more efficient design and lower operating costs – a trend that shows into sharp relief the problems associated with the legacy in Detroit. (Often still called “foreign imports,” many of these European and Japanese models are actually built by American workers in U.S. plants owned by the foreign manufacturers.) Some of the proposed European assistance is aimed at helping offset the costs to consumers of meeting new environmental restrictions.
U.S. war on drugs has failed, report says
The United States' war on drugs has failed and will continue to do so as long as it emphasizes law enforcement and neglects the problem of consumption, a Washington think tank says in a report co-chaired by a former president of Mexico. The former president, Ernesto Zedillo, in an interview, called for a major rethinking of U.S. policy, which he said has been "asymmetrical" in demanding that countries such as Mexico stanch the flow of drugs northward, without successful efforts to stop the flow of guns south. In addition to disrupting drug-smuggling routes, eradicating crops and prosecuting dealers, the U.S. must confront the public health issue that large-scale consumption poses, he said. "If we insist only on a strategy of the criminal pursuit of those who traffic in drugs," Zedillo said, "the problem will never be resolved." The report, which is the work of Brookings' Partnership for the Americas Commission, offers especially pointed criticism of the way the drug war has been waged.
