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Outsourcing Jobs to ... Detroit? Now, one tech company is declaring the latest trend, “Outsourcing to Detroit.”
Outsourcing generally refers to hiring an outside firm that’s cheaper, generally in countries like India or China, but Detroit was hit so hard by the auto industry crisis of the past two years, both in terms of jobs and real estate prices, that for American companies it’s starting to look like a viable competitor to developing nations. Following moves by Quicken Loans and Blue Cross Blue Shield to relocate workers from the suburbs to downtown Detroit, IT-services provider GalaxE, based in Somserset, NJ, decided to set up shop there too. Outsourcing from New Jersey to Detroit may seem like a punchline, but, in fact, it makes a lot of sense: The costs are just a little bit higher than they would be to set up shop in a place like Brazil, GalaxE CEO Tim Bryan said, but with added benefits.
A Solution for Cities on the Brink of Bankruptcy. Unfunded government pensions are driving municipalities across the country into bankruptcy — from Detroit, Michigan (the largest municipal bankruptcy ever) to Vallejo, California.
Despite the need for states and municipalities to have contributed large annual payments to their pension funds over many years, as a group they failed to do so. When coupled with overly optimistic return assumptions (also designed to reduce annual contribution requirements), it is no surprise that most pension plans are not actuarially solvent. With the can now kicked, municipalities face unaffordable annual retirement contributions, taking away funds for current services and forcing municipalities like Detroit into bankruptcy.
Detroit Rising: Life after bankruptcy. One year after a federal judge approves Detroit's bankruptcy exit plan, progress has been made while looming challenges remain, especially city pensions The City of Detroit has more than enough cash to pay its daily bills.
Thousands of busted streetlights have been replaced. City retirees still receive pension checks, and valuable paintings remain ensconced in the gilded halls of the Detroit Institute of Arts. Jcdurbant. Detroit Is an Example of Everything That Is Wrong with Our Nation. Back on July 18, 2013 the city of Detroit filed for Chapter 9 bankruptcy.
Detroit is now seeing a little life, but the city is far from where it once was. Once the wealthiest city in America, known as the “arsenal of democracy,” Detroit was the fourth largest city in the U.S. in the 1960s with a population of two million. Now it has become an example of everything that is wrong with the American economy, Detroit has become nothing more than a devastated landscape of urban decay with a current population of 714,000 whose unemployment rate at the height of the recession was as high as 29 percent, and has only decreased due to the rapidly decreasing population. Visiting Detroit is the closest Americans can come to viewing what appears to be a war-torn city without leaving the U.S. In pictures: Detroit's rise and fall to bankruptcy. Job Searching While Black: What's Behind The Unemployment Gap? : Code Switch.
A man interviews for a job in Detroit.
The unemployment rate for black Americans in Michigan was 18.7 percent in 2012, more that twice the rate for whites in the state. Paul Sancya/AP hide caption toggle caption Paul Sancya/AP A man interviews for a job in Detroit. BLSSummary Detroit. The onrushing wave. IN 1930, when the world was “suffering…from a bad attack of economic pessimism”, John Maynard Keynes wrote a broadly optimistic essay, “Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren”.
It imagined a middle way between revolution and stagnation that would leave the said grandchildren a great deal richer than their grandparents. But the path was not without dangers. G.M., Detroit and the Fall of the Black Middle Class. After high school, Powell enrolled at Wayne State University in Detroit and was planning to major in mass communications and broadcasting, but he dropped out halfway toward his degree.
He wasn’t the most focused student. What’s more, he had a weakness for trendy clothes and racked up about $800 in credit-card debt.