Mixed income housing is not “revitalized, but not gentrified”; in fact, it pretty much requires gentrification of existing low income areas by the addition of amenities to attract higher income residents.
Making neighborhoods “safer and cleaner” requires an increase in civil services such as police patrols, sanitation, public works, and incentives to attract employers and retail businesses. Who pays for this, particularly in Rust Belt cities that are strained or defaulting on their existing debt?
Pittsburgh is the best case scenario. It has mostly recovered in that it has a lower unemployment rate than the rest of the state and the population decline has leveled off. What was not recovered are all the peripheral towns around it like Duquesne, Clairton, and McKeesport and those never will. If a city can keep its citizens safe and is large enough to diversify into healthcare and education they have a chance, but the region as a whole will never recover.
Problem is, is that the revitalization of Pittsburgh has been geared more towards professionals and not at all towards nonprofessionals. I know they’ve introduced high tech industries there but then again it only benefited affluent newcomers. It hasn’t benefited any working class Yinzers. And Pittsburgh still suffers from population erosion. And about the aforementioned towns there’s a good chance that they could become ghost towns. If only they could do something for Pittsburgh’s long time working class population then maybe Pittsburgh could get some more optimal recovery.
I don’t know about that. Have you been in West Mifflin lately? There has been a resurgence that has surprised me. Bloomfield as well. Craft breweries, niche restaurants, art galleries, music venues (Homestead’s Carnegie Library!), etc attract visitors.
We live an hour-plus east of Pittsburgh and very rarely visit the city. We are in Bloomfield/Homestead/West Mifflin an awful lot, though.
Duquesne, Clairton, and McKeesport are definitely lagging, but other towns (adjacent to these three) are prospering. Maybe due to local government decisions?
I keep thinking… for someone to be paid $x/hr, they must do something that creates MORE than $X/hr in increased earnings for their employer. Right? Otherwise the employer just loses money and eventually goes out of business.
But also, the amount (how much the worker increases the employers earnings minus what the employer pays the worker) must be MORE than the amount (someone/thing else accomplishing the same task increases the employers earnings minus what the employer pays to get the job done by that way.) Yes? Otherwise any sensible business man goes with the cheaper method, be it hiring it done overseas or investing in spiffy new automation.
What kind of jobs that don’t require a lot of specialized education (or some rare talent) that create enough added value to be worth even $20/hr exist in great numbers? What can a high school grad with few assets beyond basic good health do that justifies paying him ‘a living wage’, especially if we define a living wage to mean 'earns enough to let him pay for a decent place to live, food, clothes, etc, and not just for himself, but for a child or two?
I think tradesmen are currently safe, I mean, the type that do work that requires great on-the-fly flexibility because the work site is spread out and varied from day to day. Like electricians and plumbers and housepainters and car mechanics and so on.
And jobs which involve a huge amount of social skills, which robots aren’t likely to manage any time soon. Like personal secretaries and salemen and politicians.
I don’t think rust belt towns will ever make a comeback, at least as a manufacturing base. I think a lot of them grew during the industrial revolution by being near an ever-present water source, such as was common along the northern tier, so were already rooted when modern large scale manufacturing came along. Since then, a factory can be located anywhere, and usually goes to the lowest bidder rather than a water source as a requirement.
I imagine maintaining a factory in a high latitude is more costly than somewhere warmer (altho AC probably offsets that somewhat). Factories seem to be located 1) near where the people are, and 2) where there is a steady stream of people getting educated, and 3) where there is capital. I bet there is a link between manufacturing and all three of those things migrating south in the last 100 years.
Windsor, Canada was mentioned. I was curious about how far the rust belt extends into Canada. Are cities in southern Ontario experiencing the same problems, and opportunities, as in the US northern tier?
Problem is when gentrification happens we have condos and luxury apartments constructed, and not much is invested into mixed income housing. And with all the condos and luxury apartments, any low income folks have no choice but to leave.
This video should explain it and later in the video the speaker will point out viable alternatives to gentrification:
“They” are who is building condos and luxury apartments in the cities which makes the communities more expensive. Thus, thus would be developers, city planners, and architects making them possible.
Now if they decide to invest in mixed income housing, then maybe just maybe they will be doing something for the working class. Thus we could get a mix of affluent and non-affluent residents in the community. But unfortunately a lot the city planners don’t want mixed income housing. Instead they just want either condos or luxury apartments.
City planners and administrators want a tax base than brings in revenue to pay for all of the services, infrastructure, and maintenance that residenial areas and the businesses that come with they require. Architects and developers just want to sell properties and clear a profit.
After watching a couple of minutes of that video, I can’t really tell what the speaker’s precise point it, but there is no simple solution to preventing property in desirable areas from becoming more costly because everything increases in cost over time. It’s called inflation and it is a basic principle of growth in macroeconomics. Mixed use housing helps to prevent socioeconomic stratification but your notion that “they” can somehow “revitalize” blighted areas without additional costs to be born by someone or tearing down rundown and often poorly constructrd housing to replace it with housing and commercial property built to modern standards and aesthetics is not grounded in any kind of reality. Most people don’t want to live in small, poorly insulated ‘Sixties-era tract homes or shoddy apatment buildings surrounded by crummy strip malls. If they did, everyone would be moving from Los Angeles and San Francisco to the hip old-new digs in Fresno and Bakersfield.
No, I’ve learned not to waste time listening to 20 minite rambling TED talks where the speaker doesn’t actually reveal any novel insights or come to a coherent conclusion. Perhaps you can summarize?
Alright then. The woman in the video pointed out that gentrification has lead to a lot of displacement, especially among the lower class, and affluent residents become dominant in the community. And as for the viable alternatives they can refurbish structurally sound housing, which would be environmentally responsible. And housing authorities have worked to improve low income housing and they even invested into building newer and cleaner low income housing as well. They would only demolish housing that is not structurally sound. Also there’s also housing where tenants can control their own rent, thus it doesn’t have to be privatized.
It’s also important to know that displacement has lead to a lot of homelessness, especially in the Rust Belt cities. And your refusal to watch the video was actually narrow minded of you. You could of at least watched and I would of been open to your input on it.
Don’t forget prostitution! World’s oldest profession, and although sex robots will undoubtedly be created, they’ll likely remain niche compared to demand for good old humans.
If it were possible, I’d bet heavily on prostitution being legalized broadly within the country and the income taxed to shore up dying municipalities and counties well before any sort of UBI is implemented.
Now you did mention politicians which are very nearly the same thing (just with corporate clients instead of human clients, so prostitutes v2.0 if you will), but they just can’t scale to meet demand the same way v1.0 can.
Either that, or it will remain criminalized and Rust Belt areas will bifurcate into half people who work for the massive prison-industrial complex, and half people incarcerated by same. Whichever works.
