  Deandub11 Member Username: Deandub11 Post Number: 271 Registered: 05-2006 |
I hate Forbes and their stupid lists. http://www.forbes.com/business /2008/08/04/economy-ohio-michi gan-biz_cx_jz_0805dying.html www.DetroitArmy.com | ||
Higgs1634 Member Username: Higgs1634 Post Number: 622 Registered: 10-2005 |
yeah.. crazy how they keep pointing out facts and stuff. | ||
Detroitrise Member Username: Detroitrise Post Number: 3294 Registered: 09-2007 |
It's so true, I'm sorry if you people refuse to see that. This is the first list Forbes made that I agree with.  (Message edited by DetroitRise on August 06, 2008) | ||
Viziondetroit Member Username: Viziondetroit Post Number: 1963 Registered: 11-2003 |
I agree DR. I don't agree with most of their lists, but this is one I agree with. It's great to have hope, zest, and be optimistic but at the end of the day our city is on life support. | ||
Digitalvision Member Username: Digitalvision Post Number: 1063 Registered: 11-2003 |
Forbes does drink the Detroit hater-ade, that's for sure. But so does most of the country. I was interviewed on a show in Denver - and what was the first thing they talked about? Kwame and how crap Detroit (and the region) is. It's hard when that's the first opening barrage. However, I tried to keep as upbeat as possible and tried to explain that there are a lot of people who see the glass half full for the region (and especially the city) if it makes the right choices and comes together to move forward to create jobs and innovate. I was told that literally they've never met anyone nationally so optimistic about the city. That's sad, 'cuz anyone who knows me knows I have a serious cynical streak. So we need to be optimistic - because apparently no one else is. | ||
Deandub11 Member Username: Deandub11 Post Number: 272 Registered: 05-2006 |
Oh I didn't say anything about whether they were right or not, but I still hate them. I agree with you digital. I'm one of the most cynical people around and everyone laughs at how optimistic I am about Detroit. If this city is to be saved, optimism, action, and positive thinking is our only chance www.DetroitArmy.com | ||
Iheartthed Member Username: Iheartthed Post Number: 3364 Registered: 04-2006 |
9.7% unemployment? 0.5% GDP growth?! Wow... All while the mayor makes a fool of himself and the rest. | ||
401don Member Username: 401don Post Number: 708 Registered: 11-2007 |
Is the city of Detroit's unemployment rate really 9.7%? Or does that no. just appear low (for Detroit) because the "left the workforce" numbers, mostly on welfare now, are so high. Would Detroit's welfare numbers be a lot higher than most of the rustbelt cities? | ||
Viziondetroit Member Username: Viziondetroit Post Number: 1964 Registered: 11-2003 |
I really think someone at Forbes lived in Detroit, worked in the auto industry, got fired, got dumped, was mad the sun didn't shine enough, was miserable, etc... | ||
Iheartthed Member Username: Iheartthed Post Number: 3365 Registered: 04-2006 |
quote: Detroit proper is somewhere in the 10-15% range, last I heard. I think that the 9.7% figure is for the metro area. | ||
Gaz Member Username: Gaz Post Number: 324 Registered: 04-2008 |
This kind of negativity, which seems common the our press, is one of the things that helps the continuity of Detroit's problems. When people are constantly barraged by this kind of "information" they begin to believe it. I have heard people put down Detroit - and they've never even been there. | ||
Zrx_doug Member Username: Zrx_doug Post Number: 401 Registered: 03-2008 |
It ain't "negativity" if it's true..and it doesn't matter if you see Detroit's glass as half empty or half full..what matters is that the rest of the country's glass is pretty much overflowing by comparison. I'm as optimistic & upbeat about the city as anyone..but reality is what it is, and while "hope & faith and a good attitude" are all necessary components of success, they aren't the whole equation. | ||
Gaz Member Username: Gaz Post Number: 327 Registered: 04-2008 |
Zrx, I agree with you on that. As I have said, Detroit's always stepped up to the plate when this country needed it, and now it's time for the country to pull together to help Detroit. We give away so much foreign aid; why not help our own? | ||
Jazzfan Member Username: Jazzfan Post Number: 25 Registered: 07-2008 |
Gaz-How about they skim a few of the billion they're using to fight the occupation in Iraq and spend it here? | ||
Zrx_doug Member Username: Zrx_doug Post Number: 404 Registered: 03-2008 |
We don't need to go that far..we could skim a few million off the KK defense fund without leaving our own backyard, and if we kick the crook and his overpaid, under-qualified cronies out of their jobs, we'd probably be so flush we could start giving out foreign aid to Windsor.. | ||
Professorscott Member Username: Professorscott Post Number: 1534 Registered: 12-2006 |
Why does anyone expect the federal government to do something for Detroit? We should try to do for ourselves because Uncle Sugar isn't going to pay our way out of our mess, which is largely of our own making. We've created a region that is not growing and whose economy is overly reliant on a single industry, and that industry's best days appear to be behind it, at least in the short term. We don't propose to change one single damned thing about how we govern ourselves or what we spend our money on; we intend to keep doing exactly the same thing and yet somehow believe we will get different results. Why would anyone else send their money into this environment? | ||
Viziondetroit Member Username: Viziondetroit Post Number: 1967 Registered: 11-2003 |
The federal government ain't gonna send any money to Detroit. | ||
Iheartthed Member Username: Iheartthed Post Number: 3366 Registered: 04-2006 |
Obama said he would send you $4 billion. | ||
Sean_of_detroit Member Username: Sean_of_detroit Post Number: 1389 Registered: 03-2008 |
Here's some silver lining; Detroit's current appearance and conditions are attracting, and creating some very creative individuals. No news is good news, but bad news can be spun into a recruitment video... just like the army or navy commercials. | ||
Rhymeswithrawk Member Username: Rhymeswithrawk Post Number: 1395 Registered: 11-2005 |
That's a horrible picture of Detroit that it used. Why not zoom out a tad so you can see all of the RenCen? | ||
Detroitrise Member Username: Detroitrise Post Number: 3297 Registered: 09-2007 |
that is hilarious & ironic! Compared to the pictures they had for other cities, that particular picture of Detroit would suggest we're huge, bustling & growing.  | ||
Mackinaw Member Username: Mackinaw Post Number: 5232 Registered: 02-2005 |
Forbes sells magazines by continually coming up with new lists that rehash the same old conventional wisdom for people to read while they wait for their dentist appointment. To get the bigger picture you need to seek out more obscure facts and statistics, keep up on development and other trends. The people on the ground in a given city, the people taking it in on a day to day basis, are in a better position to speak on whether a city is growing or dying or at some level in between than magazine writers who are only looking at metro-wide stats. In fact it is kind of egregious to label these rankings as "cities" when they are looking at regions. The stats state the obvious-- the wrong types of industries (if we're looking for growth at the present time) are in Detroit and the rust belt-- and the macroeconomy of our region makes it all the more of an upward battle for Detroit to redevelop. But saying that Detroit will therefore die requires faulty logic. | ||
Gaz Member Username: Gaz Post Number: 328 Registered: 04-2008 |
Oh, but the government should help Detroit! They are actually helping corporations to go offshore! In my opinion, that is treason, and it is doing great harm to this country, most especially what the media gleefully calls the rust belt. | ||
Flanders_field Member Username: Flanders_field Post Number: 827 Registered: 01-2008 |
We can thank our import-friendly corporate capitalist controlled leadership in Washington over the past 40 years for selling the US out cheaply to help create the global economy. Nixon's revenge from the grave. | ||
Mackinaw Member Username: Mackinaw Post Number: 5233 Registered: 02-2005 |
There are winners and losers, but always gains on the whole from expanded trade. The areas Forbes identified have had the smallest growth rates over the last decade or so within America, but America on the whole has clearly seen huge growth in prosperity. You can't go back to mercantilism, you can't go back to tariffs-- then you all will really have something to whine about. Plenty of American industries are growing, they just aren't here, by our own fault and the fault of our elected officials, among other misfortunes. Even in recessions, the American economy still grows. Even metro Detroit is growing at a flat, unimpressive .5 %, and we (along with all those towns in Ohio) are the official American losers in the new global economy: we're at the bottom of the barrel and we're still growing. Several European countries post year over year negative growth rates. And those pictures of lifeless old downtowns in Forbes are not a result of globalization. They're a result of the local/regional economy vacating the city for other areas of the same region. Fewer people live in the city, work in the city, etc., but they didn't cease to exist because of globalization, they simply moved to the suburbs-- which had nothing to do with globalization and "selling out" Nixon style. It just so happens that the most anti-urban areas in the country that have seen the most urban divestment have also been the areas that are seeing the smallest gains from globalization: the rust belt is rusty for a variety of reasons. | ||
Bragaboutme Member Username: Bragaboutme Post Number: 423 Registered: 02-2008 |
I agree Mackinaw, from 1980-1996 there was a building boom outside the city. The only major developement in downtown was the comerica tower, that was 1993 I believe. It was projected at that time Oakland County would grow faster than the city. The reason Bill Davidson built the Palace of Auburn Hills way out in the middle of nowhere was because of these projections, Chrysler also. I think at that time it seemed like a good idea, but now it's just a bunch of building that will never get recognized on a national level as they would've if they were downtown. | ||
Jjaba Member Username: Jjaba Post Number: 7128 Registered: 11-2003 |
Accurate list based on census. Census doesn't lie. These are dying cities. Nobody wants to live in them. Be it jobs, lousy landscapes, environment, lack of recreation, shitty schools, bad race relations, dying ecology, strip mining, lousy infrastructure, you name it. Who wants to live in ruins, vacant streets, terrible services, garbage everywhere, locked factories, no new investment, etc. jjaba. | ||
Ltorivia485 Member Username: Ltorivia485 Post Number: 3006 Registered: 08-2004 |
Blame 50 years of terrible leadership at all levels of government and business in Michigan for the decline of the metro Detroit area. They are inept and only care about personal gain. Detroit could have had more potential and glory now if only our leaders weren't corrupt and ignorant of changing economic conditions. | ||
Lmichigan Member Username: Lmichigan Post Number: 6185 Registered: 10-2003 |
Everyone wants to attach optimism and pessimism, but how about some realism? It seems to me that quite a few folks, here, that claim to be realist are actually nothing more than poseurs. While Detroit's struggle may very well be the most visible because of the sheer size of the area, if realist cared to actually look at the list, it would show that Detroit is not uniquely struggling . It's why they have a list of 10 and not one. If anyone else noticed, there are four cities on that list from Ohio, and two from Michigan. If you're looking at purely loss population to measure "dying", which is hyperbolic in itself, Detroit does not rank first among Rustbelt cities in population lost since it's peak, nor the the region showed population loss like the metropolitan areas of Cleveland and Pittsburgh have for the last 20 years. If people really are the realist they claim to be, they wouldn't be treating Detroit as uniquely "dying". I'm not sure what's worse, the decline-denying optimists, or the faux-realist poseurs. | ||
Mayor_sekou Member Username: Mayor_sekou Post Number: 2476 Registered: 09-2006 |
That baby boom they noted is interesting. 430,000 since 2000? With that many young people in that age range shouldnt the population naturally increase over time anyway? | ||
Detroitrise Member Username: Detroitrise Post Number: 3314 Registered: 09-2007 |
^Not when there is a higher average number of people leaving annually. |
