<p>Article from Robert Reich on the Detroit bankruptcy:
Detroit</a> and the bankruptcy of America?s social contract « The Berkeley Blog</p>
<p>Thoughts from Michigan residents?</p>
<p>I see those pictures of a decaying Detroit and it's pretty sad.</p>
<p>It is very sad. And the problems are so many. I hope that they take this opportunity to make things right, and not end up making even more problems.</p>
<p>Just so foreign (and out of town) visitors to this thread know, Detroit is nowhere near Ann Arbor, so don’t worry about the effect on University of Michigan (none).</p>
<p>Atlas shrugged…</p>
<p>“The median household in Birmingham, Michigan, just across the border that delineates the city of Detroit…”</p>
<p>It always amazes me when writers pretend they know an area and them comment on them like they are some kind of expert. Birmingham is not “just across the border” from the city of Detroit. I really dislike people who cannot take the time to even look at a map to see if what they spewing is factual.</p>
<p>^ Looking at a map, I’d say Birmingham is a suburb of Detroit. Would you agree? My basis might be different from you…I’m from L.A. where you would classify cities of Lancaster and Palmdale as suburbs of L.A. Reich’s point was how big do you draw the metropolitan boundaries? Don’t the people in Detroit’s suburbs use Detroit metropolitan resources? Such as the airport, museums, entertainment, baseball and football stadiums?</p>
<p>How would this affect Detroit’s airport, for example?</p>
<p>I was wondering where you can find professor that ■■■■■■■■, and then I realized he’s from the public policy department at berkeley, where Karl Marx is revered as god.</p>
<p>Sure the hardworking people who accumulate their wealth/social standing through talent and hardwork should pay more tax and subsidize the largely drug-infested, illiterate, lazy city of detroit full of deadbeats so they can get more welfare and public service. What a joke… </p>
<p>LMAO at that so-called “social contract”… uh I never signed one.</p>
<p>Contrary to this idiot’s point, this is exactly why this detroit bankrupcy is great. Talented, hardworking people with discernable skills generate their share of economic output and collectively pay their own share; An underperforming group DO NOT get subsidized by someone else’s money and suffer the consequences of their own making. You bet cities like Chicago are taking note because they are next.
You eat what you kill for the most part. That’s how it should be. </p>
<p>This idiot epitomizes your typical socialist. Instead of focusing on the obvious issues (deadbeats in detroit not generating their share to pay for their crap), they blame everyone else, in an effort to get everyone else to pay for their problems.</p>
<p>Boundaries make no difference. People who moved out of detroit in the past wanted to distance themselves away from the “poor utility/safety/services per tax dollar paid” they were getting because they were subsidizing dead beats in the rest of the city. You draw a bigger boundary, people just move further away.</p>
<p>“Don’t the people in Detroit’s suburbs use Detroit metropolitan resources? Such as the airport, museums, entertainment, baseball and football stadiums?”</p>
<p>So does everyone else in America. They pay to do so. They generate revenue for the city as they do so. Should every city/neighborhoods that ever had residents fly through DTW subsidize detroit’s poor financial management and deadbeat tax base?</p>
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Before that, Reich was Secretary of Labor under the Clinton administration. I don’t always agree with his views, but he’s far from ■■■■■■■■…Dartmouth/Rhodes Scholar/Yale Law educated.</p>
<p>
Valid point. But, I like to have some civic pride. If the urban core of my city were decaying and I lived in a well-to-do suburb of that urban core, I’d like for some cooperation for reinvestment and redevelopment. </p>
<p>
City of Detroit pensioners will likely suffer the biggest consequences. I don’t think it was a fault of their own making, it was the fault of city leadership and failure to adapt to a changing economy.</p>
<p>The DTW airport is not even in the city of Detroit and has little to do with the bankruptcy. They are in the same Wayne county though. The airport is half way between Ann Arbor and Detroit and is not operated by the City of Detroit.</p>
<p>Part of the reason for this bankruptcy and for other cities and situations facing financial crises, are the commitments made to pensioners and other groups that cannot be changed without going the bankruptcy route. You can cut the bus service, but you can’t cut the pensions and other entitlements. Vanity Fair featured an interview with Arnold Schwartzenegger when he was governor of CA that I think is a good example of what happens when you are stuck with these entitlements and no money. CA has enough people making money so that raising taxes was possible. When those with the money leave a city, there aren’t enough getting anything to tax. And those with the entitlements will refuse to budge until the first check comes with cuts in it or doesn’t come at all which may happen with Detroit’s bankruptcy. The point has come now where these entitlements do not necessarily have to be honored.</p>
<p>“Looking at a map, I’d say Birmingham is a suburb of Detroit.”</p>
<p>Yes it is. It is also no less than 6 miles away from the outer city limits of Detroit. It is not, " just across the border that delineates the city…" My point was that obviously Reich is not all that familar with the area. When I read a comment like that, I automatically discount the rest of the commentary. To me it reads like, as they put it on Fox, the drive by media.</p>
<p>“I’m from L.A. where you would classify cities of Lancaster and Palmdale as suburbs of L.A.”</p>
<p>Yes, and if someone said that Lancaster or Palmdale is located “just across the border that delineates the city of” Los Angeles, you would laugh in their face.</p>
<p>^ But where is the City of Detroit’s border in relation to Birmingham? Was he technically correct? Birmingham is just outside Detroit city border? :)</p>
<p>
Nah, Lancaster and Palmdale are separated by the Santa Susana mountain range from the Los Angeles basin. They are in the county of Los Angeles - not the city. Technically, they’re part of the Los Angeles metro area but not part of the City of Los Angeles - they’re just across the border that delineates the City of LA + a mountain range. :)</p>
<p>“But where is the City of Detroit’s border in relation to Birmingham? Was he technically correct? Birmingham is just outside Detroit city border?”</p>
<p>No, he was technically incorrect. “Just across a border that delineates the city” is pretty specific. It is like going from Los Angeles to East Los Angeles or from Los Angeles to Santa Monica. It means that they actually touch each other. Ferndale is just across the border, separated by the famous 8 Mile Rd, from Detroit. So are many other suburbs of Detroit. Birmingham is not one of them. Once again, my point was that Reich does not know the region and was commenting based on his perceptions from 2000 miles away. That is ok, but at the same time he loses credibility with people who really know the area.</p>
<p>“Before that, Reich was Secretary of Labor under the Clinton administration.”
That further proves my point. Those who can’t do, teach. Those who can’t teach govern.
One of the other big reason detroit has been falling apart other than the obvious reason that it’s full of deadbeats is the unfettered influence of unions with their unrealistic demands over the years. The Clinton administration was a huge proponent of that; and as the Secretary of Labor, his job was to push the union agenda.</p>
<p>“he’s far from ■■■■■■■■…Dartmouth/Rhodes Scholar/Yale Law educated.”
They call people like Reich educated idiots or limousine radical liberals. Career politician/academia people with no practical experience doing real things, theorizing BS that doesn’t make sense.</p>
<p>“Valid point. But, I like to have some civic pride. If the urban core of my city were decaying and I lived in a well-to-do suburb of that urban core, I’d like for some cooperation for reinvestment and redevelopment.”</p>
<p>If you want to show your civic pride, send a donation check to the city of detroit. As a free citizen, I should be allowed to voluntarily support a “good” cause, but I shouldn’t be forced to pay for something that I have no legal and logical obligation to pay for. It’s within Reich’s rights to make a nonsensical moral argument because he has a bleeding heart and like to sympathize with everything, but that has no place in public policies.
This is the problem with radical Marxists like Reich. They want to make it other people obligation to pay for someone else’s problems through their own fault (socialization of costs).</p>
<p>“City of Detroit pensioners will likely suffer the biggest consequences. I don’t think it was a fault of their own making”
It is absolutely their fault. Unions were the problem. They were part of it. They weren’t satisfied with the golden egg they didnt even deserve in first place, and proceeded to eat the goose while they were at it.</p>
<p>^ If it is not in Wayne county, it cannot be neighboring Detroit unless it is in Canada.</p>
<p>You wouldn’t want to walk from Detroit to Birmingham. That would be my definition of “just across the border”. My city is even closer to Detroit (and it’s problems) and walking there would be an undertaking. </p>
<p>The borders between Detroit and suburbs are sharply defined. Sometimes as clear as one side of the street from the other. But Detroit is HUGE and the outside “border” isn’t really where most of us judge by, because we have no reason to be there. We would use Downtown (with the sports, entertainment, dining etc) as our yardstick.</p>
<p>Los Angeles is separated by mountains, Detroit is separated by lots of freeways and a river. By the time you cross “your” freeway you are out of Detroit.</p>
<p>Detroit Metro Airport is VERY far from Detroit, again just to reassure the out-of-towners.</p>
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That’s why I asked local opinion. Thanks.</p>
<p>
In fairness, he did include a map in the article. A broad map, but a map. Haha!</p>
<p>The main point and question is what do you consider “Greater Detroit”? Does Greater Detroit have some responsibility to help Detroit proper?</p>
<p>“The main point and question is what do you consider “Greater Detroit”? Does Greater Detroit have some responsibility to help Detroit proper?”
Does Wayne county have some responsibility to help Greater Detroit? Does Michigan have some responsibility to help Wayne County? Does the entire Midwest have some responsibility to help Michigan? Does the entire country have some responsibility to help the Midwest? Does all of Americas have some responsibility to help the US? The the whole world have some responsibility to help the Americas?</p>
<p>Does the whole world have some responsibility to help Detroit proper?</p>
<p>Detroit proper does not really provide anything to the rest of Metro Detroit. It’s more of a hindrance really. Maybe 50 years ago it did, but not today.</p>
<p>There have been many times that the surrounding counties have tried to help Detroit with various projects etc. Most of the time it is rejected as “the suburbs trying to take over what Detroit has” rather than “we are all in this together”. There are more opportunities than I can count that Detroit has had an offer of help (including federal) and turned it away.</p>
<p>The voters in Wayne, Oakland, and Macomb counties approved a millage to help support the Detroit Institute of Arts and the Detroit Zoo. I was more than willing to pay this (on top of my already too high property taxes) to do my share. Has it helped? Nope, money has been diverted and contested.</p>
<p>Those anywhere near Detroit are already paying a high price. My car insurance is high. I have to lock my car doors when I run into the 7-11 down the street and double lock my house doors. What other price should we pay exactly?</p>