How to deal with decline in the rust belt?

[VetLegion]

Steel industry is labour intensive so it had to move abroad. I think China is the largest producer nowadays beacuse of that. For example, Australia is chock-full of both iron ore and coal but they still export it all to China (with difficulty - ports are too small!) instead of smelting it themselves.

[Sarxis]

I live in Detroit.. in an historical district known as "Indian Village".

This city is an interesting place to say the least, where the rich are rich, and the poor live right outside their doorstep. The Grosse Pointe communities aren't even five miles from some of the most decayed and abandoned American urbania. Another 'Rich man/Lazarus' scenario.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grosse_Pointe

http://www.historicindianvillage.org/

[LordShiva]

Indian village

[Darius871]

Originally posted by LordShiva
My Hometown

I was eight years old and running with a dime in my hand
Into the bus stop to pick up a paper for my old man
Id sit on his lap in that big old buick and steer as we drove through town
Hed tousle my hair and say son take a good look around
This is your hometown, this is your hometown
This is your hometown, this is your hometown

In `65 tension was running high at my high school
There was a lot of fights between the black and white
There was nothing you could do
Two cars at a light on a saturday night in the back seat there was a gun
Words were passed in a shotgun blast
Troubled times had come to my hometown
My hometown, my hometown, my hometown

Now main streets whitewashed windows and vacant stores
Seems like there aint nobody wants to come down here no more
Theyre closing down the textile mill across the railroad tracks
Foreman says these jobs are going boys and they aint coming back to
Your hometown, your hometown, your hometown, your hometown

Last night me and kate we laid in bed talking about getting out
Packing up our bags maybe heading south
Im thirty-five we got a boy of our own now
Last night I sat him up behind the wheel and said son take a good
Look around
This is your hometown

- Bruce Springsteen

Speaking of depressing-ass music videos pertaining to the industrial decline, this came to mind (or at least starting 3:57, showing what a rusted-out ****hole Ballmer is now):

[LordShiva]

You didn't quote my full post

[Darius871]

With good reason

[The Mad Monk]

You may as well throw Billy Joel's Allentown into the mix.

[Darius871]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K62DdoFoNeg

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Oerdin
I've never understood why so many people from the Arab world have decided to move to Detroit. It's a crap hole.

Soon it will be their crap hole, and don't forget, it sits on the border between the US and Canada. Once they control the city they'll be able to control that segment of the border.

[TCO]

stop the illegals. It's supply and demand. Workers here are hurt by illegals (wages depressed with more competition). Employers are helped (wages depressed).

[TCO]

my best friend is from Youngstown.

[TCO]

my best friend is from Youngstown.

[LordShiva]

Why are New Yorkers always depressed?

Teh light at teh end of their tunnel is New Jersey.

[Julian Delphiki]

But thats the train. Or bus.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by TCO
stop the illegals. It's supply and demand. Workers here are hurt by illegals (wages depressed with more competition). Employers are helped (wages depressed).

Whatchu talkin' about, Willis?

Illegals would actually have helped Youngstown and much of the rest of the Rust Belt; a cheaper labor pool might have allowed Big Steel to keep competing in a global market.