10 Local American Economies That Have Changed Forever

[Capt Worley PE]

Buffalo, NY

Flint, MI

Hartford, CT

Cleveland, OH

New Orleans, LA

Detroit, MI

Albany, NY

Atlantic City, NJ

Allentown, PA

Galveston, TX

A city does not die when its last resident moves away. Death happens when municipalities lose the industries and vital populations that made them important cities.

The economy has evolved so much since the middle of the 20th Century that many cities that were among the largest and most vibrant in America have collapsed. Some have lost more than half of their residents. Others have lost the businesses that made them important centers of finance, manufacturing, and commerce.

Most of our list of America's Ten Dead Cities were once major manufacturing hubs and others were important ports or financial services centers. The downfall of one city, New Orleans, began in the 1970s, but was accelerated by Hurricane Katrina.

Notably, the rise of inexpensive manufacturing in Japan destroyed the ability of the industrial cities on this list to effectively compete in the global marketplace. Foreign business activity and US government policy were two of the three major blows that caused the downfall of these cities. The third was the labor movement and its demands for higher compensation which ballooned the costs of manufacturing in many of these cities as well.

24/7 Wall St. looked at a number of sources in order to select the list. One was the US Census Bureau's list of largest cities by population by decade from 1950 to 2000 with estimates for 2007. Detroit, for example, had 1.9 million people in 1950 and was the fifth largest city in the nation. By 2000, the figure was 951,000. The city was not even on the top ten list in 2007.

The Census data also describes the shift of much of the population to cities which were not considered large at all in 1950. Most of these are in the southern part of the US. Rising populations in these locations has been driven by the growing number of retired people and a relocation of the nation's workforce. This is how San Diego, Phoenix, and San Antonio have moved onto the list of the ten largest cities in America.

Full text and pictures at the link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/25/a...05.html#s130928

 

[Capt Worley PE]

The Clean Air Act, while a good thing overall, killed the steel industry in the US. That act coupled with safety and CAFE regs came very dang close to killing the US auto industry in 1975. Very few people realize how close.

 

[Dleg]

You can't blame the loss of the steel industry (and pretty much all inudstry) on safety and environmental regulations alone. As the article above stated, there are a lot more factors, including the opening up of foreign trade and unions.

What would have happened, I wonder, if the US government had played more of a protectionist role, and made it more difficult for cheap imports? Would skyrocketing prices caused by unionization and regulation have been driven back by reduced sales? In other words, would the "market" have adjusted itself, even if the market were restricted to the US? Just curious. It's far too late, IMO, to do anything about it. The US has declined and it's not coming back anytime soon. How can it? Our incredible prosperity and recovery after the Great Depression and WWII were due primarily to our ability to produce goods. What do we produce now? Nothing but food! I bet the US couldn't produce anything now - we've lost all the skills, knowledge, and abilities already. We'd be starting from scratch.

(feeling a little pessimistic today)

 

[picusld]

Not sure that AC, NJ really applies. Its downfall was due to adjacent states legalizing gambling.

 

[Capt Worley PE]

You can't blame the loss of the steel industry (and pretty much all inudstry) on safety and environmental regulations alone. As the article above stated, there are a lot more factors, including the opening up of foreign trade and unions.

It was really kind of the perfect storm of the three that killed the steel industry. IMO, the Clean Air Act was the big one. For all intents and purposes, it required completely new mills be built. The major comapnies didn't want to invest in big new mills, since the foriegn competition didn't have this constraint and would always produce cheaper steel because of it. Most just closed up shop, but some opened new, smaller boutique mills, and seem to be doing OK.

As for production, we had a huge edge on the world after WWII. We were a superpower AND the only major economy that hadn't been reduced to shambles after the war. Not only did we manufacture our wants and desires for the nex few decades, but we produced goods for the entire world. Hell of a captive market, eh?

In the 70s, the rest of the world started to catch up in a serious way, and we stumbled by saddling our industry with more regulation. The auto industry was particularly hard hit, but all manufacturing took it on the nose.

I think NAFTA was a tacit admission by the government that they killed manufacturing in the US and extended somewhat of an olive branch to manufacturing concerns. Like it or not, it is a global marketplace now.

I do wonder if it would have been better for industry if the gov had put out protetctionist legislation, but I really doubt it would have. Manufacturers were concentrating on designing product and new processes to meet the regs, and loss control of quality manufacturing. The late seventies/ear;y eighties were the nadir for quality in US manufacturing. People back then were already paying extra for quality importants, and I don't think they would have accepted the protectionist legislation at all.

 

[Master slacker]

I lay a huge partial blame on unions. Long story short, my dad is working right now as a contractor at a plant that currently has a union strike. With half of the normal, union labor and less than normal experience at this plant, production has doubled. Oh, and only two of the five production trains are running. Oh, and the salaries for the unioners were an absolute abortion. Example: a FORKLIFT DRIVER was getting paid $140,000... yes, fatty money to drive a forklift. You kidding me? He's not working in downtown Los Angeles either. This is in mountain country, hill billy area.

Unions are the root of all evil in the labor world, like it or not.

 

[FusionWhite]

Im pretty sure CAFE regulations apply to all cars. Not just the ones manufactured here in the US. The Japanese and Germans managed to do what American auto companies couldnt (or were not willing to do): make smaller, more fuel efficient and more reliable cars. Look at the times when when the US auto industry really got hit hard, they were times when fuel prices sky rocketed (early 70's, mid-2000's). Thats when people turned their back on American gas guzzlers and bought up foreign built cars that got better gas mileage.

That has nothing to do with the gas mileage regulation, but how companies respond to the demands of their customers.

The article and the general feeling of this post is that the government is killing our economy through regulation in general and environmental regulation specifically. Im not sure what the alternative is here? Tell all the steel mills and powerplants to scrap their pollution control equipment? That would be a great idea if you want your city to look like Beijing during the last Olympics. Can anyone honestly tell me you want to see that kind of shitty air quality in your city?

 

[Capt Worley PE]

That has nothing to do with the gas mileage regulation, but how companies respond to the demands of their customers.

Not really. the car companies have to satisfy government requirements BEFORE they can sell their wares to the public. They had CAFE, safety, and emissions regulations slammed onto them all at once. Almost all of their engineering went into passing these standards, and they did. However, quality suffered. People didn't like that. Poor quality drove more people to Japanese and European cars than temporary gas shortages (real and imagined) did.

The article and the general feeling of this post is that the government is killing our economy through regulation in general and environmental regulation specifically. Im not sure what the alternative is here? Tell all the steel mills and powerplants to scrap their pollution control equipment? That would be a great idea if you want your city to look like Beijing during the last Olympics. Can anyone honestly tell me you want to see that kind of shitty air quality in your city?

I agree with you. The environment is far better off than it was in 1970, and I, for one, appreciate that greatly. I am just pointing out that the tradeoff we got was we lost our manufacturing base partly because of it. Was it worth the tradeoff? I think so. that's why I don't whine too much about the loss of rust belt industry in this country. But I completely understand why people are cheesed off about it at the same time.

The unions were/are a huge problem, too, and I won't deny that they are probably even a bigger factor than government regulations. However, without the regs and the unions, foriegn competition probably wouldn't have even entered into it. There was still a huge anti-german and japanese sentiment in the 70s, at least here in the south. I know tons of people who curse those 'ass engine nazi wagons' and 'jap tin cans' even to this day.