Flint has long been suffering economically. This year we were voted the third most depressing city to live in. Homeless, jobless, and foreclosure rates are at an all time high.
And the poverty rates, well that’s beyond sad. The national average is 12.5%. The state of Michigan’s poverty average is 14%. Here in Genesee county it’s at 16.8%. Inside Flint city limits there are a whopping 35.5% of residents living in poverty.
There doesn’t look to be any relief in sight either as GM is laying off thousands of workers in the area and the threat of GM going bankrupt may completely decimate us.
UM economists George Fulton and Joan Crary have been forecasting Michigan’s economic future every year for 36 years. This may be the bleakest prediction they’ve ever given.
An expected 108,000 thousand Michigan jobs will be lost in 2009. The unemployment rate in Michigan will jump to over 10% for the first time since the recession of the early 1980s.
US auto sales are expected to fall below 12.2 million, that’s down from the horrible 13.3 million sales of this year.
Fulton and Crary expect the next two years to be the hardest Michigan has seen.
Is there any good news for Flint? I haven’t found it yet.
Third most? Which two cities could be more depressing than Flint?
Sadly, I think you are on target…
There is an unfortunate reality that being ‘fast’ in Silicon Valley is not the same as being ‘agile’ in Michigan/Ohio– in the auto industry.
We need a massive investment in re-tooling the nation’s industrial belt. Right now it looks like the electric vehicle industry (which is all about energy storage) is going to launch in Asia. I’m struggling to see how the US can compete right now in this new platform. Time for some deep soul searching, I think!
Garry G
Editor
TheEnergyRoadmap.com
http://www.theenergyroadmap.com