Assignment: Chapter 5 Posting Deadline: Thursday, February 13
Reading:
Chapter 5: "The Damning Mark of False Prosperities": The Deindustrialization
of Detroit
Questions:
1. What
happened to manufacturing employment in Detroit beginning in the late 1940s and
into the early 1960s?
2. Where did
manufacturing jobs go as they left Detroit?
3. What are
some of the reasons that manufacturing employment declined?
Source
for Questions: Charles Brown, “[Marxism-Thaxis] Study
Guide: Origins of the Urban Crisis.” Retrieved Jan 11, 2009. http://lists.econ.utah.edu/pipermail/marxism-thaxis/2009-January/023574.html
Assignment - Deadline: Thursday,
February 13
A. Post two paragraphs inspired by the
study guide questions/thoughts for the week
B. Post two separate comments to
one or more of your colleagues reacting to their paragraphs.
After reaching its peak, manufacturing employment began to decline in Detroit. This downward trend was led by the automotive industry and, consequently, caused a dramatic ripple effect across other manufacturing industries. Within Michigan, many of these jobs went to newly built factories in the suburbs or small to medium sized towns. Outside of Michigan, rural areas in Ohio and Indiana lured plants to their sites with the promise of lower business taxes and labor costs. The Sunbelt states and California took advantage of federal political influence to obtain defense contracts that were once plentiful in Detroit.
ReplyDeleteAutomation and federal policies that lowered transportation costs were the primary reasons manufacturing employment declined. Automation displaced workers, especially those who previously worked in dangerous jobs. The great expansion of the federal highway system and inexpensive fuel afforded the building of manufacturing plants in locales without the requirement of being close to railroads and waterways. As Detroit’s tax base deteriorated with plant closures, it could not compete with other locations, which could offer lower business expenses.
After reading this chapter, it reinforced something that I often tell people who like to take jabs at the city of Detroit: "Manufacturing peaked mid-century and with its decline, the city was never going to maintain such a large population dependent on a single-industry."
ReplyDeleteOnce manufacturing was expanding to the other midwestern states, as well as the east and west coasts, the writing was on the wall for Detroit, as far as industry dominance was concerned. With the expansion of transportation (i.e. highways) that wasn't dependent on a waterways or a fixed rail line, industry became flexible across the nation, thus, allowing greater competition for industry.
Your comments on the troubles the city faced by its heavy reliance on a single-industry reminded me why I find this book so enlightening. One can easily translate the lessons from this book to any region which also found itself in the same quandary. The steel industry of Pittsburgh and the mill industry of New England quickly come to mind. In fact, there was an interesting story by NBC news on a Rhode Island town suffering the same debilitating cuts in pensions and city services that Detroit is undergoing - http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/its-degrading-bankrupt-new-england-mill-town-offers-detroit-bleak-v19697878
ReplyDelete