Here's a headline you haven't seen in the Plain Dealer: Cleveland is poorest of top 50 U.S. cities But it's true -- or at least it's what the new U.S. Census tells us. The average personal income of all Cleveland residents in 1999 was the lowest among the nation's fifty largest municipalities. That makes us literally the poorest (to be precise, the lowest-income) big-city population in the nation. This, despite the "downtown comeback" of the 1980s and 90s. This, despite the fact that we are sitting in the middle of the country's 15th biggest metropolitan market... no longer the nation's best location, but still a pretty good one. Of course "per capita income" isn't the only measure of personal prosperity, and there's no inherent reason to use the conventional "top 50" for comparison. If we change the frame of reference (to median household incomes, for example) or lengthen the list of comparables, Cleveland may not be at the absolute bottom of the list. If we include all 67 cities of more than a quarter-million, our per capita income is third from the bottom, edged out by Newark and Santa Ana, California. Or if we look at median household incomes for that same, longer list, we're a little better off than Buffalo and Miami (but worse off than Newark and Santa Ana). Feel better now? Neither do I. So why are we so poor? The list of causes is long and familiar: The collapse of manufacturing. Terrible public schools with horrible graduation rates. Middle class flight to the suburbs. Loss of major corporate headquarters. A late start in the Information Economy. National trade policy. Globalization. Racism. All true, but none of these problems is unique to Cleveland. The people of other cities -- Milwaukee, St. Louis, Baltimore, Toledo, Cincinnati, even Detroit -- have faced similar obstacles but are doing somewhat better. Why are we at the bottom of the income pile? More to the point, what should we -- the people of Cleveland, our elected leaders, our community organizations, not to mention that vague and shifting network called our "civic leadership" -- be doing about it? 1) Cleveland needs a serious political dialogue about "the income issue". To his credit, Council President Frank Jackson steadfastly insists on injecting the economic interests of poor citizens into more fashionable discussions like regionalism and the proposed Convention Center. And Jobs With Justice, led by the Cleveland AFL-CIO, has made the Living Wage and union organizing rights of low-income workers a real issue for local public officials and institutions. This is a good start -- but just a start. 2) In order to talk about our residents' jobs and incomes intelligently, we need data. One census every ten years does not come close to enough. The City and our local universities need to create a comprehensive, up-to-date tracking system for our local workforce -- what people do, where they work, what they're paid. (Note: This is all available by ZIP code in the city's wage tax records!) 3) I personally believe that there are at least four areas that greatly affect Clevelanders' incomes, but get little or no attention from local economic gurus:
Three years ago I would have put Information Technology opportunities on this list, but the local "tech sector" is now getting lots of attention from the media and City Hall. Will IT create real income opportunities for Cleveland residents? That subject isn't on the agenda yet. But see the website for Cleveland Digital Vision. |