America’s Urban Distress: Which States And Regions Set Up Their Cities To Fail?

In 2011, the four U.S. cities with the highest unemployment rates were:
Stockton, California (20.2%)
Detroit, Michigan (20.0%)
Flint, Michigan (19.0%)
San Bernardino, California (17.8%).

Today, only one of those cities is still standing. Bankruptcy-free, I mean. Stockton went bust in June 2012, San Bernardino in August 2012 and Detroit last month.

With facts like these, I’ll go out on a limb and argue that our job creation and municipal solvency problems are nearly one and the same. And city leaders in Stockton, San Bernardino, Detroit and elsewhere failed to balance their books partly because they didn’t keep enough of their constituents employed.

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