October 9, 2008
Looking at a Post-Boom NYC
Joel Kotkin, author of The City: A Global History, pontificates on urban social trends over at The Observer, saying that New York should, and may already, be modeling itself after other cities. He warns that "New York has been on what you could call the ‘plutonomy wagon.’ So New York has been the ultimate trickle-down economy—it’s been a relatively small group of people driving the economy. The skills of New York are still here; the roots of some of the industries are still here. But, unless many things are grown to replace this plutonomy, the city’s going to continue to go through this spiral where it becomes more and more bifurcated—there are no middle-class jobs, except in the plutonomy." His solution: look to San Francisco as a model! Or Chicago, though all he really says about the Windy City is that they have good PR.
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So he's saying that New York needs to become more bifurcated than it already is to survive... like San Francisco which has only a 5% wealthy/student/nomadic consumer class and the rest of us get to be their servants? It's a joke right? Service economy apocalypse humor.. right?
Right? It's a joke. Right?
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I've never seen more apparant class division in a major US city than in SF. It's street by street there. Only super rich and super poor and a dirth of young or middleclass people.
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I will say that Chicago is still affordable and still has a middle class in the city, a creative music and theater scene, so maybe that is the city to look at. In fact, a lot of middle American cities (Chicago, Minneapolis, cities in Texas) seem to have less income inequality and are more accessible and have a more balanced economy than NYC, so maybe NYC should get over itself and see what they are doing right.
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I don't believe SF or Chicago are cities NY should model themselves after. There is already a movement to make NY smug like SF. Mayor Daley of Chicago is a friend of Bloomberg's. They share many of the same visions for there cities. That means losing more of your freedoms. New Yorkers don't want any of that. Joel Kotkin is talking out of his ass. There will always be middle class jobs. New Yorkers are realizing they need to take City Hall back and put an end to the corruption.
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NY will end up like SF regardless of what particular city its leaders may attempt to model it after. Wealth still speaks louder than anything and when all you have left is inherited wealth, like SF, then that's the kind of world you get. NY's great middle class was an outgrowth of the era when NY was as much a factory town as it was a financial and commercial one. In boom times, service jobs could get you into the middle class, in this bust, you'll slip back into poverty.
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What did they do the NYC?
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NannyState is right...
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Here is more about kotkin's comparison to SF:
http://www.newgeography.com/content/00258-a-new-model-new-york-san-francisco-anyone
I wouldn't say he's propping up SF as a positive model.
"Of course, New Yorkers may reject this vision of their future. San Franciscans, have long prioritized joie de vive over imperial visions. In contrast, New Yorkers derive much of their civic self-esteem from their city’s role as the “capital of the world.”
But if New Yorkers want to keep this slogan to be more than a marketing jingle, they will have to transcend the lame “luxury city” zeitgiest. Spending nearly four billion on new sparkling sports stadiums, and even Bloomberg’s media mastery, won’t get it done. It will take hard work, a commitment to infrastructure and broad-based job growth.
It’s hard to know if New York still has the stomach for this kind of hard work. As someone whose familial roots in the city span over a century, I hope so. New Yorkers are a resilient lot, as they have shown many times in the past. But if they have lost their appetite for hard struggle, well, they can always consider becoming the next San Francisco."