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You are here: Home / Organizing & Resistance / Fables Of The Reconstruction / Location, Location, Location

Location, Location, Location

by Zandar|  May 4, 20159:06 am| 40 Comments

This post is in: Fables Of The Reconstruction, Show Us on the Doll Where the Invisible Hand Touched You, Decline and Fall, Riveted By The Sociological Significance Of It All

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A major new study adds to the evidence that where you grow up plays a major role in how far you get in life, and of course it’s the worst for kids growing up in poverty-stricken urban counties.

The feelings heard across Baltimore’s recent protests — of being trapped in poverty — seem to be backed up by the new data. Among the nation’s 100 largest counties, the one where children face the worst odds of escaping poverty is the city of Baltimore, the study found.

The city is especially harsh for boys: Low-income boys who grew up there in recent decades make roughly 25 percent less as adults than similar low-income boys who were born in the city and moved as small children to an average place.

Beyond Baltimore, economists say the study offers perhaps the most detailed portrait yet of upward mobility — and the lack of it. The findings suggest that geography does not merely separate rich from poor but also plays a large role in determining which poor children achieve the so-called American dream.

How neighborhoods affect children “has been a quandary with which social science has been grappling for decades,” said David B. Grusky, director of the Center on Poverty and Inequality at Stanford University, who was not involved in the research. “This delivers the most compelling evidence yet that neighborhoods matter in a really big way.”

So yes, after decades of white flight, gated communities, exurbs, urban gentrification, and taking schools, infrastructure, and jobs with them, are we surprised that kids who grow up with multiple structural advantages do better than those who grow up with nothing?

Why, it’s almost like the people who keep pointing out that there are structural barriers to the American dream for an entire class of people, and those barriers are not a product of nebulous “morality” as some would have it but a distinct feature of our broken system (if not the desired outcome of that system that’s not broken at all, but working as intended.)

In America we stack the deck so high that it blots out the sun and people still wonder why the grass doesn’t grow very well. The redistribution screamers are perfectly fine with the wealth remaining in the giant Scrooge McDuck money bins that exist now. The rest of us are just there to get crushed under all that loot, I guess.

P.S. The worst counties to grow up poor in according to the study? Reservation counties, particularly in South Dakota, counties along the lower Mississippi, and Forsyth County NC, home of Winston-Salem, about a hour from where I grew up.

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Reader Interactions

40Comments

  1. 1.

    Botsplainer

    May 4, 2015 at 9:27 am

    I keep going back to the squalls of conservatives in the 40s, 50s and early 60s on how so many black intellectuals were exploring alliances with communism.

    Why in fuck WOULDN’T a black intellectual explore common cause with communism, given all the wonderful gains that conservatism delivered to people of color?

  2. 2.

    dmsilev

    May 4, 2015 at 9:29 am

    Here’s another example:

    Lead paint poisons poor Chicago kids as city spends millions less on cleanup

    Alarming levels of brain-damaging lead are poisoning more than a fifth of the children tested from some of the poorest parts of Chicago, even as the hazard has been largely eliminated in more prosperous neighborhoods, a Tribune investigation has found.

    The toxic legacy of lead — added to paint and gasoline for nearly a century — once threatened kids throughout the nation’s third largest city. As Chicago’s overall rate of lead poisoning steadily dropped during the past two decades, the disparities between rich and poor grew wider.

    Some census tracts, smaller geographic areas within neighborhoods, haven’t seen a case of lead poisoning in years. But children ages 5 and younger continue to be harmed at rates up to six times the city average in corners of predominantly African-American neighborhoods ravaged by extreme poverty, chronic violence and struggling schools, according to a Tribune analysis of city records.

  3. 3.

    WereBear

    May 4, 2015 at 9:35 am

    Which is why we sponsor a child through:

    Children Incorporated

    Who were the only ones I could find who supported Native American children.

    So many of the others would rather put Bibles in their hands than food in their stomachs.

  4. 4.

    WereBear

    May 4, 2015 at 9:39 am

    @Botsplainer: During that time Communists were also the only ones who a strove for sexual equality, as well.

    When the other side can’t even talk a good game…

  5. 5.

    D58826

    May 4, 2015 at 9:47 am

    totally OT but certainly relevant to the various Baltimore threads. Over on Huffington

    Baltimore and Grants Pass: A Tale of Two Uprisings –
    The events described above actually took place 2,800 miles away last week in Grants Pass, Oregon, where a band of gun-toting insurrectionists have gathered in response to a dispute between local miners and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). The co-owners of the Sugar Pine mine, Rick Barclay and George Backes, claim to have surface rights to the plot of land, in addition to mining rights (which are not in dispute). BLM notes that the surface rights to the land were ceded to them by previous owners in 1961 and states, “[Barclay and Backes] had …begun putting up a house on public land; and had failed to file appropriate mining plans with the BLM

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/josh-horwitz/baltimore-and-grants-pass_b_7203042.html

    You just have to have the right complextion

  6. 6.

    Bobby B.

    May 4, 2015 at 9:55 am

    @D58826: I live in Grants Pass and I can tell you those oathkeepers are all white , all on food stamps, and all addicted to driving around town in pickup trucks. What unrest?

  7. 7.

    April

    May 4, 2015 at 9:59 am

    And we have Paul Ryan just yesterday decrying the problem is Baltimore is that welfare programs have been too generous. He says Republicans believe in upward mobility but Democrats don’t. Yeah, Paul, don’t believe the science about lead and about mobility again but simply appeal to beliefs then? So, cut poverty programs and tell Baltimore to wish harder and all will be fine?

    Over and over again the differences between the parties are revealed In stark contrast.

  8. 8.

    RSR

    May 4, 2015 at 10:04 am

    I’ll just leave this here:

    Activist Ignites Heated Debate Over Whether Charter Schools Can Save Baltimore

  9. 9.

    Betty Cracker

    May 4, 2015 at 10:07 am

    Krugman’s column today is highly relevant to this topic.

  10. 10.

    Tone in DC

    May 4, 2015 at 10:09 am

    I used to think calling Paul Ryan a “granny starver” was hyperbolic and a bit ghoulish (and ghoulish is a trait many right wingers have shown themselves to have).

    But he just keeps showing that he wants to let all poor people starve, not just grandmothers.

  11. 11.

    boatboy_srq

    May 4, 2015 at 10:10 am

    @Bobby B.:

    all white , all on food stamps, and all addicted to driving around town in pickup trucks.

    Sounds indeed like time to rework “entitlements”.

    @RSR: Wow. Nothing like a little Privatisation™ to keep Those People in their place drown Gubmint in a bathtub make everything better.

  12. 12.

    boatboy_srq

    May 4, 2015 at 10:12 am

    @Tone in DC: In Paul’s view, if The Poors and The Olds starve in the street, it’s clearly because they didn’t plan far enough ahead and invest properly for their retirement instead of taking on debt they couldn’t manage.

    /snark

  13. 13.

    Mike in NC

    May 4, 2015 at 10:15 am

    @April: Upward mobility for
    Republicans means marrying a millionaire, which is what Paul Ryan did.

  14. 14.

    rikyrah

    May 4, 2015 at 10:26 am

    I consider this water is wet news. Because I live reality-based, the conclusions of the study are obvious.

  15. 15.

    Roger Moore

    May 4, 2015 at 10:41 am

    @rikyrah:

    Because I live reality-based, the conclusions of the study are obvious.

    Even obvious things need to be tested, and they’re worth noting when the test gives the expected results.

  16. 16.

    Tone in DC

    May 4, 2015 at 10:46 am

    @boatboy_srq:

    Sad thing is, he’s not even the worst repug in the House. There are several representatives who have shown themselves (regarding civil rights, women’s health, foreign policy and so many other issues) to be to the right of George Wallace, Nathan Bedford Forrest and Genghis Khan.

  17. 17.

    Gex

    May 4, 2015 at 11:08 am

    Sadly, the problems with these studies is that those who need to understand them can’t. They will never see those “others” as being human like them. It is far too easy for them to see people as either inferior and therefore incapable of doing better or as bad and therefor unwilling to do better. Study after study can show systemic bigotry and how whites and men gain advantage as a result, but many of the people who benefit simply want to believe they are superior and the studies just measure that very fact.

    It is beyond depressing. It is no different than denying the science behind evolution or climate change, but then there’s a lot of overlap in the groups who won’t believe these studies and the groups who fight those sciences as well.

  18. 18.

    gorram

    May 4, 2015 at 11:25 am

    The worst counties to grow up poor in according to the study? Reservation counties, particularly in South Dakota, counties along the lower Mississippi, and Forsyth County NC, home of Winston-Salem

    Majority indigenous, (largely) majority Black, and disproportionately Black. Spot the trend.

  19. 19.

    Frankensteinbeck

    May 4, 2015 at 11:27 am

    @Gex:
    Not a coincidence. Science keeps telling them things they don’t want to hear, so they’ve decided science is just another opinion.

  20. 20.

    Gex

    May 4, 2015 at 11:31 am

    @Frankensteinbeck: Indeed. It’s funny how the truth, that the rest of us just fail to admit, is that they are superior and that they do nothing wrong. They don’t hurt those different than them or with less. They don’t need to change their lifestyles, they aren’t hurting the planet. And so on and so forth.

    Whereas I get deeply suspicious if all truths that I arrive at through study and soul-searching conveniently benefit me over others.

  21. 21.

    srv

    May 4, 2015 at 11:35 am

    It’s not just poor people that are stuck. Imagine being rich and feeling the same way:

    Wealth is a double-edged sword for today’s millionaires, a new report says, bringing plush comforts and a better lifestyle but also carrying increased stresses, anxieties and sacrifices with family and relationships.

    According to the report from UBS, today’s millionaires also feel they are one stock-market crash away from losing their fortunes and that there is no such thing as “enough” wealth to feel secure.
    …
    The report found that 52 percent of millionaires expressed the feeling of being “stuck on a treadmill, but I can’t get off without giving up my family’s lifestyle.”

  22. 22.

    ruemara

    May 4, 2015 at 11:56 am

    @Roger Moore: Except the people who need to learn this have closed eyes, ears & minds. For POC, we live this and, man, are we fucking tired.

  23. 23.

    Steve in the ATL

    May 4, 2015 at 12:03 pm

    @Mike in NC:

    Upward mobility for
    Republicans means marrying a millionaire, which is what Paul Ryan did.

    You nailed it

  24. 24.

    rikyrah

    May 4, 2015 at 12:22 pm

    @ruemara:

    so true

  25. 25.

    Paul in KY

    May 4, 2015 at 12:25 pm

    @srv: Oh, boo hoo. The poor dears…

  26. 26.

    Tone in DC

    May 4, 2015 at 12:33 pm

    Another fucked up incident. At least the kid is still alive (gotta take good news where I can find it).

    http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/04/new-york-state-police-handcuff-shackle-connor-ruiz?CMP=ema_565

  27. 27.

    Librarian

    May 4, 2015 at 12:36 pm

    @Botsplainer: It wasn’t just conservatives who were delivering those wonderful gains, it was society in general.

  28. 28.

    Brachiator

    May 4, 2015 at 12:41 pm

    @April: Wasn’t Paul Ryan on welfare or some other government assistance for a while?

    Welfare without other meaningful opportunities can be a trap. Hell, you see it in the UK, where you have generations of whites living on the dole in decaying cities where jobs have disappeared.

    Welfare programs that only strive to provide a comfortable level of misery is no real answer.

  29. 29.

    Tenar Darell

    May 4, 2015 at 12:47 pm

    @Brachiator: He and his siblings had social security survivor benefits.

  30. 30.

    tk

    May 4, 2015 at 12:50 pm

    It’s becoming more and more obvious to me that only a violent end to the status quo in this country is going to change anything. Lead poisoning, but only for the poor. In 2015. In the richest country in the world. it’s like the rich want to be hung.

  31. 31.

    Brachiator

    May 4, 2015 at 12:54 pm

    @srv: Rich people feel stuck. Poor people ARE stuck. Not the same thing.

    This reminds me of the propaganda of some Spanish language and Brazilian soap operas popular with poor viewers, which were typically about how miserable the lives of the rich were.

  32. 32.

    Paul in KY

    May 4, 2015 at 1:02 pm

    @tk: They think that we are so much a ‘rule of law’ country & the police are so much in their back pockets that it just can’t & won’t ever happen here.

  33. 33.

    Paul in KY

    May 4, 2015 at 1:04 pm

    @Brachiator: Any and all forms of ‘rich people have it tough and if you ever win the lottery, you’ll have it so tough too’ BS is pure propaganda, placed out there with malice aforethought.

  34. 34.

    Gex

    May 4, 2015 at 1:43 pm

    @Paul in KY: maybe if they didn’t make their millions cutting jobs and the social safety net (or voting for those things) they wouldn’t be so scared.

    They make it a winner take all proposition then cry about how scared they are that they might come in second place.

  35. 35.

    Gex

    May 4, 2015 at 1:46 pm

    @Tenar Darell: Benefits denied me as a gay widow, of course. There’s still hypocrisy in there if you look.

  36. 36.

    Paul in KY

    May 4, 2015 at 2:00 pm

    @Gex: Good points, Gex!

  37. 37.

    muddy

    May 4, 2015 at 2:12 pm

    From the OP:

    In America we stack the deck so high that it blots out the sun and people still wonder why the grass doesn’t grow very well.

    This is a great line, well stated.

  38. 38.

    Tenar Darell

    May 4, 2015 at 3:58 pm

    @Gex: Gigantic hypocrisies. But, that’s the reason someone’s whose actions are like Paul Ryan’s, in particular, are so pernicious. He’s benefited from multiple programs, spent his entire working life in government service, and his every waking moment (practically) has been spent trying to cut off everyone else’s current and future lifelines. It’s IOKIYAR, and cutting the rungs from the ladder, and even morally reprehensible. Because of people who behave like Ryan, people will die.

  39. 39.

    April

    May 4, 2015 at 9:23 pm

    @Brachiator: yup, welfare did not rob Paul Ryan of his desire to work hard to succeed. unfortunately our taxes helped this POS into a position where he can kick others in his situation in the head rather than give them a similar hand up that he received.

  40. 40.

    Austin Loomis

    May 4, 2015 at 10:35 pm

    @Gex:

    maybe if they didn’t make their millions cutting jobs and the social safety net (or voting for buying politicians who do those things) they wouldn’t be so scared.

    FTFY.

    @Tenar Darell: He and his siblings had social security survivor benefits.

    Brother Charles used to remind the ZEGS of that, with a “You’re welcome, dickhead” thrown in.

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