While cities like Dallas and San Francisco have rebounded strongly since the recession, many other places are still struggling for economic growth and prosperity. As time goes on, we're seeing a divergence between successful parts of the country and the non-successful parts.
More than 50 million Americans live in "distressed" ZIP codes, according to a new report from the Economic Innovation Group, a Washington D.C. think-tank.
— Fast.Co Exist
"These areas—largely concentrated in the South, Southwest, and the Rust Belt—are suffering a "recovery gap" driven by low home investment, shuttering businesses, and poor job opportunities."
According to the report, economic opportunities are intimately tethered to geography in the United States. In turn, the regions most susceptible to job loss remain those with a history of financial woes, in particular former manufacturing hubs.
The report ranked cities based on economic indications such as the percentage of the population with a high school degree; housing vacancy rates; unemployment rates among adults; poverty rates; median income rations; percent changes in the number of available jobs; and percent changes in the number of businesses.
Here are the 10 most "distressed" cities in the United States:
1. Cleveland, Ohio
2. Detroit, Michigan 
3. Newark, New Jersey 
4. Toledo, Ohio 
5. San Bernardino, California 
6. Stockton, California 
7. Milwaukee, Wisconsin 
8. Buffalo, New York 
9. Memphis, Tennessee 
10. Cincinnati, Ohio 
For more on the economic health of American cities, check out these links:
13 Comments
Ohio, Ohio, Ohio. So much for that "moderate" Kasich being capable of running a state well.
Clown.
Totally agree, if you can't fix a state how is it he can fix a country? Telling people he fixed Ohio makes him a liar more than a "clown".
Yep. Ohio appears to have a load of problems these days.
When the San Andreas fault goes crazy, everyone will flock to these cities. Paul Giamatti FTW (AIA speaker next year?)
^might be on to something, 7/10 sit on an endless supply of fresh water.
That's what downtown Buffalo looks like?
I always just assumed it was just the Ralph Wilson stadium and tail-gate lots.
My firm has done work in almost every one of these cities ( Great Lakes ). There is still a tremendous amount of manufacturing, very high tech manufacturing, in these cities. I wouldn't be surprised that there is a booming corporate economy and a depressed blue collar worker economy as there is not as large a need for mass labor anymore. At least these cities are going through the painful transition and shedding people. They will emerge leaner and easier to run. I fear for where all the extra labor ends up, and what becomes of them and those new cities longer term.
I live in one of the dreaded 10. That last part isn't that easy, what "sheds" are the people and businesses who can make a city survive and grow and the underemployed and undereducated just go on assistance and rot in place, the underutilized don't go anywhere because there is nowhere to go other than to an oil field for 18 months...
I'm not sure what the metrics are but as for distressed, I'm pretty sure the metrics don't include cities/towns below some size metric.
However, I don't necessarily disagree with the list from such moderate to large size cities.
a reverse diaspora back to the south is what's called for. we need your beer, your brats, your corn fed women.
It interesting that only Detroit was represented by an image of an abandoned home. All the other distressed cities in this list had nicer images of either the downtown area, waterfronts, or skyline. This is just perpetuating the myth and misinformation of Detroit. The "bleakness" there is also found in the other cities on this list. The original article on Fast.Co Exist doesn't use an abandoned house photo either.
I've linked a couple more appropriate images that are inline with the other city images. They were pretty easy to find. http://gppreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Detroit-Skyline-3-1160x480.jpg
http://whitneysociety.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/photo-2.jpg
http://d39ya49a1fwv14.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/01182013043938.jpg
Nice point, hw.
Hw, true about Detroit, it’s a powerhouse in balance…
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