CHICAGO | General Discussions

[moorhosj]

Originally Posted by Kenmore

people love to talk about the loop/downtown as the "economic engine" of the city as means of hand waving over neighborhood disinvestment, it's just trickle down garbage

The takes get worse and worse. People love to talk about the Loop being the economic engine because of analysis like Zotti's that absolutely proves it to be the case. Trying to somehow compare the network effects and business clustering of the Loop to trickle-down-economics shows you are running out of ideas. It's the mirror of people calling any government involvement "Marxism". You have become that which you claim to despise.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by LouisVanDerWright

It hasn't regressed in the least considering everyone is free to wear whatever they want whether it be suit or Hawaiian shirt...

or even a hawiian suit, if one is so inclined.


source: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Colourful-S...-/333123455234

[Buckman821]

Originally Posted by LouisVanDerWright

Lol gentrification is the trickle buddy boy, all sorts of previously depressed areas with massive levels of segregation are being uplifted and the segregation is being busted.

But we already know you don't want that, you need segregation and concentrated poverty to keep your preferred candidates in power...

Seriously, you can't have your misery both ways!

Complains about neighborhood disinvestment then complains even harder when neighborhood investment occurs

There really is no pleasing some people.

[Chisouthside]

I mean you can argue that the focus on downtown was an economic necessity to keep Chicago from majorly declining but at the same time you can't deny this has also had disastrous effects on huge swaths of the city.

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by Chisouthside

I mean you can argue that the focus on downtown was an economic necessity to keep Chicago from majorly declining but at the same time you can't deny this has also had disastrous effects on huge swaths of the city.

Pretty much. As I've been saying for quite awhile on here, the city has been in the middle of an economic shift for at least a decade. The types of jobs that have replaced those lost before are more white collar.

Whether you like it or not, a lot of companies opt for more urban, walkable, etc. Locations these days. In the case of Chicago a lot of this is downtown. The mayor's office doesn't have to twist anyone's arm to get them to put an office downtown.

The areas that have been disinvested in are not ones where a company like Google is going to put an office. And if they did, then there would be huge gentrification calls there most likely.

Most of the companies downtown and ones who have moved downtown are ones that would probably be met with negatively if they located instead to disinvested neighborhoods.

So whether you like it or not, downtown is going to continue to grow with offices because no company wants to be met with protesters for merely putting an office there because of threats of gentrification and most companies are not going to put their employees in danger if you are talking about some of the more dangerous levels.

The city could probably incentivize NOT going downtown, but don't expect the name brand companies and/or ones with a lot of money to follow suit... I'm talking about companies priding themselves on being in dynamic urban environments.

So the investment in these areas need to not be "Amazon is opening an office in a disinvested area".. it needs to be something else that allays these fears

[Via Chicago]

Originally Posted by LouisVanDerWright

Lol gentrification is the trickle buddy boy, all sorts of previously depressed areas with massive levels of segregation are being uplifted and the segregation is being busted.

But we already know you don't want that, you need segregation and concentrated poverty to keep your preferred candidates in power...

you honestly believe gentrification somehow solves poverty and segregation rather than sweeping it to another area that is in that moment less desirable to the gentry/capital? people can support economic growth that dosent also come at the expense of displacing the very people it is supposed to serve (i.e. current residents). gentrfication is literally the battle of the affluent against the poor. guess who wins that matchup everytime, and who's favor the odds are intentionally rigged? banks and other financial institutions are the primary causes and beneficiaries of gentrification. youre more interested in property rather than people, and at worst are conflating the two as the same thing.

[the urban politician]

Originally Posted by marothisu

Most of the companies downtown and ones who have moved downtown are ones that would probably be met with negatively if they located instead to disinvested neighborhoods.

Great point. A good example is the Obama Presidential Library. Finally an investment that may improve property values and bring some tourism and $$ to the community and a vocal bunch of idiots are out in full force complaining about "gentrification" and wanting a "Community Benefits Agreement". Those same people probably whine and moan all day about "lack of investment" in their community.

Luckily they are overshadowed by the rest of the community there that mostly supports the project.

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

Great point. A good example is the Obama Presidential Library. Finally an investment that may improve property values and bring some tourism and $$ to the community and a vocal bunch of idiots are out in full force complaining about "gentrification" and wanting a "Community Benefits Agreement". Those same people probably whine and moan all day about "lack of investment" in their community.

Luckily they are overshadowed by the rest of the community there that mostly supports the project.

Some of the neighborhood is actually for it so I'm not sure how good the example is, but it could work because there are enough people against it.

I'll give more examples though. People in Humboldt Park and Pilsen have vandalized and given crap to single, independently owned coffee shops because of what they apparently represent. Yet those same people complain about companies not wanting to put jobs in their area and downtown getting all the action. What company who might be seen as gentrifiers is going to be eager to go into that environment who knows about these things?

I mean I understand the position, but they are in a way contradicting themselves. The neighborhoods like this might be sheltered from easily getting a bunch of tech startup offices, but they aren't automatically safe from actual residential and retail gentrification especially if their areas are near the trains.

On another note, I have a friend who is a branch manager at a branch in Logan Square. He's told me the gentrification there has made millionaires out of some of the Mexican immigrants who moved to the area and bought property awhile ago. The long time residents who didn't purchase property ever might get the short end of the stick but apparently there's a bunch of long time residents who have made out very well. I have some friends in the area who have been there for awhile who are for gentrification because they know they'll have a nice payday on their house they own and also bring down the crime (neither are white and one grew up there since the 80s and 90s).

And I'm not all for gentrification, but some of the ways which people talk about it are interesting.

[Baronvonellis]

How does more jobs downtown hurt other neighborhoods? If anything it indirectly helps them, there's more jobs available within easy commuting access via public transport to the people that live in the neighborhoods. The graphs showed that there are more jobs in the neighborhoods as well since 2010, just not as many as downtown. All the trains in the city converge on downtown, so it only makes sense to locate jobs there, so that north, west, and south can all easily access the jobs.

Putting a new coffee shop in a neighborhood is investing in the neighborhood. Yea, you can't have it both ways. You either want to keep it poor and disinvested, or you want it to improve. It makes no logical sense.

[marothisu]

^ the issue of why it hurts isn't really one that could be applied to any city. I think as the prices go up in the neighborhoods that everyone wants to live in, that they'll look to other areas. That might already be happening as LVDW has on his own properties.

In chicago, a 23 year old who can only afford $750/mo might actually still be able to live in Lake View. On the flip side, you can take NYC as an example. A lot of people have moved to areas in Queens and Brooklyn simply because the prices are too high in the areas they might want to live. This has led to gentrification in areas that 20 years ago nobody would have thought twice about moving as a "young professional"

[the urban politician]

Originally Posted by marothisu

In chicago, a 23 year old who can only afford $750/mo might actually still be able to live in Lake View.

^ I don't know.....if you're charging only $750/month for your apartment in Lakeview it means that either:

1. Your apartment is an utter piece of shit the size of a shoebox
2. You're leaving money on the table because you're a horrible businessman
3. Your apartment isn't really in Lakeview
4. You bought your building in 1966, have dementia, and still think it's 1966
5. You were drunk when you signed that lease.

Has to be one of the above

[glowrock]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

you sure can. and if you want to dress like that, absolutely no one is stopping you.

if it's 70+ degress and sunny and i'm running errands around the neighborhood on a saturday afternoon, i sure as fuck will NOT be joining you on the dress slacks and collared shirt train.

my own personal comfort desires FAR exceed my ability to give a shit about other people's judgments of my wardrobe choices.

america, fuck yeah!

This is exactly how I feel about the subject. Of course perhaps I might feel differently if I were in better shape and about 50 pounds thinner, so perhaps I wouldn't be so freaking hot and sweaty all the time the moment it tops 80 degrees.

Aaron (Glowrock)

[Buckman821]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

^ I don't know.....if you're charging only $750/month for your apartment in Lakeview it means that either:

1. Your apartment is an utter piece of shit the size of a shoebox
2. You're leaving money on the table because you're a horrible businessman
3. Your apartment isn't really in Lakeview
4. You bought your building in 1966, have dementia, and still think it's 1966
5. You were drunk when you signed that lease.

Has to be one of the above

Or, you know...roommates.

[LouisVanDerWright]

Originally Posted by Via Chicago

you honestly believe gentrification somehow solves poverty and segregation rather than sweeping it to another area that is in that moment less desirable to the gentry/capital? people can support economic growth that dosent also come at the expense of displacing the very people it is supposed to serve (i.e. current residents). gentrfication is literally the battle of the affluent against the poor. guess who wins that matchup everytime, and who's favor the odds are intentionally rigged? banks and other financial institutions are the primary causes and beneficiaries of gentrification. youre more interested in property rather than people, and at worst are conflating the two as the same thing.

Are you arguing that the effects of rolling price increases in Pilsen, for example, hasn't made hundreds of previously low or middle income Mexican families millionaires? No one living in Pilsen or Logan Square has benefited from improving schools or reduced crime? How many Latino teens that have grown up in Logan Square are NOT dead that would have been killed in gang activity that was disrupted merely by the introduction of Gentry which has zero fear of "snitches get stitches"?


The problem with your theory about gentrification simply pushing poverty around is that it's empirically wrong. Studies have shown over and over again that people aren't actually displaced very often by gentrification and that, by in large, outflows of one group or another do not happen at a faster rate in gentrifying areas than they do in any other area. Here's a massive decade long study from the Philly Fed of 100 metros backing exactly what I'm saying up:

https://www.city-journal.org/gentrif...social-justice

There's having an opinion and then there's spitting unthe face of science. I view the anti Gentrification crowd as science loving and climate denier or anti vaxers. They deny reality. We can and do measure the effects of development in the inner city. We've done it for 100 years and there are very few studies indicating that redevelopment does anything other than improve schools and reduce crime for EVERY resident of the area.

[the urban politician]

Originally Posted by Buckman821

Or, you know...roommates.

Obviously, but I was talking about whole apartments.

[LouisVanDerWright]

Oh and I can vouch for the fact that my buildings in little village seem to wind up with an almost perfect distribution of Chicagos demographics on a block that used to be 95% Latino. I average about 30% black, 30% white, and 30% Latino with 10% Asian or other in my properties. I have transexual tenants, gay tenants, straight married tenants, large families, people with no kids, veterans, people who were previously homeless addicts at one point, etc. The result of my investments has unequivocally been wayyy more diversity than the previous hardcore segregation...

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

Obviously, but I was talking about whole apartments.

I was talking about any situation - roommates apply. A lot of 23 year olds just out of college go this route. Replace it with any number which is reasonable for a neighborhood. The point doesn't change - it still forces people to look in other neighborhoods. I have many co-workers who are younger who have been "forced" to either rent really small places in East Village or Lower East Side with roommates because they "HAVE" to live in Manhattan and think Upper West or Upper East is lame, or the smarter ones will go to neighborhoods like Flushing, Astoria, Elmhurst, etc in Queens or Crown Heights, Bed-Stuy, Flatbush, etc in Brooklyn or places like Jersey City, Union City, etc in New Jersey.

It's a weird formula - like you want to see the city you are in succeed, which means an increase of jobs and maybe in Chicago's sake you don't want to see it increase ONLY downtown - but then you're against gentrification and don't want "those people" to live in your neighborhood to gentrify it...which kind of forces many people to just pile into the same neighborhoods. But then you want your neighborhood to succeed, but not as many people want to move to it. So the jobs you want are ones that used to be there in the neighborhoods, and some have returned, but they aren't going to return like they were before. And just because someone is making "only" $40K doesn't mean they aren't a gentrifier either. It's just a weird situation to me. You can't have it all easily.

[Via Chicago]

Originally Posted by LouisVanDerWright

Are you arguing that the effects of rolling price increases in Pilsen, for example, hasn't made hundreds of previously low or middle income Mexican families millionaires? No one living in Pilsen or Logan Square has benefited from improving schools or reduced crime? How many Latino teens that have grown up in Logan Square are NOT dead that would have been killed in gang activity that was disrupted merely by the introduction of Gentry which has zero fear of "snitches get stitches"?


The problem with your theory about gentrification simply pushing poverty around is that it's empirically wrong. Studies have shown over and over again that people aren't actually displaced very often by gentrification and that, by in large, outflows of one group or another do not happen at a faster rate in gentrifying areas than they do in any other area. Here's a massive decade long study from the Philly Fed of 100 metros backing exactly what I'm saying up:

https://www.city-journal.org/gentrif...social-justice

There's having an opinion and then there's spitting unthe face of science. I view the anti Gentrification crowd as science loving and climate denier or anti vaxers. They deny reality. We can and do measure the effects of development in the inner city. We've done it for 100 years and there are very few studies indicating that redevelopment does anything other than improve schools and reduce crime for EVERY resident of the area.

Lol you're citing City Journal, which is funded by the Manhattan Institute?. Yea big shock a Federal Reserve study had that conclusion. As I said to begin with, gentrification favors big banks and capital first and foremost. Why would the biggest bank of all say anything different?

And here's a study with a totally different conclusion

http://maps.ncrc.org/gentrificationreport/index.html

[Khantilever]

Originally Posted by Via Chicago

you honestly believe gentrification somehow solves poverty and segregation rather than sweeping it to another area that is in that moment less desirable to the gentry/capital? people can support economic growth that dosent also come at the expense of displacing the very people it is supposed to serve (i.e. current residents). gentrfication is literally the battle of the affluent against the poor. guess who wins that matchup everytime, and who's favor the odds are intentionally rigged? banks and other financial institutions are the primary causes and beneficiaries of gentrification. youre more interested in property rather than people, and at worst are conflating the two as the same thing.

Everyone can agree that there is a 'natural' tendency for neighborhoods to gravitate toward either one of two extremes--high or low income. But there are many mixed-income neighborhoods in transition, and the transition can last a very long time. And during that time, poor residents can enjoy the many benefits of richer neighborhoods--lower crime, better amenities--without initially paying the full cost.

There is a wealth of academic research coming to this conclusion. A long-established empirical finding is that there is very, very little evidence of 'displacement.' This is a counter-intuitive result, but makes sense when you consider how the vast majority of neighborhood change occurs through 'replacement' as residents come and go from neighborhoods over time. People tend to move over time as their income or family or job situations change. Gentrifying neighborhoods are characterized by lower-income residents being replaced--rather than displaced--by higher-income residents. https://www.nber.org/papers/w14036

In fact, the rate at which poor people leave gentrifying neighborhoods is *lower* than the rate at which they leave non-gentrifying neighborhoods. How do you reconcile this empirical fact with the poor being hurt by gentrification? https://www.researchgate.net/publica...y_in_the_1990s

There's a really nice working paper I saw at a recent conference which followed households over time, and found that the children of poor families living in gentrifying areas were significantly better off than those who didn't experience gentriifcation. https://www.nber.org/papers/w25809

^ Also, as an economist who has worked with Fed researchers and presented my own research there, I have to say they definitely are not biased or have some kind of agenda.

[LouisVanDerWright]

Originally Posted by Khantilever

In fact, the rate at which poor people leave gentrifying neighborhoods is *lower* than the rate at which they leave non-gentrifying neighborhoods. How do you reconcile this empirical fact with the poor being hurt by gentrification? https://www.researchgate.net/publica...y_in_the_1990s

This is the biggest fact that detractors ignore: poverty is already a high displacement condition.

Think about the poor areas of Chicago, what is happening to the housing stock there? It is being left to rot and being destroyed. You don't think that is displacement? Every single vacant lot in Chicago where there used to be housing is displacement and I gurantee you there are more vacant lots than the total amount of housing in Pilsen and Logan Square combined.

Again, my own experience. I've now rehabbed 18 units on one block in LV. Every single one of them was in demo court or about to be. A grand total of three of those units had anyone living in them to begin with (and I now know all of those residents well because not a single one of them moved more than two blocks away, the horror!).

However the two featured in my video that was so contraversial were left to rot vacant for so long that they eventually caught fire after providing the community with a gang party house and squatter residence for 15 years. What happened when they caught fire? They ignited a perfectly serviceable 3 flat with 3 families living it next door displacing all three of them. The owner has been doing his best to repair the building, but it's still vacant two years later.


So you tell me, what caused displacement in my story VIA? Is it the big bad developer who saved and repaired 18 units of housing that were previously vacant on their way to being gone forever? Or is it the condition of poverty and disinvestment that caused continual rot of the housing stock spreading from one building to the next while encouraging crime and drug use?

^ Also, as an economist who has worked with Fed researchers and presented my own research there, I have to say they definitely are not biased or have some kind of agenda.

Yeah anyone calling the fed biased is revealing their ignorance of economics. The Fed is possible the most empirical organization on the planet. Just look at their recent handling of monetary policy where they've basically ripped up the playbook of everything they were taught or learned about MMT. They are data dependant and just because they are "central bankers" doesn't mean they are die hard capitalists churning out propaganda...