The Big Problem Behind Shrinking Cities

[@EconomicsExplained]

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[@urbanistgod]

Your video reminds me of the sub r/antiurban

[@Gemoron]

"Abandoned buildings attract more crime" Wrong and this broken window theory has been debunked and mixes up corrolation and causation. more correct would be to say that abandoned buildings lower property value. After all, they aren't nice to look at. It is also cheaper to build a new road (that needs to maintain) than to demolish a ruin and reuse an existing plot of land, especially industry ruins which might have contaminated soil.

[@danhobart4009]

Your Detroit summary was terrible. Detroit died because of racism.

[@sanjaymatsuda4504]

There's a typo at 4:10 : it reads "Chicago's popuplation".

[@Battleneter]

Good video, but Detroit Metro area population is 4.3 million, you were technically correct but the population number you provided is a little misleading in isolation.

[@JXY2019]

Two notes. 1. New York did lose population in the 1970s as well. 2. The biggest proportion of Detroits population loss was not to other cities but just to the suburbs of Detroit outside city limits

[@jeffmorris5802]

New York is losing population right now.

[@dansands8140]

Hmmm, what happened in the 1970s that is also happening right now? Is a certain group perhaps in power?

[@deyoungyoung3059]

@@dansands8140 The financial crisis, high crime rates, and damage from the blackouts led to the widespread belief that NYC was in irreversible decline.

[@anthonyward8805]

Yeah the auto industry is still huge and prosperous in metro Detroit, it’s just the city itself that suffered from white flight and corruption

[@denislomakin247]

Correct. Detroit was also the first city that built out auto oriented suburbs, increasing its infrastructure costs without increasing its tax base. This video seems to ignore that fact entirely.

[@SchwarbageTruck]

As someone in the Detroit area, I can say that unfortunately one of the big things that throws off the population count for the city is from people moving to the suburbs. There's a bit of a cycle: bright-eyed young person moves in and works at a corporate job downtown, loves it --> gets older and/or starts a family, or just wants a bigger place to live --> moves to the suburbs. I've seen it happen dozens of times because unfortunately, in many cases you can get a house in even the ritzier suburbs for a fraction of the cost of a studio apartment in a hip downtown neighborhood and can still get downtown in less than 20 minutes in some cases. Heard the story more than I want to from people who just moved to the Grosse Pointes & St Clair Shores, as well as places like Ferndale, Royal Oak and Birmingham. And sadly working from home just made it worse. The good news is that working from home has also attracted more people than I anticipated to Detroit proper due to housing being relatively affordable compared to LA or NYC, especially if you're fine putting in some work. It's attracted a surprisingly decent amount of people who just wanted to change things up for themselves.

[@markwhelan1652]

Detroit corrupt politicians is one of the biggest reasons leave for the suburbs where criminals are not coddled.

[@Angel-yz8gt]

Very interesting, didn't know this, thank you

[@InvestmentJoy]

Living very close to a former shrinking City here in Ohio, the big takeaway for my local environment is that politicians and city planners have to be very aggressive at not being reliant on one or two sources of revenue. As it stands today free coronavirus we were expected to grow 15% by 2050, instead we did that in three years. When business, tax, housing environment is positive it's amazing how fast a city can grow

[@otheredits]

Do you live near Cleveland?

[@cmbakerxx]

@@otheredits I'm guessing Columbus which has seen significant recent growth. Cleveland is still shrinking although it has slowed in recent years as the downtown and a few other key neighborhoods have seen significant growth.

[@greywolf7422]

@@otheredits That would explain the absurd growth statistic.

[@otheredits]

@@cmbakerxx Yeah that would explain everything

[@LIFEwithBAVAN]

Yes that rustbelt effect. I moved from the northeast to a smaller city near Chicago and they were also negatively affected by reliance on like 1-2 major manufacturers. Never put your eggs in one basket

[@jaredspencer3304]

"If you live in NYC, Toronto, of San Francisco, you might think your city could be never become a shrinking city." My brother in economics, people are fleeing SF like rats leaving a sinking ship (myself included).

[@aaronwinegar9724]

If by "fleeing" you mean .5% left after decades of unsustainable growth in a tiny peninsula, then sure. Do that for a couple of decades, and they'd be back to 1990 population levels (which was still bad). Or, you know, they could put an end to the Libertarian rules about blocking other people's sunlight and start building up. Nah, never go for it.

[@warsawpacked418]

New York City also, according to the census bureau.

[@BillDotree]

@@warsawpacked418 I don't trust that data

[@TheGhostOf2020]

Have you seen the data? The vast majority moved to other Bay Area counties, and if not that then further inland to the Sacramento area. It’s not like region is shrinking like SF is.

[@kalebschetter2215]

San Francisco feels very similar to Detroit with the fact that they have one main industry that is offshoring their labor to other parts of the country/world. I’d say the major difference is that San Francisco at its core is at a desirable spot of the country (climate and scenery-wise) and they are a lot less car-centric there. When the main industry left Detroit they were stuck with crumbling car-based infrastructure built in a spot where the natural beauty is lacking and the weather is miserable for 6 months out of the year

[@ichifish]

In Japan, where I live, the problem with rural areas is a lack of dynamism that's evident in many rural areas of the US. There are lots of small towns back in New England, where I'm from, that are bustling independent communities that keep enough young people because of job opportunities and attract families because of the quality of life. For most Japanese the countryside doesn't offer an improved quality of life because only the most remote areas have the large open spaces/proper nature/sense of independence that compensate for the inconvenience and lack of jobs.

[@GUITARTIME2024]

Japan is aging fast. That affects rural, and cities will be next.

[@zhcultivator]

hopefully Japan would get a high fertility rate and a rural population boom one day, but that isn't guaranteed for the foreseeable future unfortunately. perhaps a better work culture/work-life balance and greater or more religiosity might help bring about a population boom. 🤔

[@MrxxVENUSxx]

@@zhcultivator Religion will do nothing, it's just because they're overworked. They have no time to make babies.

[@dazzlebreak4458]

To be honest, I think that the majority of people who grew up in big cities aren't going to feel comfortable living in smaller towns (let alone a real countryside) in the long run.

[@stevedavenport1202]

@dazzlebreak4458 You would be surprised. Aside from the few "big city" amenities like fine arts, concerts and exotic cuisine, small towns have most of the comforts of big cities like super markets, running water, electricity, etc. With high speed internet, entertainment is readily available.

[@neilbucknell9564]

Actually, this video misses an even more fundamental point. The way that municipal authorities are funded varies enormously from country to country - in many (including the UK) a substantial part comes from national, not local sources. The problem is geographic, and this drives the economics, not the other way round. So in the UK most shrinking cities originally grew up as they were on coalfields or had good water power, so attracted and stimulated the early Industrial Revolution. In the former USSR and Warsaw Pact countries many grew in response to state driven industrialisation. When in both cases industry declined as demand for their products declined as they were replaced by newer technologies or cheaper or more efficient overseas supplies, they became places "in the wrong place", unable to compete with places whose locations were more advantageous for the new industries and enterprises that replaced them or which arose in the intervening period. No amount of new parks, sustainable transport systems or similar is going to attract people to an abandoned Siberian mining town or an old Welsh mining town at the top of a remote valley. If a city has become established as an administrative, cultural or commercial centre and is not too remote (like Manchester or Cardiff) it can thrive in a post-industrial world.

[@polar_bay]

Very true! US is not Europe... here cities have to largely finance themselves. And then, on the other hand, decaying cities tend to vote for different political parties than the state so, state officials have little incentive to come to the rescue. And for when the State gets a political party in power inSync with the city one... it also does not care since it takes those votes as granted (ailing cities hardly change political ideology).... I have seem that phenomenon in places I have lived in Europe, Asia and Americas.

[@zhcultivator]

exactly

[@josephfisher426]

@@polar_bay Exhibit A: Baltimore.

[@Bustermachine]

@@polar_bay To be honest, this feels kinda unfalsifiable. It may well be true, but it excludes cases where it's not true, becaue you don't go looking for them. Not that I don't politics plays a big part. It is worth mentioning that, in the US, both parties have wings that are resistant to urbanist reforms, often co-opting the same talking point in a different context. "It'll drive down my property value!" "It will drive low income families from their homes!" Over the exact same policy decision.

[@barryrobbins7694]

You are talking about political geography vs physical geography. It still depends on the specific situation. An industrial town in Siberia is an extreme situation, but many cities in the United States can and should be revitalized even if it requires federal funds. Low density, resource intensive, energy inefficient, and expensive suburbs are not the solution. The solution is to make cities more livable. Deindustrialization has its own issues - the United States produces very few of its own antibiotics for example.

[@rudynathan8852]

In Charlois belgium the same happened. It used to be the richest city of Belgium but their whole economy was reliant on the steel industry. When that industry the city lost 100.000s of inhabitants and the whole society collapsed.

[@profbbfab6211]

I think it was Liège de richest at the time. While it also suffered a huge blow, historically it had other things going for it, things that Charleroi didn't. But it's been changing for both cities in a positive way, not perfect but way better than what it was 15 years ago

[@ihmpall]

Waffles

[@jefverstraete8574]

The population of charleroi and liege are quite stable now. They dont keep shrinking like so many us cities.

[@Staurcomb]

​@@jefverstraete8574Isnt that because of refugees from the global south?

[@getnohappy]

Nice reminder that when we look at the ruins of ancient cities and settlements, none of the people living then believed their city would ever be abandoned

[@justicedemocrat9357]

How could you possibly know that none of them believed that?

[@dixonhill1108]

That's not totally true, a lot of these collapses happened due to big nasty events. Like wars, diseases, economic famine, weather problems. They didn't walk away they were forced away.

[@sangeethvaheesan3173]

exactly, we can not simply expand without end, people seem to forget that earth has a limit

[@kiel_3222]

Not sure mate... People from Pompeii and Herculaneum would probably say otherwise

[@angry3055]

So when will people start going back to the City of Uruk?😅

[@viktorandersson7802]

We have this in Sweden as well. A city or smaller village that blooms thanks to a local industry booming, attracting new people from the rural areas with work. This is going well for some decades and then suddenly the globalisation hits and then a lot of smaller domestics industries here in Sweden could not compete which lead to close down and start the downfall of the community built around this singular industry.

[@andresoares2110]

Out of topic, do you recommend me to go to Scandinavia for study purposes (master's in business administration in English)?

[@Johann_Gambolputty_of_Ulm]

On the positive side, your cities AFAIK are largely sustained by the central budget; and, Sweden being Sweden, this still provides them a hefty amount of money. I don't think there are many countries in the world, who can affort relocating the whole town 😅 like u do with Kiruna.

[@santorini8423]

Don’t forget the massive crime wave in Sweden, just like this j off forgets to mention about his crime ridden flea holes in the US

[@xdanbo1859]

4:58 - The majority of people who left the City of Detroit in the 80s and 90s did not move to NYC. They moved to the suburbs surrounding Detroit or to sunbelt cities.

[@ZCSilver]

Remote work is going to affect this pretty heavily. Some remote work that requires the occasional day in the office will promote growth in the more affordable small cities around anchor cities. Work that is entirely remote will have people moving wherever has the best combo of cheap and nice.

[@ahmedzakikhan7639]

I don't wanna leave the city even if I work remotely because I have friends and family living here.

[@TimothyCHenderson]

@A B It will also imbalance cost of living as people with a much higher income who traditionally lived in the more expensive cities move to the suburbs or country. Housing, services, and goods will all rise in price accordingly.

[@triton62674]

In the long term, automation may have an impact on the service industry effecting remote jobs specifically. Not to mention companies are pushing to pay employees based on their location and associated cost of living rather than the work itself.

[@michaelfink2070]

@@TimothyCHenderson If those high income people become a significant minority, yes, other things will rise in price. However, if there's a relatively uniform distribution, it won't have a ton of impact. There is near limitless land in the US; if you spread those people out, even if you say "everyone within 2 hours of a major airport", there's just so much land that it's near impossible to see how supply/demand will result in a tremendous increase in prices. In rural areas, land typically goes for 3-20K/acre. Even doubling that, it's pretty insignificant. Overall, you're right, but I think the effect will be blunted. Unless we start to get "superstar" rural areas, think Jackson WY, where everything is wildly expensive because tons of rich people all piled into that one small area.

[@benchoflemons398]

Yeah, but remote workers want to live in low tax states.

[@ingvar1996]

population decline is only a problem when a city has a hight debt burden and needs to continue to grow to be able to pay interest. Cities with low debt burdens can easily implement smart shrinkage.

[@benchoflemons398]

I wouldn’t describe many governments as “smart”

[@josephfisher426]

So how ordinary is it for a city to have a low debt burden? Many will claim that they have a great bond rating, but that doesn't mean that they aren't eroding year by year until suddenly lenders realize that they have been stripping the walls bare...

[@barryrobbins7694]

The problem with low density is that it REQUIRES growth. Low density is resource and energy intensive. It is also expensive.

[@Bustermachine]

In theory, sure, but that only goes so far. It's entirely possible for a city to contract in an intelligent fashion that minimizes the discomfort to its residents, but that would be mean condemning entire neighborhoods and consolidating populations so that the tax base can actually pay for the infrastructure that has to be used. Leaving abandoned districts of the city to slowly rot and be reclaimed by nature has its own problems. Not the least being potentially toxic material abandoned in place.

[@deeznoots6241]

Part of the problem is that the cities ‘losing population’ are actually just having population shift to the suburbs and this is bad because suburbs are massive tax drains due to how horribly inefficient they are, anybody living in a Suburban area would have to pay double the taxes just for suburbs to break even.

[@abarbar06]

I'm baffled that you didn't bring up land value taxes. The Detroit Mayor is pushing towards that solution by reducing taxes on buildings and increasing tax on land by X3. He gave a talk about this just last month.

[@georgewhite8118]

Also that most of city income doesn’t come from property taxes at this point… the largest share is gambling taxes and then income taxes and THEN property taxes

[@HughJass-313]

Doesn't fit the Narrative! 🤣🤣

[@dannyarcher6370]

Georgists are smart. But I'm guessing he's no Georgist.

[@bryanutility9609]

Black people

[@abarbar06]

@@bryanutility9609 orange cats

[@MrEddieoutrageous]

Thanks for covering the city! One factor that was missed it government policy. That has led to mismanaged funds, and also the money Drain Detroit found itself in. Most of the people who made ~80k+ a year do not live in the city limits. They live in the suburbs . They come to the city, earn their money, and then spend it back in the suburbs. The money isn't revolving in Detroit itself. This is all remnants of redlining, white flight, and after the 80s, black flight. Also, Detroit has long had a bad image problem. It became associated with blight/ruin porn, etc and no one ever looked at the beautiful neighborhoods nor resources here. Such as: Stable Climate, Freshwater (Detroit still has one of the best water systems in the country), Infrastructure, cheap land value, and a strong blue collar workforce with top universities around it. However, as social media became more popular and everyone became more trendy, and impressed with how things LOOK, Detroit simply couldn't keep up. We already had two black eyes. But now things are changing. A lot of the children of the white families who participate din white flight are coming back to the city. There's construction projects everywhere! Also, I'm running into more and more transplants from the east and west coast. What Detroit really needs is investment in it's people, schools, programs, social services. Maybe the new investments in the city will somehow trickle down, but then again remember this city's history with corruption. Those old school mob ties run deeeeep here.

[@anthonymatzat6992]

Alot of other USA cities like Baltimore,Chicago,and Milwaukee are in the same boat as Detroit,part of the problem is stupid planning,just found out Jacksonville,Florida was the square milage of Detroit in early 20th century,and now due to crazy planning you can fit 7-8 more Detroit's in Jacksonville,and Houston,Texas,Oklahoma city,Oklahoma seem worse,some cities like Philadelphia solved this problem. by merging with their counties,wonder if cities like Detroit shouldn't become the size as in land maybe like Baltimore,Maryland size then it might be more sustainable,the next city that may go through what Detroit has gone through might be Chicago,Illinois,Milwaukee,WI recently adjusted its tax base to not fall in the trap Detroit got into wot bankruptcy,I guess to sustain some us cities folks running the cities,and folks living in them need to get to really cooperate with each other,instead of fighting each other over resources,which means start really regulating property developers in where,and what they create,even here. in Madison,WI the core of the city which is the isthmus/university is growing too fast and since Madison sits on 2 lakes northeast/southwest,and not a grid like parts of Detroit,it seems Madison is getting more congested even the main freeway around Madison the beltline has added traffic,get the feeling. the guy who choose Madison as state capitol was drunk,and didn't plan for the future as in the consequences of our actions,since had he,Madison might not feel like a human with the flu,and stuffed up,but I guess some of us need greed over common sense,this is why I worry about places like Houston Texas with future storms like hurricanes getting worse,since where are the folks,and stuff going to go,and in other nations its worse than in Detroit is,but I guess some of us focus only on places like Detroit,and don't realize how alot of USA cities unless they adjust through. common sense planning could be Detroit next,and its less about shrinking but how to be sustainable,and unless folks truly want to pay more taxes,and help their cities adjust Detroit might be viewed as starting a bad trend,when its been around since 1781,and has gone through many periods like this,but the problem is alot of us don't study to understand this stuff,so we think feel this stuff is just a fluke,this reminds me that most of us humans average lifespan is between 80-100+ years,while pluto takes 248 to go around the sun,and uranus goes around the sun at a 90 * angle,if here on earth the sun rises in the east,and sets in the west,imagine what its like on uranus if we really studied it,plus this report is 2 months old according to the his info bar on you tube,imagine in another year what this guy says,reminds me of the pro con studies of coffee,read them and realize how these studies change,not saying this guy doesn't have interesting facts just amazed how some of these studies get on even you tube,guess as long as Google makes money off of you tube they put anything on,even if its just 2 months old,sorry for this long tangent,just feel we should really decide if some of these views are worth our reading this site,or we feel some of these folks feel bored so put anything just to calm their fears,and views about what's happening around them,when like the rest of us they can't control alot of this stuff,now I know where the saying misery loves company comes from.

[@My_Old_YT_Account]

Crime is the reason people left, if it's not being fixed then people won't come back

[@MrEddieoutrageous]

You are correct. We know this as well, and Detroit isn't as bad as it used to be. Now there are other cities that take the top prize for crime. But also, people are just scarier these days. They'll let someone read them crime reports and tell them its unsafe rather than seeing for themselves. As long as you aren't bothering anyone, you'll be good. @@My_Old_YT_Account

[@MrEddieoutrageous]

The city has thought about shrinking a few times before. The issue then becomes a county/state/issue as well. Maps have to be redrawn, laws set for new cities. It's costly and messy. Detroit was (and still is IMO) one of the first modern developed cities. Henry Ford set the modern 'American Dream' was of life as it is today and for the most part, people still follow that path.@@anthonymatzat6992

[@justsamoo3480]

@@My_Old_YT_AccountWhat do you think created crime?

[@CanCobb]

Our major cities are just placed where there is easily accessible fresh water, and many of them are attractive geographically or were defensible positions when the control of the area was less certain. I think the MOST interesting point when it comes to municipal development patterns is how little they've changed in 40 years. The names are all the same. There hasn't been some new upstart city in the last 20 years that's become a vibrant center - it's just an existing medium-sized city that did better than it used to. It really points to the stagnation of infrastructure development over the last 50 years and how we're still just riding on the postwar boom.

[@douglasscharnberg3883]

Yes. We have, as a nation, failed to adapt. Why do we permit LEGAL immigration? Still no mass transit? 100 years ago the nation had a train to every town. That infrastructure was destroyed and turned to salvage so you would be forced to buy a car. No planning, indeed!

[@TheHonestPeanut]

​@thomasfranklin1757considering all their city start ups are failures, it'd probably be a bad idea.

[@Pawel_Mrozek]

In order to sustain a shrinking city, it cannot be allowed to spill out into the suburbs at the same time. Inward development of cities while limiting urban sprawl is, from the point of view of urban planning, practically the only cure to restart the city engine. The remaining energy in the city needs to be focused on a smaller area and get rid of redundant infrastructure. Since many local governments do not have the tools for this, centrally subsidized revitalization programs are needed. And so that only external development companies do not profit from them, public-private contracts are needed that will guarantee that the energy of these programs will actually be directed to the residents. You can also try to achieve the "Bilbao Effect" with some shockingly good investment in the city that will reverse its image, but that's easier said than done. Additionally, change the spatial policy. Relax the rules that allow for a multi-functional type of development. It also helps to stimulate entrepreneurship in the area of already owned or used real estate. Of course, within certain limits. We are not talking about someone suddenly opening a petrol station in front of their house, but allowing the development of service fronts in the form of small shops, cafes and workshops. This can significantly lower the threshold for becoming an economically active resident and improves the local economy on the smallest scale by making neighborhoods more economically resilient and less dependent on the prosperity of large employers.

[@seanwilliams7655]

It kind of depends really. For instance, there's plenty of space in Chicago to build, and there aren't any zoning laws preventing construction of large multi family buildings. There's even space relatively close to downtown. The issue is that those areas are very poor, and have high crime rates. So nobody wants to build anything there because it will be years, or possibly decades, before the building actually turn a profit. But, if Chicago can figure out that problem, there are miles and miles of land that can be built on.

[@greywolf7422]

@@seanwilliams7655 The suburbs though are legendarily bad at developing a sense of community and more nurturing of an atomized socio-economic situation.

[@willblack8575]

@@greywolf7422 still better than cities...lets be real...

[@HonoredMule]

@@greywolf7422 You don't have to make it sound so attractive. There are downsides too.

[@greatwolf5372]

​@Will Black Yeah we all know what the the amazing sense of community in inner cities of North America actually entails lol. I am fine with living in dense neighborhoods of East Asia and Europe. Not so much in the US.

[@erf3176]

Shrinking cities like Detroit end up trying to attract industries like casinos to make up for the budget shortfalls. Casinos generate taxes but also create problems if your local population starts gambling away what little they have. The jobs from casinos and hotels downtown near a convention center help cushion the high unemployment from loss of manufacturing but the salaries are not as good. You can't hope to replace a a tax base of manufacturing workers with a tax base of bar tenders and room. The salaries are lower and the numbers of workers needed are also smaller.

[@tatie7604]

Detroit failed because you had people hired who are so stupid/lazy they should never have worked in a factory.

[@ascra1693]

London did not srink due to the great fire.. all the people stayed and lived in tents.

[@adamcetinkent]

It was intense.

[@ChuckThree]

Los Angeles didn’t even have a great fire and still has tons of people living in tents 😅

[@miguelinop]

What about those who died?

[@adoho]

And? It wasn't a shrinking city.

[@lesliecas2695]

In 1666, where would they go?

[@buddermonger2000]

I think a problem which you seem to have overlooked is that in the age of population decline, even the anchor cities would lose population. Which means that everyone would fall into economic decline.

[@TonyTheTGR]

It's not a "population decline," it's a "population correction." If you lack the resources and infrastructure for people to live, and live well, then you need fewer of those people to burden your system. "Unwatered trees bear no fruit" and all that.

[@tatie7604]

We have 9 billion people worldwide. 2 billion in 1950 was more than enough. Too many bastards, lazy, stupid people were born to amoral people. Stop illegitimacy at all costs. 99% wind up in prison because they ARE criminals or creeps. It is the worst problem on earth.

[@alyssabaerne9508]

I have to admit that this video did highlight one historical element. The historic cycle. The first time the cycle happens, you can hardly prepare for it, but once you get into the second cycle, there's your chance to take the lessons from the past to adapt to them. In one form or another, history WILL repeat itself, it is up those living in the now, to mitigatethe damage when the historic recly repeats, be it wartime (which is proven tp have a semi-set time cycle between major wars and is an aspect of historic cycles we seem to fail to learn from past mistakes) or economic cycles like the financial collapses or industries and speculatibe bubbles ( which we also keep failing to learn from past mistakes) or as mentioned in this video, city shrinkage.

[@fightsports66]

Detroit is an outlier, there is literally no other major city in this country that was mismanaged as badly and for so long as Detroit was under Coleman Young. There is no other city that was as dependent for so long on a single industry and no other city that waited so long to even try to build and attract other industries to the area. I have no expectation that the rest of this country’s cities are going to have the same fate.

[@Elementalism]

Eh I'd argue Chicago and Cleveland are going down the path of Detroit.

[@LucasDimoveo]

@@Elementalism Chicago is actively growing right now though

[@Elementalism]

@@LucasDimoveo Chicagoland shrank by nearly 2% since 2020. The city of Chicago proper has seen its population drop by nearly 3%.

[@seanwilliams7655]

@@LucasDimoveo Chicago is up in the air. While it has a pretty diverse economy, Chicago just can't seem to gentrify the same way the costal cities have. At this point, it could still go either way.

[@cpm1003]

@@LucasDimoveo Really? I see that Chicago lost about 80,000 residents from 2020-2022. Has this suddenly turned around in 2023, with crime exploding?

[@jamesodell3064]

One run down building you showed, The old train station is being rebuilt by the Ford Motor Company and no longer looks like what was shown in the picture. While the City of Detroit has declined over the years the rest of the metropolitan area has continued to grow and is doing just fine.

[@dannydaw59]

The revitalized train station would look less dramatic for the video. He showed the Packard Plant too. Much of that building has been demolished.

[@1122slickliverpool]

@12:58 The anchor city that Detroit has is Ann Arbor Michigan. There building a technology and entrepreneurship campus in downtown Detroit. There leaders and business people have been more pro Detroit than the surrounding counties around the city. They've definitely been a blessing for the city.

[@killbot7205]

Eh, id tweak this. The ideal would be for each city to convert homes that are further out from the urban core into either farmland, parkland, or a separate urban core. And they should extremely densify their urban cores with a variety of housing. I think every city should be wrapped in green belts

[@ocnier]

You and this video forget the cities are terrible for children hence a self consuming outcome.

[@marcbuisson2463]

​@@ocnierSuburbs are horrible for children, and that's the most common type of urban environments accross the US. American kids don't go home from school by feet. Can't hangout with friends in streets and parks, can rarely visit friends, have no activities in their neighborhoods, and have absolutely no independance to travel in their cities/suburbs by lack of bus, transit, and to be fair, places to go and hang out. It's also partially why american kids (and their parents who move around only in cars) are fat. And stay at home constantly.

[@oakblaze433]

@@ocnier Cities are the best places for children. More of a community, easier to get to places that are closer, easier to become independent, more options for transportation, better schools (though not in the US)

[@ocnier]

Umm how's that San Fransico working out?... Just asking for a friend lol@@marcbuisson2463

[@ocnier]

I disagree, my kids are in the suburbs but always happier when we visit the grandparents in country. Children are not meant for concrete. They are meant trees and nature. Also how's that San Francisco type cities working out? Just asking for a friend.... LOL...@@oakblaze433

[@johnmcho]

I don't think anyone living in San Francisco is blind to the fact that the city could turn into Detroit.

[@NE-BO]

One major aspect I've seen in my own community is a big shift in development philosophy. Where in previous decades they focused on attracting new businesses, factories, etc. The shift now is attracting people to move to the community to fill open positions and it's not been working well. For attracting businesses it's easy just show off the possible profits and what infrastructure they'd be promised. You're also only having to persuade a few individuals within the company. Whereas, it's difficult to attract the variety of people with different needs and how do you advertise a community to those people?

[@jrk22233]

The better question is how do you advertise moving to a city that became famous for being a fallen city its a hard sell I've talked to people about the possibility of moving to Detroit and always get told that it's a bad idea

[@crimsonlightbinder]

correct,how can you advertise moving to Detroit to anyone? Or Chicago where the crime is extreme for a "gun free" city and your face is frozen for half a year if you get out of the house

[@asw654]

Attracting business sounds way too right wing for most city dwellers, who tend to be left wing. They'll continue to vote for and push for policies hostile to businesses. This will be to their detriment as increasingly, high paying jobs will allow for more flexibility in where you work.

[@financecarter]

Midtown Detroit is wonderful. It almost feels like a suburb even though it’s in city limits. They’ve focused heavily on police and have multiple museums there, multiple hospitals, plus Wayne State University’s campus is the heart of Midtown. And if you want to go to the downtown area to party or hang out it’s literally down the road like 8-10 blocks before you’ve reach “downtown”. And it’s not abandoned downtown areas you’re greeted with, the home arenas of the four major sports teams and a bar scene is right there at that 8-10 block trip. The next phase that was supposed to start around 2015 that hasn’t happened is further lane development next to the stadiums. It’s currently empty lots but the Ilitch family (who own Little Caesar’s, the tigers, and the red wings.) are supposed to be building residential there. The only major employer included in this equation are Wayne State, a few hospitals, and the city itself, museums, police, etc. Obviously there is still the other 7/8 of Detroit which is the office buildings further into downtown, and the other residential areas. But start with what’s easy to fix. In this case an area with highly educated jobs, and a college. (Although the downtown area has plenty going on as well.)

[@cryptowire]

Yeah, this video is bashing what Detroit used to be! There has been so much innovations and progress in Detroit! Maybe he should visit to catch up on the facts!

[@tjones44236]

Any white kids in the public schools?

[@AlexandroGarcia6492]

@@tjones44236 Whats with that?

[@noahgreer4228]

This is just gentrification

[@mandywinter8871]

​@@noahgreer4228 I'm confused - is there a way to make a city nicer and less crime-riddled without people complaining about "gentrification"?

[@sharpboy211]

It's cool to see my city represented. Thank you EE! There is plenty wrong with Detroit, but I do believe it's moving in the right direction. 100% agree with the conversion of old infrastructure to new greenspaces.

[@steveuganski2394]

My daughter goes to Wayne State and Midtown is a great area. Encourage you all to visit!

[@danielmorton9956]

On the empires bit, those are the most dramatic examples, but cities also shrink due to environmental change. A clear example is Alexandria, which lost the Nile over time and went from the largest most prestigious city on the Mediterranean outside of perhaps Rome and Constantinople to more of a town. Cairo took it's place. Other "lost" cities often suffer the same fate where people leave. If it's a city state, the state collapses as a result.

[@jimpaddy79]

The fact Byzantine naval forces were able to strike at Alexandria after the Arab conquest of Egypt, was also a factor in the move to Cairo

[@danielmorton9956]

@@jimpaddy79 Secure ports are always better but it likely would have been fine under the Ottomans and stayed a large or major city.

[@bonganiluthuli6864]

Reminds me of my hometown of Welkom, Used to produce a quarter of South Africa's gold when the mining industry declined, the town's economy also declined. The biggest problem of the city was an over dependence on a single industry.

[@andrewmckendrick2482]

I visited Welkom on a rugby tour when the gold industry was still in good shape (80s) and grew up in Detroit, lol. Have to say that Welkom was not a relatively attractive place to live compared to the rest of the country. Everyone we met in the rest of RSA kept asking, "why are you going/did go to Welkom?" It makes sense that many left once the mining turned down tbh. Sorry.

[@bonganiluthuli6864]

@@andrewmckendrick2482 To be fair the town was a settlement that sprang out of nowhere, it didn't grow gradual like other cities. Nonetheless the town is losing population at an unprecedent levels. It's honestly sad.

[@papaicebreakerii8180]

@@bonganiluthuli6864it’s the same in a lot of towns and cities in America too. Look at the coal regions of the east coast and you’ll see what I mean

[@AdamShanghai2023]

So basically Robocop predicted the future accurately.

[@bobmartin9918]

Minus robocop. Shame.

[@rickdeckard7098]

I'd buy that for a dollar!

[@wompa70]

For jobs that don't require you to be on site every day, buying a home further away makes sense. You can get a bigger home or just lower your required expenses. But, like you said, that needs an anchor city. Most people who work in Atlanta don't live there. When I worked in Midtown I'd drive to the MARTA station on the south side and take the train to work every day.

[@gdf_6c]

3:25 - those were some beautiful visual effects. Kudos to the designer

[@muhammadspeaksnews]

Thanks for calling it out. I watched it again about ten times to figure it out

[@Zed_Oud]

This is even worse when you consider that single family homes are always a net loss to cities: they cost more to maintain their utilities (roads, etc) than the city earns from their property taxes.

[@donalddavis4387]

Fantastic video Everybody wants to be financially independent and live a better life.With savvy investing, an inexpensive lifestyle, and diligent budgeting, this is not difficult to do. I'm glad I realized early on that achieving financial freedom requires hard work.

[@aarondaniels5525]

Investment is a fabulous way to save money for the future as well as a way to generate passive income. Those who make poor mistakes early in life regret them later in life. But, if done alone, investing may be challenging and risky. For this reason, I suggest consulting experts for advice (financial advisors). The difficulty lies in effectively employing it, not just watching videos and reading investing books.

[@jessicasam2516]

Please let me know how to contact your financial planner.

[@aarondaniels5525]

Sure,my advisor is Olivia Maria Lucas. In terms of portfolio diversity, she's a genius. You can look her name up on the internet and verify her yourself. she has years of financial market experience plus she is also FINRA & SEC verifiable.

[@josephhughes9583]

Thank you for this tip. it was easy to find your coach. and I conducted thorough research on her credentials before scheduling a call with her.Based on her résumé, Olivia Maria Lucas appears to possess a high level of proficiency, and I am grateful for the opportunity to speak with her

[@sophiehernandez4108]

Olivia Maria Lucas really seem to know her stuff. I found her website, read through her resume, educational background, qualifications and it was really impressive. She is a fiduciary who will act in my best interest. So, I booked a session with her

[@g.zoltan]

I think there is a different trend here. The few largest cities attract all the people, grow at an incredible rate, and have very high property prices as a result. Meanwhile, normal cities experience a small shrinkage, and small towns and villages are literally emptied.

[@barryrobbins7694]

About a third of the U.S. population lives in low density suburbs.

[@drunkenmessiah]

Nope. The trend is towards MORE remote work, not less. Megacities like NYC, London, and Tokyo are likely at or near the very highest population levels that they will ever see. As remote work is normalized over the next decade there will be less and less reason to live in 'rising star' cities like Austin. Sure the restrauants are great, but is that really worth the wildly inflated housing costs? Some people will say yes, but many will say no. If you want a prototype of this future, just look at the western slope of Colorado. The tiny mountain towns out there have been BOOMING despite how small and remote they are. Wealthy work-from-home FAANG employees have been snapping up property out there since the pandemic began. The great summer weather and charming natural splendor more than make up for the lack of big-city amenities in the eyes of many.

[@1370802]

Zachary, the US is a special case because it’s already a highly suburbanized society. People are accustomed to driving long distances for many activities, so small towns are more of the same. In other countries it’s not like that, hence places like Japan experience what the original comment said, not what you said. Tokyo has a shrinking population because of a low birth rate, not because people are leaving. Very very few people leave Tokyo for small towns. Lastly, remote working is not possible for many industries. I’m an archaeologist. We need people at the office taking care of the artifacts, which cannot be done remotely. Before this I worked in a museum, another thing that can’t be done remotely. The historical preservation sector will never be remote, nor the healthcare sector, or the performing arts, etc. Lastly, mega cities are booming in countries that are today undeveloped, like Lagos, Jakarta, Cairo, etc. Kinshasa is projected to have a population of 70 million, and by then perhaps the DRC will be a global superpower, so that city will by like the next New York. Cities aren’t going anywhere. It’s only the US where small towns are booming.

[@pattyeverett2826]

@@drunkenmessiah There are small rural towns all over the US that have been shrinking for decades. I grew up in one of them. I am not sure remote work will ever reverse the trends in these towns.

[@EvilMonkey7818]

The trend in the US is the opposite. Medium to medium-large cities have been growing the most while historically large, more crammed cities have been shrinking.

[@00000a0009]

Venice (Italy) is an example of a shrinking city that becomes LESS affordable every time. With its own set of problems

[@Croz89]

Venice isn't really a shrinking city, it's just turning into a tourist attraction. Residents are leaving and tourists are more than taking their place.

[@shayneweyker]

While beautiful, Venice feels more like a theme park than a city when you walk through it. Maybe that's mostly just the lack of roads, but the lack of business other than retail, food, and lodging is a thing.

[@Unknown-jt1jo]

@@dylantwists Can't even spell "city's" right.

[@Unknown-jt1jo]

The city of Venice proper is indeed shrinking, but the broader metropolitan area isn't. It's only the historical core that's losing population. Moving forward, though, who knows what climate change will do? Venice has already had massive issues with flooding. It's only going to get worse.

[@00000a0009]

@@dylantwists you are right it should be written in Italian, not in French. So Venezia. Your message about the "cities name" has been really useful!

[@tjr-007tt]

Most people tend to move within the metro area. This what’s happening, the city it’s self may lose population but the metro area stays constant or increases. Big cities lose people everyday, and there is always someone to replace them.

[@brentmanhart1026]

Come and visit us in Detroit sometime. Much like you noted, one of the city’s prime investments lately has been converting unused infrastructure into greenspace and unused housing into agricultural space. I say us but I’m actually a resident of what is essentially a garden city. One of our neighboring communities is actually called Garden City, Michigan.

[@flo3502]

I love the point about shifting mindset. As a city girl, there are particular luxuries of a city that if I had in a smaller town or city I would live there like more parks, walkable cities/towns, access to goods and services.

[@Bustermachine]

The ideal urban layout is something like this - A regional major city, acting as an industrial/financial/cultural center, it's immediate surrounding include naturally developed suburbs that gradually taper down into countryside. Surrounding the large city are smaller satellite towns and cities that offer their residents all of the day to day amenities as well as an efficient transit link (such as rail) to the main city's downtown. We don't get that much anymore due to the rise of car centric suburbs.

[@flo3502]

@@Bustermachine and i think that’s what contributes to the bottleneck of major cities and “shrinking cities”. As pointed out in the video, revisiting the way we look at shrinking cities I think could alleviate that issue. After all, many people prefer cities for a number of reasons but if the core things were provided just outside, it helps spread economic opportunities.

[@ZombieCSSTutorials]

​@Bustermachine It just means that cities cannot adapt and have outlived their usefulness.

[@Tounguepunchfartbox]

@@Bustermachineyou’re literally describing the Bay Area.

[@jackedpackage796]

You don't have to look so far as Japan to find places incentivizing moving there. Take a look at some of the cities in Kansas that offer you thousands of dollars to move there. I have no idea how the economic policy is working for them but it's pretty well known that Kansas pays you to move there in the U.S.

[@Timturtle]

That's because there is nothing there.

[@polar_bay]

Detroit and Japan should be the places economists, especially those studying the Western world. should be publishing on the most. Both Detroit and Japan represent the future for the West and both would offer probably first a path forward... if any.

[@danharvey3096]

Melbourne was set to be a shrinking city in the late 90s when it was hit with a combination of an enormous property & financial industry crash, at the same time as the full effects of de-industrialisation was being seen, as Melbourne was Australia's industrial powerhouse, & Sydney was on the up & up leading up to the Olympic Games & afterwards for some time.. But Melbourne re-focused towards concentrating on being the cultural & sporing hub it always had been, & boosting it's education, re-invigorating its CBD laneways & ex industrial inner suburbs, celebrating & leveraging its huge & diverse immigrated population for all the culture & cuisine.. Fast forward to now & Melbourne not only reversed the flight of Melbournians & the bulk of new immigrants to Sydney & Queensland, as was the case in the late 1990s & early 2000s, but is now set to overtake Sydney's population much earlier than expected, & is already bigger if you include Geelong in the same way that Sydney includes the Central Coast.. It's a really good example of city re-focusing & revitalisation working. It's just a pity that in the rush to revitalise the abandoned inner city port areas, that all but one of the historic port warehouses were demolished rather than retained, to build generic apartment buildings, in a rush to profit by various developers & contractors. In stark contrast to how the historic character of the laneways was preserved, & the Victorian character of the CBD largely celebrated, after so many amazing Victorian buildings were demolished during the developer free for all in the 70s.. I guess reversing shrinkage can have both positive & negative effects, & sometimes both can happen simultaneously..

[@tigerkuma1011]

As a Melbourne resident fortunate enough to live in an inner city suburb (albeit one bedroom flat) the urban sprawl that continues hardly looks like a success....

[@tomdonahoe3539]

I'll suggest reviewing some of the materials from Strong Towns. They talk about R1 zoning, minimum lot sizes & set backs & parking ordinances & how these affect tax revenue per square mile.

[@guilhermetavares4705]

Rio de Janeiro and Salvador are examples of shrinking cities here in Brazil. We also have cities threatening to go to court against the census done by the federal government last year. Here the trend is migration to cities in the interior where agribusiness is growing.

[@markhaneklau5021]

How do you say ‘White Flight’ in Australian

[@shonnicus2607]

Yeah this is a bad vid, imo; when they don't get half of what happened to Detroit. If your industry leaves oversees or shuts down aka the auto industry and yes white flight and many other things that is going to collapse a city. Using Detroit here is the most extreme example which I somewhat understand they were getting at. But missing some big points as if Detroit just failed for being a Big City is beyond this channel's grasp.

[@LD-Orbs]

It's easy to point and scream "Racist!" It's hard for the Elite to actually understand what's going on, and lead the on-the-ground fight to change the tide on behalf of all residents, white and black. But for the Rulers to understand, they first have to care about all the residents, white and black. Don't hold your breath, waiting for that to happen.

[@007kingifrit]

if whites move into an area, they call it gentrification, if whites move out they call it white flight. its just racism to point out where whites are moving

[@cjmhall]

Right. Most of the people who left simply moved to another part of the metro area outside the Detroit city limits. This is why the metro area’s population has remained fairly stable despite Detroit itself losing a huge number of people.

[@Boss-xu8wp]

It’s Black flight now too

[@Ralphieboy]

I grew up in Gary, Indiana and remember it as a booming Midwestern industrial town. It is now a vacant wasteland, having lost nearly 2/3 of its population which peaked around the time I was born.

[@redwow]

The Budd Company built a huge new stamping and assembly plant in Gary in the 70's and never opened because of an ongoing inion strike. Everybody lost.

[@Paint2D_]

My home city of Zürich, Switzerland had a huge drop in population in the 1980s and large civil unrest. Drug crime rates in the early 1990s where very high caused by heroin this also came with rising HIV rates and a huge spike of people living on the streets living from heroin shot to shot. Today Zürich is the most beautiful and safest city in the world and among the richest. One big thing that helped Zürich come back is that the banking business never left but also that the city made needles and heroin freely available for people that need it. This resulted in doping crime rates and improving health standards, it also made selling heroin very unprofitable.

[@greatwolf5372]

San Francisco is doing pretty much the same thing. Let's how that works out for them. One thing many articles on this topic noted is that European cities that decriminalized drug use and even provided needles also mandated compulsory rehabilitation and enforced zero tolerance for vagrancy. While North American cities like Vancouver and San Francisco adopted the decriminalization of drug use but ignored mandatory rehabilitation. That would make a huge difference in the results of the policy.

[@phuturephunk]

@@greatwolf5372 There's legal issues to dealing with institutionalization and vagrancy in the West, specifically in the United States. You really can't just lock people up here without cause for living out of a tent in a park or along a disused highway. They haven't committed any crime and if you do make that an actual crime, then the cost burden transfers to the State in the form of ever increasing corrections budgets. I don't know how we fix this in the US.

[@PancakeProduct]

Switzerland =\= America What works somewhere will not work elsewhere. We've tried this theory throughout history.

[@Paint2D_]

@@PancakeProduct Do people not like free heroin in the US? Using the power of capitalism to make selling drugs not profitable sounds like the most American thing ever to me.

[@jackuzi8252]

​@@phuturephunk So what you'd do is advertise the free heroin, but have it be provided in a "treatment camp" 100 miles away in the countryside, far from any transport back to the city. So there'd be regular "free heroin" buses out to the camp, but return buses only on Tuesday mornings at 1 am, with few seats and people who have completed rehab given priority for them. This would create a "Hotel California" situation, where people remain free to leave but if they have to hitchhike a long distance to get back to the city, during which they'll go into heroin withdrawal, many are unlikely to try.

[@visno]

when a city has shrunk its very tough to bring them back from collapse because of the self reinforcing feedback loop of being undesirable. the easiest way to fix this is to move a government agency to that city. the government will always have people employed and that can be the base working population needed to set stable roots for a city to grow back.

[@joshuamarpaia]

12:58 This reminds me of the relationship between Sacramento and the cities of San Jose and San Fransico

[@ErwinSchrodinger64]

The only reason why New Orleans average income is increasing is because we've had a large influx of people from big tech and buy up housing and rent it out. Hence, we've seen increases in homes, a growing tax base that doesn't support nor care about the city. It's driving many natives out. New Orleans is not a good example of what to do.

[@peteydog1473]

if you want to play this out, the fall of winterhome scenario in frostpunk is hellish and more importantly: very different

[@איתןשי]

Economics Explained: All cities will experience shrinkage Me (in a city that has doubled in size in the past 5 years): Please take our excess and solve everyone's problems 🙏🏿

[@alpacaofthemountain8760]

Great video! It’s always helpful to view things from a resident’s point perspective

[@chrisk5437]

11:52 has a wonderful shot of CLE (Cleveland, OH). Moved away in 2015 and miss it everyday.

[@phinexgamer-hg7kv]

my native city Chennai (Detroit of Asia) is constantly growing economically and also by population. it currently has a population of 11.9 million people

[@007kingifrit]

asia has unreasonably high birth rates but that will change in 50 years

[@lord_of_love_and_thunder]

@@007kingifrit Tamil Nadu has had below replacement fertility rates for decades now.

[@GUITARTIME2024]

​@@007kingifrit china is already shrinking. Japan and SK much faster.

[@crimsonlightbinder]

​@@007kingifrit china is shrinking fast and facing population collapse. They had 2 generations of one child policy. You need a birth rate of over 2 to have an increasing population. They are at 1.1 and gave been for over 2 decades and have reported (total BS) that they still have an increasing population. It may be the case that china's population is over counted by about 20%

[@saltandpeppertofu]

Start of video: “It’s expensive to service low-density cities.” End of video: “Have more low-density cities!” Actual solution: Medium-density, then make the edge of the city into parklands. Example: Vienna. Look at it on a map. Five-story buildings across the city makes the city compact, so excellent public transport (people even giving up their cars), and vast, accessible green space around the edges. (But, of course, it’s way more complicated than this. Nice video!)

[@chiquita683]

Alternative Spicy Take Title: Diversity is our strength

[@ericvulgate]

People in these comments are dancing around that one.

[@alaunaenpunto3690]

​​@@ericvulgate had a 10 yo nephew drop that line at an extended family gathering in this context. Everyone got uncomfortably quiet for a couple minutes and we're a white, largely maga conservative family. It was funny af

[@adrean83]

There's a scientific study by James Laurence and Lee Bentley published in the European Sociological Review which provides evidence contrary to the axiom that Diversity is Our Strength

[@eternalcanadiandevyt]

Alternative spicy take: Race has no correlation to the success of any city because 1) There is no genetic link between violence, crime, intelligence or any other characteristic and the colour of ones skin 2) I encourage you to find a credible source to disprove the 1st point. (You can't) 3) Nature vs Nuture is strongly documented and it is clear cities like Detroit and Chicago are a victim of circumstance and not the colour of the people who happen to live there

[@millennialmind9507]

​@@alaunaenpunto3690 lol, Maga people hate diversity 😅😂

[@spartandmac]

Loved this video. I grew up near Detroit and it's great to see it spotlighted

[@whatthepick]

An Urban Shrinkage manager may actually be an interesting career :) Get to build parks, expand farmland on rarely tilled virgin soil. Install roundabouts to reduce traffic light costs, redesign areas to make it more attractive in the future, recycle old materials from housing projects to reduce costs of destruction, maybe even make garden cities from your fragments seems unique. Simply put a city planner who has power to redesign the areas. Maybe even change city taxation

[@andrewross484]

I'm surprised you didn't go more into mega city's growth, like Tokyo, affect on shrinkage and urbanization.

[@Unknown-jt1jo]

A few dozen commentators are "surprised" that he didn't mention their pet points. If he had, the video would be triple the length.

[@andrewross484]

@@daisy9181 Im not trying idealize Tokyo, I'm referring to the growth of megacities at the cost of smaller cities. Often times these large metro centers add population and industry at the expensive of medium sized metro areas.

[@Bustermachine]

@@daisy9181 That's a marvelously specific statement based on one person's experience of a massive metropolitan area. I'd actually say the issue isn't with Tokyo itself, but the rather soul crushing work and school culture of Japan. Meanwhile, Tokyo's physical density and layout has more to do with it being one of the flat areas to put a city in a highly mountainous country.

[@Bruv009]

@@daisy9181 i would disagree. yeah the city itself is a living thing that just somehow works perfectly well. But i would blame instead the culture, society, work culture as being the crux of people wanting to off themselves. Not the city itself.

[@benx2230]

Would it be possible for a city like Detroit to redraw the city boundaries to shrink the total physical size of the city? Or would that not be a working solution to managing the city budget?

[@gilbertvehicleservices]

None of Detroit is totally abandoned, people live in all parts of the city, but in the lesser density than it was in 1950. In order to “redraw boundaries”, you would need for the residents of that area to support breaking away from Detroit and form a new city. Then you need leaders in this area to manage structuring this city and raising capital for the initial expenses of setting up all of your own city services (police, fire, schools, courts, etc.). It would be an expensive proposition for those residents.

[@hgman3920]

Anyone who lived in New York in the 1970s were extremely aware that their city could wither and die. For this same reason, New York is also the poster child for cities who have turned themselves around

[@ramencurry6672]

I think part of the reason is because of the location. If NYC was located in another part of the country it probably would decline noticeably

[@guydreamr]

Whether growing or shrinking, mixed-use development and strong public transit are strongly correlated with urban prosperity, and usually put a city in the growth part of the ledger.

[@dubhekun]

Very solid points there. Positive ways to face degrowth, and explain it.

[@toddbowles8201]

New York and San Francisco have shrunk. Toronto has grown.

[@JChang0114]

"Take him to Detroit."

[@xploreourterra6096]

Pooulations of some cities may also decline due to that population moving to other better cities if there's No growth, peace in their own city

[@ichifish]

A point specific to the US that you should have made clear is that suburban and ex-urban growth funnel state revenues out of cities. The cost of infrastructure decreases with population density. Suburban infrastructure costs more per person. State income taxes paid by city residents (who earn more because of the cost of living in cities and thus pay more) are dispersed throughout the state, not confined to the city (which primary tax property). A new development's roads, water, electricity, schools, etc. are not solely funded with local taxes, they are funded by city dwellers as well.

[@fkurt]

3:17 this is second time my home town being shown on this page lol. it just feels good.

[@rathelmmc3194]

For cities like Detroit the federal government really needs to help provide funds to shrink the cities footprint (clean up and destroy buildings and infrastructure) so it's a more manageable size for the local government. There may also need to be some sort of pension handoff too since it's not really fair for the existing smaller population to pay for the pensions that were promised when the city was larger.

[@SU1C1D3xPR4D4]

Detroit literally just had most of its above poverty line residents moved ~5 miles to outside the city limits. Another point about Detroit, it’s also not feasible to live in Detroit if you have a family. Home are less expensive, but your property tax rate is insanely high, you pay 25-50% more per month on auto/home insurance (MI already has the highest auto premiums), and there’s no public schools anyone would send their kids to.

[@gregspecht3706]

Its crazy how ee at the beggining says its to expensive to service sprawled out cities then at the end says maybe the solution is small low density cities. It clearly has to be small high density cities for the shrinking cities.

[@ericwright8592]

Yeah the small garden city ideas of the late 1800s don't work in modern society. It sounds great to elitist nimbys. But in reality they aren't feasible. It was basically the predecessor to Euclidean zoning which is responsible for the sprawling mess we find ourselves in.

[@deeznoots6241]

Because EE is often stupid, there are tons of videos criticising his videos

[@urbanistgod]

Maybe people don’t want to live like sardines?

[@deeznoots6241]

@@urbanistgod housing in cities is far from ‘living like sardines’, if everybody lived in a suburb then climate change would be completely unstoppable and everybody would have to pay double the taxes because suburbs are just that horribly inefficient

[@urbanistgod]

@@deeznoots6241 Dude the subject of this video is literally about shrinking cities which means a stabilized or even a lower population so don’t tell me about efficiency as if it’s the only thing that matters or sprawl since there’s no more sprawl if the population stops growing.

[@DkShep]

This video really ought to come with a plug for the Strongtowns organization. They've been preaching this message at local government levels for years.

[@jayjasperjp]

This happened to Mayagüez, Puerto Rico. The city’s economy revolved around canned tuna fish factories. At one point over 80% of the canned tuna fish consumed in the United States came from Mayagüez. In the 1990s the factories started to relocate to cheaper countries, and the city’s economy collapsed. From 1990-2020 the city lost over 30% of its population

[@jmuench420]

Detroit lost most of its residents to its own suburbs, the relative decline of the auto industry or industry in general has very little to do with what the city of Detroit looks like today. On another note, Detroit still has a lot beautiful architecture, beautiful parks and the bones of many once great old neighborhoods are still intact. The city is positioned to do very well in the coming decades.

[@GUITARTIME2024]

Yes, lost to suburbs that were safer and not so horrifically mismanaged. (and demographically lopsided).

[@oldsoul9568]

The Detroit City Council approved a $250 million plan to revitalize downtown on June 1. The plan includes funding for new housing, retail, and office space. It also includes funding for infrastructure improvements, such as streetscape improvements and public transportation.

[@2hotflavored666]

And this plan will never come to fruition due to corruption, mismanagement and later going severely over budget.

[@bigfatstupidfish2397]

Imagine investing in office space when the value of office space is America is in free fall

[@SunilMeena-do7xn]

​@@2hotflavored666 there is corruption in USA? I thought it's only in 3rd world countries.

[@RockitFX1]

​@@2hotflavored666 and you know this how?

[@answerman9933]

@@RockitFX1 How? It's Detroit. It is like asking how do you know the mayor of Chicago will be a Democrat.

[@jonathan248]

A couple things to note: Detroit did not lose its auto manufacturing to cities in other countries but instead to cities in the United States. Detroit could not compete with cities in the middle of nowhere that were offering substantial tax breaks and other benefits. Pay was lower for auto manufactures in these smaller cities because while the auto worker unions were quite strong in Detroit, they did not have the same power initially in the smaller cities. Finally, most white Detroit residents moved not to other large cities but instead the suburbs of Detroit. Looking at a racial population map even today it's still possible to see remnants of the Eight Mile divide. This left the relatively powerless poorer population in the city of Detroit while White and wealthy individuals moved to its suburbs not far away. Another interesting thing is that in the mid-to-late 1900s, many political leaders of these suburban areas vocally expressed their desire to see Detroit fail.

[@oliviastratton2169]

True! Detroit gained it's auto industry because of it's geography: River access and cool climate. As the trucking industry became cheaper and air conditioning made it possible to build factories in the Sunbelt, Detroit lost it's edge.

[@donlarocque5157]

People moved to the country where I grew up and brought their big city politics with them. Totally ruined it. I'm glad we moved in 1980.

[@redwow]

Detroit lost much of its skills. We have to start all over. Will it happen?

[@HelenLannister]

I’m a bit confused… are the properties just being abandoned? If they’re abandoned and the owner isn’t paying tax, isn’t there some mechanism to track down the owner for tax evasion?

[@erikanderson8093]

Great video. Would love to see a video on the economic benefits/costs of gentrification.

[@jameslascelle9453]

I’m really interested in the future of shrinking island populations. Look at Jamaica, Virgin Islands and Bermuda. The poor population is being relocated to larger cities in Canada and the USA while millionaires and billionaires are buying up massive amounts of land to build luxurious estates.

[@avocadogaming3942]

Major cities are too expensive. Rather live in the rural area with a nice house vs renting a shoebox.

[@bearcubdaycare]

This is an unconsidered nuance to the meme of housing affordability. There are plenty of affordable homes, even many in nice neighborhoods, in various often smaller cities, or rural areas. But the migration has been toward larger cities, hence the costs there. But the economy needs to exist, and in some of the rural areas it doesn't.

[@tomh2121]

Manchester has been a really successful example of how to reverse city shrinkage and deindustrialisation. It has grown considerably since the 1980s and is now considered an example of how to combat deindustrialisation. Manchester has had lots of investment and is a centre of culture. It’s now one of the fastest growing economies and one of the fastest growing populations in the UK. I’ve moved here from the London area and so have many others. Here is a cool video on it: kzbin.info/www/bejne/nKa3eneZatqaY7s

[@everforward8651]

Is the cost of living there less than that of London?

[@tomh2121]

@@everforward8651 it is, although it has increased over the last decade. Housing is still a lot cheaper but other things are closer in price (although still less). Again though, I live in a more expensive area. There are some cheaper areas.

[@Zed_Oud]

The Land Value Tax would have prevented the conditions for most of this decline from forming. Henry George offered that solution in the 1890’s - we had plenty of time.

[@h00zn8r]

The town at 6:51 is my home town!! Never ever expected to see this place as stock footage anywhere 😅

[@MikeGaruccio]

Interestingly the two drawbacks of a shrinking city highlighted here - reduced work opportunities and fewer public services - don’t really mean much to remote workers. Have talked with a few people recently who moved from larger, growing cities to Cleveland to take advantage of the cheaper housing while still maintaining most of the advantages of living in a big city.

[@cullenpeterson]

I live in Chicago and the story here is relatively similar, though bifurcated. The core and north side of the city are thriving - rents are up, home prices are way up, city services are excellent, whereas the south and west sides are hemorrhaging population. One third of the city is prospering whereas the other two thirds are in an awful position. It’s due to a number of factors - decades of disinvestment the primary. That’s lead to rampant crime, poor social services, and an increasing downward spiral. These next two-ish decades will be pivotal if reversing these trends will ever be possible.

[@stevecooper6473]

Has it occurred to you that perhaps rampant crime has led to Has it occurred to you that perhaps rampant crime has led to disinvestment in those parts of Chicago, rather than the other way around?

[@cullenpeterson]

@@stevecooper6473 Well of course; the two aren’t mutually exclusive. Once disinvestment (or a culture of crime, either or) takes hold it becomes a pretty vicious negative feedback loop that’s extremely tough to break.

[@dougsheldon5560]

From recent reports on homelessness I wouldn't be surprised to see San Francisco on the list next

[@plasticpalace]

Engineer here. Important to note that it is much cheaper to maintain infrastructure in a flat, low-density city with a strict grid and much similar land around it like Detroit than a dense, hilly, disorganized city like San Francisco.

[@Billwzw]

One big thing not included in the video : by law (ERISA, 1974) businesses are required to put money aside to pay for employee pensions. Government units, including cities, are not. So many/most/all cities are on a pay-as-you-go system where current taxpayers pay for past employees. When a business shrinks the retirees can still get paid. When a city shrinks, the pension obligations remain but the burden is covered by fewer city residents/taxpayers. The burden can skyrocket. At the time of Detroit's bankruptcy in 2013 the city pension obligations were costed at $7.4 billion, or $11,000 for each of 692,000 residents. An obvious measure to prepare for a shrinking population is to fully fund the retirement obligations before the population shrinkage starts the downward spiral.

[@shayneweyker]

Kind of the same thing with the US Postal Service. The Republicans wanted USPS to start pre-funding pensions so taxpayers wouldn't have to make up the difference later. But as with cities, the new expense of pre-funding makes the organization less competitive (with higher prices or worse service) and speeds up the decline the pre-funding was trying to get out in front of. Also, some corporations have dodged their pension obligations with accounting tricks related to bankruptcy even though the obligations were supposedly pre-funded.

[@sandrosilva1798]

Existe também o modelo brasileiro para esse tipo de cidade: controle territorial por grupos paramilitares. Esses grupos assumem os serviços públicos e cobram taxas por segurança, correios...

[@oldsoul9568]

The Michigan Supreme Court ruled on June 6 that Detroit cannot shut off water service to residents who owe back water bills. The ruling is a victory for Detroit residents who have been struggling to pay their water bills.

[@fridgemagnet9831]

So they can use the product without paying, and those that are paying pay more because of them.

[@sweetmyth2537]

Water is very important for people to live

[@jamesodell3064]

I can't find this in Google. Could you please provide a link or citation?

[@oldsoul9568]

@@jamesodell3064 I used Google Bard

[@greatwolf5372]

"Struggling" Right 😑

[@ismailnyeyusof3520]

What a thought provoking episode from Economics Explained. My biggest takeaway was the absolute value of human capital as the driver of economic vibrancy. When we see dogma, especially fundamentalist religious dogma, I think we should see dangerously reduced economic vibrancy due to a greatly reduced flow of disruptive ideas. With less ideas appearing due to restrictive policies will come talent migration to less restrictive parts of the world and a downward spiral towards poverty and fatalism where talent is lost. It’s a real cause of economic divide, distress and ultimate decline.

[@Mr.Nichan]

12:10 Your description of "smart shrinkage" could have followed from what I was thinking whenever you first mentioned that low population density cities like Detroit have less money per unit area because they have less population per unit area, which is, "That's nothing compared to the actual countryside. How do counties manage to maintain infrastructure there?" I suspect the answer is that there is a lower density of infrastructure there, to match the lower density of residents (less demand for it) and lower density of money (to create and maintain it). "Smart shrinkage" recognizes such a balance can be maintained for any population/money density and should be maintained by changing the infrastructure density whenever the population/money density changes.

[@shayneweyker]

If areas just inside the city boundary were removed from the city and simply lost their city water and sewer services the homes in the newly disconnected areas would have to start building septic tanks and wells. Which aside from big upfront costs, don't work if neighbors live too close. So in many newly-disconnected areas some of the existing housing would have to be demolished to get the density down which is another upfront cost. Seems to make more sense to have the suburban communities absorb some of that territory and add it to their water and sewer networks. Making sure that the deal isn't one-sided in the suburban area's favor.

[@tylerstruss223]

The infographics in this video are sooooooo good looking!

[@CritterCamSoCal]

In the US many cities also collect Sales Tax on every Sale in the City, that revenue would also shrink. Often times City Employees are unionized. Politicians seeing support from unions are expected to add to salaries and benefits. So this createds a feedback loop such that belt tightening becomes challenging. Detroits Politicians found themselves in this cycle and even after filing Bankrupcy it was hard to reduce benefits, headcount, pensions etc.....

[@1toneboy]

Ethnic demographics is also a factor and the domino-effect of White Flight.

[@hasinabegum1038]

New york city is more diverse then Detroit

[@AlexM-tx2vr]

EE, I live in the metro Detroit area, and you really understated how much Detroit has improved in the past 10 years. Ten years ago almost the whole city was unliveable, but now there are many desirable neighborhoods. Detroit still has its problems, but I believe Detroit will continue to improve over the coming decade. This isn't the first time you have covered Detroit, so you should came here and get some ground true of the good and the bad of Detroit.

[@Unknown-jt1jo]

He's trying to make a larger point, not to focus on Detroit in particular.

[@N20Joe]

The problem is that the government cannot ever imagine the idea of reducing costs. It's just an absolutely alien idea that is dismissed out of hand.