An infamous New York Daily News headline of 1975
read “Ford to City: Drop Dead,” a response to his threatened veto of any
bailout for the City, which was on the brink of bankruptcy. NYC avoided that
fate, but 60 cities, municipalities and villages have attempted to file Chapter
9 since 1954, with 29 cases dismissed. The latest to tempt the route of last
resort is Detroit: New
York Times. This is ground zero of the cost of globalization, increased
inequality, neoliberal tax/fiscal policy and the void between the promise and
reality of the new world order. A city that once boasted 1.8 million citizens,
many with quality jobs for the auto industry, is now an urban wasteland of
700,000. Infrastructure is collapsing, services are being cut, poverty is up
and the cities debt load could easily eat up 65 percent of the annual budget.
That is third world country debt and
perfectly exemplifies the harsh costs accrued by the victims of neoliberal
globalization gone wild, even in the Global North. The answer to this growing
problem? More cuts, of course, just as a Democratic Presidential hopeful in New
York, Governor Andrew Cuomo, touts his “Tax-Free NY Zones” near public universities:
Salon
(more on this later in the week). It seems the worse things get, the worse the
ideas to solve our problems …
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