Amazing Graphic Shows Chicago’s Middle Class Disappear Before Your Eyes

[TarHeelJ]

Watch Chicagoland on CNN...the disparity between the haves and have nots is frightening.

[mhays]

We'll probably be more like Brazil, slowly but increasingly.

Some jobs are tied to our high-value strengths, like tech innovation, and will be worth a lot. Others are on the world market and their wages will move toward the world median, offset somewhat by location benefits. Some won't be offshorable but will be trainable, and their wages will be reduced because people from the second group will compete on price.

Meanwhile cities that people enjoy will be increasingly affordable to the world's upper-middle class as the US goes slowly downward and other countries' upper-middles move upward.

So save if you can (most can if they try hard enough), and invest in the world market, not just the US market.

[the urban politician]

In America we are moving towards (or already have moved towards, I should say) a class of nobles who essentially are given more because they already have more. They are being rewarded for being rich with more wealth.

I thought wealth came from innovation, hard work, and smart decisions? In America that is true some of the time for sure, but unfortunately there are too many people just sitting there collecting capital gains and paying lower taxes than everybody else.

As a person who has turned hard right politically in the past few years, even I am beginning to think there has to be a limit to how much incredibly wealthy people can just keep gaming the system. It's bad enough that you can pretty much get away with anything regarding civil foulplay as long as you can outspend your opponents in legal matters (lets go to court and just keep fighting and fighting until one of us decides it's getting too expensive). Now look at the recent Supreme Court ruling that lifts all limitations on campaign contributions to our elected officials. At this point they can pretty much buy out the Government, far more blatantly than ever before.

Sorry, not the kind of society we should be...

[kool maudit]

the american nobility will not be an aristocracy in the old sense. as decadent the ancién regime could be, they were intimately tied to the societies whose upper crust they formed through history, land ownership and often military duties.

just having a bunch of staggeringly rich people is something more unstable than an aristocracy.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by pdxtex

the trend is more like white flight, minority population increase in west and south side, followed by dual income no kid households in the north. two people with so so jobs and no kids can easily put them above average household income.

If you're still talking about Chicago, then white flight already happened and stopped, and now even minorities are fleeing the south and west sides.

Population Change, 2000-2010 (red is decline, blue is growth)
Even north side neighborhoods that got wealthier also lost population, as household sizes shrank and housing supply has not increased fast enough. The only urban growth is
A) in the very center and a few north side tracts, where formerly industrial/office areas have seen a population boom
B) a little bit of growth on the Southwest Side as Mexican immigrants replace aging white ethnics
C) in the mid-South Side where there is some new construction amidst a Detroit-like bombed out cityscape.


src

[Zapatan]

^Crazy

But if I'm not mistaken Chicago as a whole is still growing right?

Hope it doesn't become 3rd world in my lifetime.

[the urban politician]

Originally Posted by Zapatan

^Crazy

But if I'm not mistaken Chicago as a whole is still growing right?

Hope it doesn't become 3rd world in my lifetime.

We'll see. Latest census estimates say it is growing slowly.

I'm not sure what you mean by "3rd world" exactly, but in a certain sense it is already there. Corruption--check. Intense concentration of wealth--check. Concentrations of poverty--check. Infrastructure--defiitely not 3rd world here.

[Kenmore]

i'm raising a kid on a decent but modest income in the lone orange north side census tract…it's only a matter of time before i'm priced out and head for the burbs. Chicago is a city of the wealthy and very poor.

[oshkeoto]

Population Change, 2000-2010 (red is decline, blue is growth)
Even north side neighborhoods that got wealthier also lost population, as household sizes shrank and housing supply has not increased fast enough. The only urban growth is
A) in the very center and a few north side tracts, where formerly industrial/office areas have seen a population boom
B) a little bit of growth on the Southwest Side as Mexican immigrants replace aging white ethnics
C) in the mid-South Side where there is some new construction amidst a Detroit-like bombed out cityscape.

Although it's worth pointing out that this doesn't remotely capture where demand to live is increasing. Chicago's incredibly restrictive zoning laws outside of downtown mean that even in places where rents are rising rapidly, population is stagnating.

And actually, there's signs of an incipient broadening of the demand to live in places like Bronzeville, Kenwood, Oakland, Woodlawn, Garfield Park, etc. - places where black people are fleeing, but the absolute numbers of whites, Asians and Hispanics are growing actually pretty rapidly. They're a long way from becoming Wicker Park, obviously, but I don't think it's at all ridiculous to expect some dramatic changes in the next 10-15 years.

[ardecila]

Yes. For better or worse, we seem to be "solving" the problems of several black neighborhoods through attrition.

[10023]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

the american nobility will not be an aristocracy in the old sense. as decadent the ancién regime could be, they were intimately tied to the societies whose upper crust they formed through history, land ownership and often military duties.

just having a bunch of staggeringly rich people is something more unstable than an aristocracy.

The nobility was an approach to political organization and not just a matter of wealth, though the two of course generally went hand in hand. Peers were created and given title in return for service to the crown. And because titles are hereditary and reinforced by marriages, school ties, and social and professional relationships, it was (and is, though without much political power) quite a stabilizing force in society. That and there was generally an aspect of noblesse oblige that is missing from the modern merely rich.

[emathias]

Originally Posted by brian_b

...
The animated GIF shows two things - income and geographic area. But there is no control for population density in the geographic areas. How can you draw any meaningful conclusions without population density?

Density is less important when you're using the smallest geographical size that the Census tracks. It's not irrelevant, but it's less important than with larger geographical units.

[Centropolis]

this is why i love st. louis (or kansas city, or cincinnati or milwaukee or pittsburgh or cleveland). i can be an urban landlord on a middle class salary.

[Steely Dan]

^ I'm an urban landlord on a middle class salary in chicago.

Chicago's problem isn't affordable real estate, or even affordable family-size real estate. The problem for middle class people like me is finding affordable family-size real estate in areas that typical middle class families would find acceptable from a crime/schools perspective. I would have no problem raising my family in a 3 bedroom home in a neighborhood like Lincoln square but I can't afford a $500,000 mortgage.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ I'm an urban landlord on a middle class salary in chicago.

Chicago's problem isn't affordable real estate, or even affordable family-size real estate. The problem for middle class people like me is finding affordable family-size real estate in areas that typical middle class families would find acceptable from a crime/schools perspective. I would have no problem raising my family in a 3 bedroom home in a neighborhood like Lincoln square but I can't afford a $500,000 mortgage.

i'm just being a dick. chicago is amazing for being a big city, as far as economic opportunity if you know where to look. it's definitely easier down here though for far less return.

[Centropolis]

as well, like the other midwestern cities with decent urban inner suburbs that have good schools (like chicago), i've accepted that i may go that route if i should have kids. down here the inner suburbs encompass urban-y areas that most middle sized midwestern cities don't.

[pdxtex]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ I'm an urban landlord on a middle class salary in chicago.

Chicago's problem isn't affordable real estate, or even affordable family-size real estate. The problem for middle class people like me is finding affordable family-size real estate in areas that typical middle class families would find acceptable from a crime/schools perspective. I would have no problem raising my family in a 3 bedroom home in a neighborhood like Lincoln square but I can't afford a $500,000 mortgage.

^^^so what neighborhoods on the south side and not near the water are fairly well mixed? are there urban hipster pioneer types that are looking in tradtionally crime ridden hoods in search of good deals? i honestly dont know squat about the south side. my mom is from rogers park and pop grew up around south shore before its own days of white flight.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by pdxtex

^^^so what neighborhoods on the south side and not near the water are fairly well mixed? are there urban hipster pioneer types that are looking in tradtionally crime ridden hoods in search of good deals? i honestly dont know squat about the south side. my mom is from rogers park and pop grew up around south shore before its own days of white flight.

hyde park is where i would live in chicago, it's near the university of chicago.

[LouisVanDerWright]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ I'm an urban landlord on a middle class salary in chicago.

Chicago's problem isn't affordable real estate, or even affordable family-size real estate. The problem for middle class people like me is finding affordable family-size real estate in areas that typical middle class families would find acceptable from a crime/schools perspective. I would have no problem raising my family in a 3 bedroom home in a neighborhood like Lincoln square but I can't afford a $500,000 mortgage.

You and a million other young families! What this just shows to me is the massive unrealized demand for urban real estate in Chicago. The only reason many people don't live here is the schools which are rapidly improving in the neighborhoods that are being invaded by young, upper middle class, professionals. Your demands are more immediate than most since you are already going to have a kid, but for someone like myself, I am grabbing as much real estate in areas that I can see the schools improving in now as possible so I can take my pick some day when I do have kids without having to buy a townhome for $700k.

[LouisVanDerWright]

Originally Posted by pdxtex

^^^so what neighborhoods on the south side and not near the water are fairly well mixed? are there urban hipster pioneer types that are looking in tradtionally crime ridden hoods in search of good deals? i honestly dont know squat about the south side. my mom is from rogers park and pop grew up around south shore before its own days of white flight.

Pilsen, Little Village, Bridgeport, and McKinnley Park are all blowing up right now. I own real estate all the way over at Kedzie Pink Line and recently had a hipster bidding war erupt over this crappy ass little two bedroom apartment. I ended up leasing to a 24 year old, gay, black, hipster with a purple mohawk (well color changing as he dies it different every month or so) that works at Groupon downtown and makes $45,000 a year. When I bought that building a few years ago I NEVER thought I'd see such good tenants moving in so soon. I thought it would be decades, not a little over two years before I'd have a tenant whose rent shows up in the mail from an online bank on the first of the month every month.

Also, I keep meeting random hipsters who live in realllllly dangerous areas lately. I've met at least three people who recently or currently live in Lawndale. I met a young, white, jewish chick who moved here from NYC and lives in an old mansion in Englewood near Ashland and 63rd. I really think we are reaching a tipping point for much of the city where there is too much demand and not enough supply on the North Side so the gentrifying pioneers are being forced to explore the other two sides of the city.