Can we use Detroit as an example of what population decline will look like in other cities as birth rates stay low in countries such as Germany, Italy and Japan?

Detroit: Bankrupt and Empty

by Marcus Roberts

A few days ago we received the news that the largest municipal bankruptcy in American history was about to occur: Detroit. Since then, it seems as if announcing that you have no money to fund your billions of dollars of debt is unconstitutional: a somewhat bizarre decision it seems disconnected from reality. (Although that has now been overturned on appeal I see)

But the decline of Detroit has been noticed for some time now – on this blog we have mentioned the city’s difficulties on a few occasions, here and here and here. This was not an unforeseen, sudden decline brought on by war, plague or famine. Instead, Detroit has suffered from a decades-long malaise: industry (particularly automotive) moving to cheaper locations elsewhere in the USA, or being undercut by foreign competition; population decline; neighbourhoods being boarded up; crime rates soaring; large public service bills etc etc. Indeed, I was watching a classic move the other night: Beverly Hills Cop and I noticed that the start of the movie is set and filmed in Detroit. The movie is over thirty years’ old, but the Detroit scenes were full of dereliction and abandoned buildings. Foreshadowing evidence of Detroit’s continued decline was visible even back then. (Great movie by the way – the eighties had such a string of them: Beverly Hills Cop; Star Wars V and VI; India Jones I-III; Labyrinth; Blues Brothers; Ghost Busters etc etc)

As you may be aware, the facts of Detroit’s situation are appalling. The population is now down to 700,000 a decline of over 32% between 1990 and 2012. This of course means that there are many, many abandoned neighbourhoods where one cannot give houses away. This is particularly a problem in a city that is extremely spread out – apparently Paris could fit within the area of Detroit that is vacant!

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