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No chain grocery stores in Detroit; what welfare hath wrought
Topic Started: Jul 22 2009, 04:37 PM (856 Views)
Mikhailoh
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If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
We can thank LBJ and other social welfare programs for this. 30% of a city's population on food stamps. 22.8% unemployment.
Quote:
 
No chain groceries in Detroit - no money either
Jennie L. Phipps
Jul 22nd 2009 at 4:00PM More

Sociologists call the scarcity of urban grocery stores vs. the abundance in suburbia "the grocery store gap." It's particularly wide in Detroit, the nation's beleaguered 11th largest city, where there are no chain grocery store outlets within the city limits.

The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) opined on this phenomenon recently, and then CNNMoney.com followed suit.

Detroit isn't alone. Last year, the Washington Post bemoaned the lack of conventional groceries in both Washington DC and New York City, and mentioned a similar situation in Philadelphia. In New York, the mayor's office appointed a "food policy coordinator" to encourage the opening of more grocery stores.

In Detroit, where the unemployment rate is 22.8%, the school system is considering bankruptcy and 30% of the population gets food stamps, the lack of conventional grocery stores doesn't get a staff position.

In fact, there are grocery stores in Detroit: The discount grocer Aldi Inc. has two outlets within the city limits. According to the Food Marketing Institute, this limited-inventory approach is the grocery store of the future. And there's the Eastern Market, the 43-acre wholesale outlet and farmer's market that draws suburbanites and well as city dwellers.

And there are independent groceries. I met the owner of one of them two weeks ago when my husband and I went to the Gold Cup hydroplane races on the Detroit River. He had moored his 58-foot yacht on the straightaway and was hosting a bash for friends and family. One of them told me the grocery business is tough, and the store is only busy on days when the vouchers and the checks are distributed. But obviously, things aren't that bad.

Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
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Larry
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Mmmmmmm, pie!
I found out something I didn't know a couple of weeks ago that just made my blood boil. A woman who rents an apartment from me receives food stamps. She can't keep a job because she's a drunk. Yet a couple of weeks ago she showed me her new "toy" - a nice, loaded up with features cell phone. It was a nicer cell phone than mine!

I asked her how she could afford to pay for a cell phone like that when she was constantly behind in her rent, sucking off the taxpayer, and spending at least 20 dollars a day on beer. (Yes, I talk to them that way....)

She informed me that if you receive food stamps you get a free cell phone!

THEY'RE OFFERING PREMIUMS IF YOU'LL SIGN UP FOR FOOD STAMPS!!!!!!!!!!!


Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.......
Of the Pokatwat Tribe

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Renauda
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HOLY CARP!!!
Larry, that's almost as loony as receiving a free rifle for openning a savings account in a bank. Neither are right no matter how you look at it.
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Aqua Letifer
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ZOOOOOM!
The premium thing is stupid, but cell phones are more convenient than land lines when setting up job offers.
I cite irreconcilable differences.
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Mikhailoh
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If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
It's true. I can't believe it either.

https://www.safelinkwireless.com/EnrollmentPublic/home.aspx
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
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Axtremus
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HOLY CARP!!!
Here's the official site for that "free cell phone if you're on foodstamp" offer:

https://www.safelinkwireless.com/EnrollmentPublic/home.aspx

Yeah... this is over the top.
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apple
one of the angels
my word that's absurd

i can see the free 911 feature being of value.
it behooves me to behold
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Larry
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Mmmmmmm, pie!
The cell phone pictured in the link isn't at all like the one this woman had. Her's was a flip phone with a camera built in, fancy ring tones, the works.

Hell... maybe I'll just stop working and collect welfare and food stamps..

Of the Pokatwat Tribe

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Larry
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Mmmmmmm, pie!
apple
Jul 22 2009, 04:52 PM
my word that's absurd

i can see the free 911 feature being of value.
We don't have to spend billions of taxpayer dollars to give these people access to 911. As I understand it, any cell phone that's charged up, whether it is activated or not, can access 911. I could be wrong, but I think I'm right.

So if I'm right, and we have to give these people a cell phone so they can call the cops if they need to, then just give them all old phones that would normally have been thrown away.

Of the Pokatwat Tribe

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apple
one of the angels
you're right Larry..

my church runs a cell phone thing.. old cell phones and chargers given to older folks who might want to call 911.

i can see the value of giving people phones who might have lost a land line, but not now with our financial troubles.
it behooves me to behold
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jon-nyc
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Cheers
Mikhailoh
Jul 22 2009, 04:37 PM
We can thank LBJ and other social welfare programs for this. 30% of a city's population on food stamps. 22.8% unemployment.
That doesn't seem to make sense. IIRC, LBJ was President of the country, not Mayor of Detroit. If its LBJ's fault, why aren't Indianapolis' numbers as bad - wasn't he their president also?
In my defense, I was left unsupervised.
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Jolly
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Geaux Tigers!
jon-nyc
Jul 22 2009, 06:40 PM
Mikhailoh
Jul 22 2009, 04:37 PM
We can thank LBJ and other social welfare programs for this. 30% of a city's population on food stamps. 22.8% unemployment.
That doesn't seem to make sense. IIRC, LBJ was President of the country, not Mayor of Detroit. If its LBJ's fault, why aren't Indianapolis' numbers as bad - wasn't he their president also?
Detroit....highest percentage of blacks of any Northern city.

LBJ...the Great Society decimated the black family, and brought us waves of out-of-wedlock children and subsequently the high incarceration rates, failing academic scores and lack of economic advancement so typical of native black folk in America.

Therefore, Detroit has tuned into the poster child of what can happen to a city when social engineering goes awry...
The main obstacle to a stable and just world order is the United States.- George Soros
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Larry
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Mmmmmmm, pie!
Even the president of the Black Panther Party has stated clearly that the welfare system has destroyed the black community.

Of the Pokatwat Tribe

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apple
one of the angels
well..

it must be true.

LBJ should be in hell.
it behooves me to behold
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Mark
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HOLY CARP!!!
He is, along with FDR and Wilson.
___.___
(_]===*
o 0
When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
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jon-nyc
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Cheers
Could it have had anything to do with the collapse of the US auto industry?
In my defense, I was left unsupervised.
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Mikhailoh
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If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
Sure, it's a factor. But not the overriding one IMO. When there were no jobs in the south and were in the northern industries, people moved to support themselves. They no longer need to do so because the government will give them a subsistence living. So you have a whole lot of people living on the dole in a place where the economy is not coming back anytime soon. Throw in drugs, alcohol and hopelessness and there you go. A dying urban core.
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
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John D'Oh
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MAMIL
I blame Berry Gordy.
What do you mean "we", have you got a mouse in your pocket?
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brenda
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..............
It was already much like that in the mid to late 80s when we lived about 30 miles north of Detroit. It was scary even back then. It reminded me of the Youngstown, Ohio, area that had unemplyment of 20% or more in the mid 80s.

“Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.”
~A.A. Milne
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apple
one of the angels
Detroit is car industry challenged no doubt about it. Whole populations cannot just up and move in a short time frame. Urban cores are dying all over the industrial belt. I don't see the point of blaming welfare... that seems short sighted, partisan thinking maybe.

it behooves me to behold
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big al
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Bull-Carp
We went through that cycle when the steel industry in Pittsburgh collapsed. There were mill towns where practically everything closed. Some have recovered to an amazing degree; some haven't. Some remain in place not so much as welfare cases, but as senior citizen cases. They owned their homes, they were on pensions and SS. They had no reason or means to move away because they didn't need a new job. The Steeler fan diaspora is a sign of how many did leave to find work elsewhere at that time.

Where customers reappeared, so did the stores. A massive economic dislocation like the collapse of the US auto makers takes more than a weekend to work out. Detroit's problems have been a long time coming and they'll take some time to go away.

Big Al
Location: Western PA

"jesu, der simcha fun der man's farlangen."
-bachophile
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brenda
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..............
http://unemploymentadvice.blogspot.com/2009/07/detroits-jobless-rate-at-25.html

Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Detroit's Jobless Rate at 25%

Posted Image




According to the Michigan Department of Energy & Labor, in May 2009 Detroit saw it's jobless rate hovering at 24.7% (up almost 2 full percentage points from April 2009, and almost 10 percentage points in the last year).

This compares to Michigan's unemployment rate of 14.1% in May 2009 and the US Average hovering at around 9.4% for the same time. Clearly times are tough for motown, and with auto-sales still at multi-year lows, and Auto-makers and Auto-Suppliers filing for bankruptcy (GM, Chrysler, Lear, Visteon, etc...) it'll be some time before Detroit and Michigan start seeing a decline in the jobless rate and the ranks of the unemployed in this rustbelt state will be higher than the national average for years.


“Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.”
~A.A. Milne
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brenda
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..............
When hubby worked near and in Detroit in the mid 1980s, there was plenty of Detroit then that bore the hallmarks of the lifestyle described above: drugs, crime, poverty, welfare, etc. Commercial investment was not likely in those neighborhoods even at that time. This is not a new trend, just an extension of a long term pattern.
“Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.”
~A.A. Milne
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Mikhailoh
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If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
Nor are the auto industry's woes anything new. So we can't blame teh continuing decline of Detroit on that.
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
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brenda
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..............
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamtramck,_Michigan

Hamtramck (pronounced ham-tram-ick) was where hubby sometimes had to go for work, and he was always warned to be really careful where he parked. Thefts were an everyday event. Yet he liked going there to get goodies from Kowalski's Meats, and the bakeries were great. Every year on Fat Tuesday, they sold hundreds of pastries called paczki (pronounced ponch-key) and locally it was called Paczki Day. Man, those were really good!!

A scary area for crime at night, but during the day, what a lot of good stuff there.
“Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.”
~A.A. Milne
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