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Thread: How do we create the "Bum Economic Index?"

  1. #1
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    Default How do we create the "Bum Economic Index?"

    The Chicago Tribune ran a page one story today on how the Midwest has higher unemployment and poverty than the entire rest of the country.



    The poverty rate in Chicago is about 21%, but income still exceeds the Midwest by a significant amount.



    The twelve state area shows much higher unemployment and poverty than the rest of the US. What the Tribune doesn’t report, and Crains did earlier this year is that economic growth in Chicago has barely averaged 1% for each on the last five years. This compares to the south of 3-4% and parts of the south west at 6-8%



    Small town Wisconsin and Minnesota seem to have positive growth but the starting base numbers are very very low. The rest of the Midwest has no growth or negative growth and has for some time. Indiana seems to be doing well.



    Things in Michigan and parts of Ohio are going to get much worse. The last bus and train is at the station in Detroit. If you are a dancer be on it while you can still get out.



    So to sum up. The Midwest has low to negative growth. High unemployment and rising unemployment. Immediate prospects bad. Poverty rate is the highest in the US with the exception of West Virginia and Mississippi. Wages static and except for Chicago much lower than the US average.



    Here are two things I’ve noticed in my travels recently. They are totally subjective soi can’t prove them I’m hoping some of you statistics types in New York can help out here.



    Lets create a “bum index.” When I’m in downtown Chicago, the amount of bums has increased from five years ago. They are on almost every corner, which takes some doing because Chicago PD rounds them up and takes them away whether that is lawful or not.



    I was in Washington DC a month ago and had not been there in five years. There was a high degree of bums on almost every street corner not patrolled by the Federal Protective police, and even some on the national mall museums which I had not remembered in prior trips.



    Is the bum index up in your community? How do your prove it with statistics?

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    Default Re: How do we create the "Bum Economic Index?"

    like everything else which is published by gov't agencies, one has to pick apart the statistics i.e. separate the exclusions / weighting factors / substitutions / assumptions etc. from the cold hard facts. A think tank, the Public Policy Institute of New York State, (which is actually privately funded), has just completed such a fine-tooth combing of official NY statistics, and has just released a report that equates Upstate NY to Appalachia !!!

    It's really not surprising to hear that the midwest is following in the footsteps of Upstate NY and other northeast regions where much of the industrial economic base has already been 'chased out' of state by high taxes, strict regulations, high costs of insurance / litigation / compliance, kamikaze union negotiations, yada yada .... which has already caused a significant portion of the 'middle class' to pack their bags, thus leaving behind the 'rich' and the 'poor'. In fact, because of the 'middle class' exodus, the only reason that Upstate NY had any population growth at all in recent years was due to the building of a number of new state prisons and the relication of tens of thousands of convicts from downstate NY to Upstate NY (with the convicts families moving to Upstate NY as well !)



    The report turned up several principles which probably also apply to Illinois. #1 Average income figures are misleading, because a very small percentage of very highly paid people in the area skews the overall average income to the upside even though the bottom 1/3rd of the area's population may be seriously poor. #2 Including 'transfer payments' in the income figures, i.e. Social Security checks, disability checks, welfare checks, other social program checks etc. also boosts the overall average income figures. #3 public sector employment growth (which bleeds the local economy since those paychecks are funded by tax money) can mask private sector employment shrinkage.

    This 'selective presentation' of financial data is an issue no matter what the nature of the gov't report. As to unemployment statistics ...



    At any rate, your 'bum index' is certainly a very conspicuous indicator ... and probably a pretty accurate one as well !
    ~
    Last edited by Melonie; 07-10-2006 at 01:24 AM.

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    Default Re: How do we create the "Bum Economic Index?"

    Correction: My source for todays article is page 1 of the Business section of the Tribune dated July 9, 2006, not Section 1 Page 1. I apologize for the error.

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