By now, media stories recite a familiar litany of problems in post-industrial cities, especially in the Rust Belt: blighted neighborhoods, dwindling employment, fiscal distress, failing schools, rapid demographic change, aging populations, evaporating tax bases, and an opioid crisis.
Less noted is a widespread problem of political corruption, which afflicts many city halls-and makes it even harder to address the troubles plaguing the region.
As Scranton and Youngstown show, corruption and contentment have become institutionalized features of local governments: school districts hire teachers through patronage systems, municipal authorities overpay underqualified employees and board members, and city halls raise taxes to accommodate the same public unions that use their members' dues to elect the officials who negotiate their pay.
In Harrisburg, which filed for bankruptcy in 2011, the school board recently approved state receivership of the city's school district.
As the Washington Post reported, the Ohio city "Will become an unfortunate first: a good-size city with no daily newspaper of its own." The Youngstown metro area, long known for its disgraced public officials, will no longer have a paper to report the local news to its 500,000 residents.
"A city homeowner earning $24,311 annually, the median earnings in Scranton, spends about $137.65 of every $1,000 in wages on municipal, school, and county real estate taxes and local wage taxes," the AP noted.
Corruption only intensifies the Rust Belt's many serious challenges.
https://www.city-journal.org/political-corruption-rust-belt
Less noted is a widespread problem of political corruption, which afflicts many city halls-and makes it even harder to address the troubles plaguing the region.
As Scranton and Youngstown show, corruption and contentment have become institutionalized features of local governments: school districts hire teachers through patronage systems, municipal authorities overpay underqualified employees and board members, and city halls raise taxes to accommodate the same public unions that use their members' dues to elect the officials who negotiate their pay.
In Harrisburg, which filed for bankruptcy in 2011, the school board recently approved state receivership of the city's school district.
As the Washington Post reported, the Ohio city "Will become an unfortunate first: a good-size city with no daily newspaper of its own." The Youngstown metro area, long known for its disgraced public officials, will no longer have a paper to report the local news to its 500,000 residents.
"A city homeowner earning $24,311 annually, the median earnings in Scranton, spends about $137.65 of every $1,000 in wages on municipal, school, and county real estate taxes and local wage taxes," the AP noted.
Corruption only intensifies the Rust Belt's many serious challenges.
https://www.city-journal.org/political-corruption-rust-belt
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