Middle class are below knowledge
Using detailed data from the American Community Survey, it examines the residential locations of today's three major classes:
the shrinking middle of blue-collar workers;
the rising ranks of the knowledge, professional, and creative class; and
the even larger and faster-growing ranks of lower-paid service workers.
Such dramatic change has stoked considerable demographic shifts, which mirror the region's class and racial divide. "On one hand, you see a 'new' Detroit. Young, white, educated, and employed are the characteristics of those who are taking a chance on the city," argued Karen Dumas, former press secretary to Mayor Bing in the Detroit News this past summer. "They stand in stark contrast to native Detroiters -- most of whom are African-Americans and many who are undereducated and unemployed -- who have stayed and stuck it out over the years, through challenge and controversy." The challenge for the city and region moving forward is to spur further urban economic revitalization while bridging this class divide. That will require greater cooperation between the city and its suburbs.
Sidebar by AARON FOLEY
Jason Lorimer, according to his HuffPo bio, is the founder and CEO of Dandelion. Dandelion, as Lorimer explains, is "a think-then-do tank made up of designers, strategists and technologists...a proven team of entrepreneurs with an intimate understanding of sustainable business models that build, connect and celebrate the change they want to see more of in the world."
I still have no idea what exactly Dandelion does, but according to Model D, Dandelion is doing some big things. "I am not from Detroit," Morimer writes in Model D this week, "Yet, in the 14 months since I have lived and loved in this place, my team and I have managed to gain access to and partnered with a myriad of civic-minded institutions to provide new ideas and measurable outcomes in the communities they wish to affect." And to prove he's really about that life, he took a photo in front of the train station.