Ten years after

Newspapers are full of retrospectives on the Panic of 2008, the financial crisis that led to the Great Recession. Phoenix and Arizona were one of the ground zeros of the housing crash, the result being the worst recession here since the Great Depression.

True, its effects were buffered by the safety net of the hated Franklin Roosevelt, including the copious amounts of Social Security checks that kept coming from the hated federal government. Still, unemployment shot up to nearly 11 percent statewide by 2010, slightly less in Phoenix and Tucson. The main industry, housebuilding, had been shot in the head. Prices fell 50 percent in many cases. Recovery was much slower than peer metros.

A decade later, single-family building permits are back at early 1990s levels. Construction employment is not only not recovered from the 2000s bacchanal but far below historic trend. This would be good news for conservationists but for the fact that much of existing and planned construction involves suburban pods in bladed desert, farmland, or forest.

So let others discuss Lehman Brothers, the Federal Reserve, how close we came to a second Great Depression, the good and bad of the response and recovery. What's so striking in Phoenix is how little was changed by this tectonic event. 

The panics of the 1890s led Arizonans, especially in the Salt River Valley, to band together in the successful quest to win the first reclamation project of the Newlands Act. The Great Depression caused political leaders to seek out all the New Deal funds they could get — Arizona received far more than its "fair share" and it showed in the recovery of the later 1930s.

When the end of World War II caused a sudden contraction, local leaders crossed the country recruiting new companies and industries, the congressional delegation bringing in Cold War defense spending. The result was the birth of a tech-based sector in our growing farm town that would be the basis for a strong middle class in the 1960s and 1970s.

The 1990 "Barron's recession" shocked the boosters. But even then, with today's confluence of forces starting to take hold, leaders established ambitious yet attainable goals to diversify the economy. The cluster strategy was aimed at high-wage, high-tech sectors. It ultimately failed as local headquarters companies were snapped up, sapping the essential base of leaders who can knock heads and write checks. And population growth was faster than ever.

When my columns stunned the remaining business and economic-development people into admitting the cluster strategy had failed, and Phoenix was shaken by the 2000 recession, Janet Napolitano surprised favorite Matt Salmon in the race for governor. The "sensible center," as she called it, had prevailed.

Alas, it hadn't. But the striking thing about today's lather-rinse-repeat "strategy" is how divergent it is from the past. Since the housing collapse there hasn't even been a pretense of learning anything, contrition, much less changing course. Even supposed great news, such as ranking on the defense economy, is dependent on seeds planted decades ago. None of those efforts are happening now.

Now? Same as the 1990s and 2000s. Population growth, suburban and exurban sprawl, call-center and distribution jobs, extreme politics, build freeways, ballyhoo any Bay Area company moving some low-level jobs as north Scottsdale/Goodyear/Gilbert/Chandler being the Next Silicon Valley! Lather-rinse-repeat.

Light rail happened (WBIYB) and central Phoenix finally is experiencing its best few years since the 1960s — these are sizable victories considering the forces arrayed against them. But the distortion of sprawl keeps pulling economic assets out to Scottsdale, the Rez, East Valley, West Valley. The Kochs, with the help of a rump City Council, are even hoping to kill light rail to south Phoenix, despite its overwhelming approval by voters.

This is opposite what is happening in top cities, where headquarters are abandoning suburbs for downtowns. It's so very mid-20th century. But it's what happens when the old stewards are gone and the vacuum is filled by the Real Estate Industrial Complex. Lather-rinse-repeat. It can't be too bad, Talton — people keep moving here!

I've saved a map from a report on metro Phoenix's changing demographics from Geoscape. It's arresting for any Phoenician older than 40 (you can enlarge by clicking on it):

Phoenix was a very Anglo city up into the 1970s, and today's supersuburbs didn't exist. Now, the metropolitan fracture is stunning. This isn't news to anyone who drives around, but the map provides powerful reinforcement. We're hardly the only segregated metro in the nation, but the extent is relatively new for Phoenix and brings consequences. They go beyond our Anglo friends who don't want to venture south of Camelback Road.

The orange (Hispanic-majority) zone is disproportionately poor and politically disenfranchised. It has the worst schools, thanks to decades of underinvestment in education and the charter-school racket siphoning off vast sums. It faces the worst economic prospects, both because of the education gap and the distance to job centers in the blue zones. Ten years later — after SB 1070 and the evil sheriff — the opportunity divide is greater than ever. But this benefits the Anglo elites.

Phoenix has a large number of distressed ZIP Codes, with the poorest people. Even 85003, my old code in the Historic Districts, had 20.4 percent with no high-school diploma in 2017, compared with 13.3 percent nationally.

The 2020 Census, politicized by the Trump administration, will be interesting.

Speaking of politics, nothing has changed. The Kookocracy is more firmly entrenched than ever. The Arizona Republic's Craig Harris has been doing outstanding work digging into this racket and its connection to lawmakers. Among them is Eddie Farnsworth, who's become a multi-millionaire off charter schools — while serving in the Legislature. Eddie Farnsworth! Some of these Kooks have been around forever. Term limits merely shuffle them around. Lather-rinse-repeat.

Meanwhile, the Red for Ed effort largely failed, breaking against the red wall and the Ducey-packed state Supreme Court.

The corruption goes much deeper — into the private-prison racket, prime land deals, and suppressed water studies.

Ten years later climate change is undeniable. Phoenix is setting more heat records than ever before. Arizona is on track for its hottest summer. Idiots climb the mountains in summer, requiring dangerous rescues. But no one, it seems, will rescue Arizona. With the Colorado River in danger, not least because of climate change, no one will speak the truth. The sprawl must stop. Water must be invested in shade trees in the center city. Rising population can no longer be the prime economic goal.

Never. Lather-rinse-repeat. The short hustle. It's Chinatown, Jon.

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

[Cal Lash]

Speaking of Chinatown.
"You got a nasty reputation" Mr. Talton, "I like that."

And the Singh High restuarant closes forever this month.

Good column. Jon.

[drifter]

Thanks Rogue

[Diane D'Angelo]

Astonishing to me the so-called "educated elite" is concurrently phenomenally stupid when it comes to this "lather, rinse, repeat" cycle. Or maybe it's just the usual combination of greed and sloth.....

[Cal Lash]

dont forget who Fast Eddie has to give 10 percent of them tax payer millions too?

https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/arizona-education/2018/09/10/charter-operator-lawmaker-farnsworth-set-make-tens-millions/1224276002/

[soleri]

Metro Phoenix plays the sprawl game because there's no good card left it hasn't either discarded or ruined. It will continue to deny reality until it can no longer be denied and then look for scapegoats. We humans are very stubborn although we're very inventive when it comes deflecting responsibility.

I thought of this early today when Trump rage-tweeted his innocence (and the guilt of Democrats) concerning the catastrophe in Puerto Rico. Of course, he can't be to blame for anything since humility and humanity are signs of weakness. The Republicans in Congress eagerly nod and go about the business of jiggering yet another tax cut for the rich. The hapless white identitarians in the GOP base take his word for it since reality is no longer reality so much as a contested talking point. Fox News will ease their qualms with bromides for the faithful: "why is no one talking about what Obama/Hillary/George Soros did"?

What is happening nationally has already happened in Phoenix where government has long devolved to serve the rich and tribally connected. People want low taxes, Latinos on the other side of town, tough law enforcement, and patriotic hoopla that reminds them who the Real Americans are.

Puerto Ricans aren't exactly real in that way, and they can't vote in federal elections either. If you tried to deport them, which country could you send them to? They don't even have oil, so they're costing non-kneeling Americans money. Ingrates!

Arizona decided a long time ago that its Hispanic and Native American heritage was a quaint tourist draw and not much more. Creating Ohio in the desert seemed to be the main point in our sporadic attempts at explaining Arizona to ourselves. Eventually even that failed, and then we decided whatever knock-offs of California's Good Life was good enough for us. Hence, Fountain Hills.

I think of this because there is no one America anymore, no encompassing ideal that explains US to us. We are marooned in our explanations waiting for the Strongman who will restore our childhood dreams in this diminished present. He doesn't have to be moral, or good, or measured, or knowledgeable. Just angry enough to tell us who we really are.

[ed]

Soleri's comment is spot on:
"Metro Phoenix plays the sprawl game because there's no good card left it hasn't either discarded or ruined."

For the few who still reside in Phoenix's commanding heights all that matters is more feet on the ground. Low wage folk still need shoes, just like rich folk. Bread and the other basics of life too. When they get old and retire low wage folk can spend just as much on medical care as rich folk. Medicine is the economic driver of about the only high wage business left in town.

Dropping the retirement age to 62 would add to the local economy but that ain't gonna' happen.

[Mary Tooley]

If only Jon's commentaries and Soleri's thoughtful additions to them could reach millions in America. But we have been systematically dumbed down for the financial benefit of a few. We might all need to follow Edward Abbey's example.....work hard to save what you love, and then spend a good, long time in the desert wilderness and enjoy being alive. Some of us will have to substitute the forests or seashore for the desert.

[Cal Lash]

Human destruction of the southwest is not limited to Phoenix or as some say to the “Valley of the Sun.” In Apache Junction and Mesa and Chandler and Queen Creek and on into Pinal County the subdivisions and condos and apartments and RV Parks keep rising. And as said here before the State of Arizona recently gave an OK to further destroy the San Pedro River and the Riparian area and water supply near Benson Arizona to allow for the building of hundreds of residential structures and accompany business support systems. And then we have noted pillars of community investing in properties for residential construction west of the White Tanks and on to California. The southwest population will increase for some time. Particularly with the eastern/southern raging climate change hurricane storms continuing wide paths of inhabitable destruction.

Speaking of Cactus Ed, I recall when he got in trouble for wanting to send “illegal or undocumented” Mexicans back to Mexico with a gun. One should consider ED Abbey’s comment was possibly about terrain destruction and about the Mexican government.

“Abbey is a gadfly with a stinger like a scorpion, the most effective publicist of the West’s curious desire to rape itself since Bernard DeVoto” Per Wallace Stegner in an intro to The Abbey’s book, “Good News.”

http://covers2.booksamillion.com/covers/bam/0/45/226/565/0452265657.jpg

In the End the desert will WIN. Hear their whispers on the wind “those who are gone.”

https://gnosticwarrior.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/hohokam-canals.jpg

https://i.pinimg.com/736x/7c/70/32/7c7032df6c9e6500c307ffb4c6d955fb.jpg

[Concern Troll]

Ten years of folly. Simply amazing the people in charge have continued to double down on folly. But given the vast amount of money to be made and thrown at the plebes, it will go on.

The republican bezzle is politics as usual.

And ultimately, it will fall because of the classic counterrevolution. And then eventually corruption will eat the successors. The wheel turns. The real questions are sustainability and the end of the current political system.

Those questions will far outlive Trump and Ducey, and will continue to haunt humanity for a long time.

The lifeboat problem will be next in the world, with the places that have overpopulations seeking to move into places they perceive as rich enough or better than what they leave. The African diaspora is the first big sign of the carrying capacity blowby predicted by a lot of modern malthusians. I would add that Mexico is now beginning to experience this as well, just looking at the lack of new areas to irrigate, and the increase in population without resource increases....

http://www.fao.org/state-of-food-security-nutrition/en/

2015 seems to be the turning point...I would also notice the number of people affected by food insecurity is now growing, and with climate change showing up in much of the world, commenting about Phoenix is going to be a small bagatelle compared to other places with very large populations.

I would personally estimate that at least 20% of the population of India will no longer be able to survive within 20 years in their current locations....so either 250 million people will move or die.

Think about it. One of the mitigating circumstances here is that the Pacific will generate a lot more moisture as the climate warms, so flooding here will be much more likely.

[Cal Lash]

Thanks concern troll.

[Chris Thomas]

If you're not depressed enough already, pick up a copy of Chris Hedges' powerful new book, America: The Farewell Tour. The first chapter is deadly accurate and almost unbearable to read.

[Barbara West]

What has happened in Phoenix is happening all over America. We have allowed it. We have sat back and actually allowed a force outside of us to take our very soul. Dig deep into the ground around Phoenix or ANYWHERE and find the dirt and the bones and the rocks. THey can tell the story if you can stop, put down your cell phone and listen. I'll meet you there.