Chicago

Chicago is One Kind of Town

The geographical resorting of America continues apace–the separation of peoples based broadly on ideology.  read more »

Feudal Future Podcast — Chicago & Positioning: Becoming the Next Middle Class Hub

On today's episode of Feudal Future hosts Joel Kotkin and Marshall Toplansky are joined by Pete Saunders. Pete Saunders is a writer and researcher whose work focuses on urbanism and public policy.  read more »

The Monuments of Gentry Liberals in Chicago: White Students Dominate the Test-Admittance Public Schools

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Chicago’s population peaked a long time ago.  In 1950, Chicago had 3. 6 million people. Recent estimates put Chicago’s population at 2.7 million. With the growth of American suburbs, many Chicago families have fled to public schools in the suburbs. Chicago’s horrible public schools have been an embarrassment for Chicago’s elite.  read more »

Watch Chicago’s Middle Class Vanish Before Your Very Eyes

Note: I owe both the concept for this measurement of income segregation and much of the actual data – all of it, except for 2012 – to Sean Reardon andKendra Bischoff, who wrote a series of wonderful papers on the subject and then were kind enough to send me a spreadsheet of their data from Chicago a while ago. The maps, however, are mine, as is all the data from 2012, and any mistakes in them or in the interpretation of the data is entirely my responsibility.

I think one reason I’ve felt less than compelled by Chicagoland, CNN’s reasonably well-made documentary series, is that its tale-of-two-cities narrative is so worn, so often repeated, that it’s become a little dull. Not the actual fact of inequality – which only seems to cut deeper over time – but its retelling.  read more »

Well-Heeled in the Windy City

A couple weeks ago, noting the apparently immunity of global city Chicago to problems elsewhere in the city, I asked the question: What happens when global city Chicago realizes there’s a good chance it can simply let the rest of the city fail and get on with its business?

I’d argue we’re seeing the results right before our eyes.  read more »

Rahm Emanuel’s Chicago More Violent than Al Capone’s Chicago and the Old West

Since Rahm Emanuel entered the political scene years ago, he’s been a master at manipulating the press to his benefit. A pliant media has largely gone along with whatever talking point Emanuel desired. Lately, some of the media has begun to put the spotlight on violent Chicago with its rather high murder rate.  read more »

Chicago Tribune Joins the Ranks of High-speed Rail Critics

Last year, in congressional testimony before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee hearing on high speed rail, we cited the Chicago-to-St.Louis "high-speed rail" project as an example of the Administration's wasteful use of its economic stimulus money. We pointed out that the $1.4 billion program of track upgrades will allow top speed of 110 mph but will raise average speeds of Amtrak trains between Chicago and St. Louis by only 10 miles per hour, from 53 to 63 mph.  read more »

5000 Public School Teachers Could Lose Their Jobs in Chicago

The Democratic Party in Chicago is at war. The one party town is seeing an important element of the coalition on strike. Rahm Emanuel is at war with a real adversary:  teacher’s union boss Karen Lewis. Last year Lewis began laying the groundwork for a strike as witnessed in this Chicago Magazine interview with reporter Carol Felsenthal:  read more »

New Chicago Machine Scam In the Works: Eminent Domain Seizure of ‘Underwater’ Mortgages

With property values down 40% since 2006 in Chicago, the Chicago Democrat Machine has a new scam brewing. The Chicago Sun-Times reports:

Should Chicago use its sweeping condemnation powers to help stem the foreclosure epidemic — paving the way for underwater mortgages to be written down and repackaged under terms more affordable to struggling homeowners?  read more »

Historic Day in Corruption History: Two Governors From Same State in Jail at Same Time

Today, history will be made. Rod Blagojevich is going to jail in Littleton, Colorado.  read more »