The Comeback Read Free Page A

lobbyists are formally registered to lobby the federal government. Interest groups, including unions, businesses, and the AARP, reported spending $3.5 billion in 2009 to influence the federal government, and likely even more was spent in 2010.

    American Bar Association statistics reveal that the number of “active, resident” lawyers in Washington, D.C., jumped from 46,689 in 2008 to 48,456 in 2009. This increase is the second highest in the nation, with only New York adding more lawyers. Washington, D.C. now has one lawyer for every twelve D.C. residents. This is more than ten times the rate of the next most-lawyered state, New York, which has one lawyer for every 127 citizens.
    Why the large number and growth in lawyers and lobbyists? The Obama Administration and Congress have been legislating and regulating to a degree unparalleled in our lives. This fuels the Washington metropolitan area economy, making it the nation’s wealthiest area by almost every definition, even as the rest of the national economy struggles. And the Washington boom will continue as the federal government hires thousands of new employees to implement the mandates of the health-care and financial reform bills as well as many little-noticed new bills.
    Forbes.com reports that six of the ten wealthiest counties in the nation surround Washington, D.C. Washington, that most unique of American cities, is ever growing, ever expanding. 2 It does not know recessions because it does not produce anything consumers can reject. You must purchase what Washington is selling. You pay for your required purchases with taxes, which feed Washington more than any other city in the country.
    Indeed, it is the best of times for our nation’s capital.
    For Detroit, it is the worst of times and has been for some time. Over the last fifty years, the city has lost more than half its population. Despite an influx of Washington stimulus cash, the 2010 Census shows that Detroit is still bleeding residents, losing over 1,700 people in 2009, second only to Cleveland. 3 As they say, people vote with their feet, and the flight from Detroit mirrors a larger national trend, with states like Michigan, New York, and Illinois suffering net population losses over the past ten years. People go where there’s opportunity, and there simply isn’t any in Detroit.

    What a difference a couple of decades make. In my lifetime, albeit when I was young, Detroit represented the epitome of the American Dream. It was a destination city for entrepreneurs, innovators, executives, blue-collar workers, and thousands of poor African Americans fleeing the bigotry of the Jim Crow South. Now, the children of those dream-seekers can’t wait to leave.
    As I leave the Detroit airport to see my family, the anecdotal evidence bears this out. The unprecedented number of “for sale” signs, abandoned buildings, and empty lots tell the story of Detroit’s vast decline. ABC News reported that, in March 2010, more than 33,000 Detroit homes were believed to be vacant. 4
    Meanwhile, the economic numbers reveal a city struggling with high unemployment and a flaccid business environment. In the summer of 2010, Detroit’s unemployment rate was over 20 percent, twice as high as the national average. And even before the current economic downturn, Detroit led major metropolitan areas in unemployment trauma. Between 2000 and the first quarter of 2010, Detroit lost over 270,000 jobs, making it the worst out of 363 job markets measured by the U.S. Conference of Mayors.
    Of course, Detroit’s decline is tied to the absolute and relative decline of the Big Three auto manufacturers, which remain the city’s largest employers. Fifty years ago, these distinctly American companies were the Dells, Microsofts, and Apples of the American economy. Although the United States didn’t invent the automobile, this country made it its own—indeed, never in the history of mankind had such an advanced technological achievement been