Editing Rust Belt (section)

==Background==
[[File:Total mfctrg jobs change 54-02.png|thumb|The change in the total number of manufacturing jobs in metropolitan areas between 1954 and 2002 (the figures for [[New England]] are from 1958 to 2002):<br />
{{Legend|maroon|>58% loss|size=60%}}
{{Legend|red|43–56% loss|size=60%}}
{{Legend|#FFA0A0|31–43.2% loss|size=60%}}
{{Legend|#FFC000|8.7–29.1% loss [US avg.: 8.65% loss]|size=60%}}
{{Legend|#80F000|7.5% loss – 54.4% gain|size=60%}}
{{Legend|#00F020|>62% gain|size=60%}}]]

In the 20th century, local economies in these states specialized in large-scale [[manufacturing]] of finished medium to heavy industrial and consumer products, and the transportation and processing of the raw materials required for heavy industry.<ref>Teaford, Jon C. ''Cities of the Heartland: The Rise and Fall of the Industrial Midwest''. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993.</ref> The area was referred to as the Manufacturing Belt,<ref>Meyer, David R. 1989. "Midwestern Industrialization and the American Manufacturing Belt in the Nineteenth Century." ''Journal of Economic History'' 49(4):921–937.</ref> Factory Belt, or Steel Belt as distinct from the agricultural Midwestern states forming the so-called [[Corn Belt]] and [[Great Plains]] states that are often called the "breadbasket of America".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.learner.org/interactives/historymap/fifty3.html|title=Interactives . United States History Map. Fifty States|website=www.learner.org|access-date=June 7, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170404164131/https://www.learner.org/interactives/historymap/fifty3.html|archive-date=April 4, 2017|url-status=dead}}</ref>

The flourishing industrial manufacturing in the region was caused in part by the proximity to the [[Great Lakes]] waterways, and abundance of paved roads, water canals, and railroads. After the transportation infrastructure linked the [[iron ore]] found in the so-called [[Iron Range]] of northern [[Minnesota]], Wisconsin and [[Upper Peninsula of Michigan|Upper Michigan]] with the [[Metallurgical coal|coking coal]] mined from the [[Geology of the Appalachians|Appalachian Basin]] in [[Western Pennsylvania]] and [[Western Virginia]], the Steel Belt was born. Soon it developed into the Factory Belt with its manufacturing cities: Chicago, Buffalo, Detroit, Milwaukee, Cincinnati, Toledo, Cleveland, St. Louis, Youngstown, and Pittsburgh, among others. This region for decades served as a magnet for immigrants from [[Austria-Hungary]], [[Poland]], and [[Russia]], as well as [[Yugoslavia]], [[Italy]], and the [[Levant]] in some areas, who provided the industrial facilities with inexpensive labor.<ref>, McClelland, Ted. ''Nothin' but Blue Skies: The Heyday, Hard Times, and Hopes of America's Industrial Heartland''. New York: Bloomsbury Press, 2013.</ref> These migrants drawn by labor were also accompanied by [[African Americans]] during the [[Great Migration (African American)|Great Migration]] who were drawn by jobs and better economic opportunity.

[[File:Per capita personal income change in metropolitan counties, 1980-2002.png|thumb|The change in per capita personal income in metropolitan counties relative to average U.S. metropolitan areas between 1980 and 2002:<br />
{{Legend|Green|income above avg., growth faster than avg.|size=60%}}
{{Legend|Lime|income above avg., growth avg. or below avg.|size=60%}}
{{Legend|#80F000|income above avg. but decreasing|size=60%}}
{{Legend|Pink|income below avg., growth faster than avg.|size=60%}}
{{Legend|red|income below avg., growth avg. or below avg.|size=60%}}
{{Legend|maroon|income below avg. and further decreasing|size=60%}}]]
Following several "boom" periods [[Gilded Age|from the late-19th]] to the [[Post–World War II economic expansion|mid-20th century]], cities in this area struggled to adapt to a variety of adverse economic and social conditions. From 1979 to 1982, known as the [[Paul Volcker|Volcker shock]],<ref name="Wolf 2022">{{cite web | last=Wolf | first=Zachary B. | title=This kind of shock to the economy will have consequences | website=CNN | date=July 27, 2022 | url=https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/27/politics/fed-interest-rate-volcker-what-matters/index.html | access-date=October 3, 2023 | archive-date=October 15, 2023 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231015094745/https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/27/politics/fed-interest-rate-volcker-what-matters/index.html | url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Statista 2022">{{cite web | title=Volcker Shock: key economic indicators 1979-1987 | website=Statista | date=October 10, 2022 | url=https://www.statista.com/statistics/1338105/volcker-shock-interest-rates-unemployment-inflation/ | access-date=October 3, 2023 | archive-date=October 15, 2023 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231015094746/https://www.statista.com/statistics/1338105/volcker-shock-interest-rates-unemployment-inflation/ | url-status=live }}</ref> the [[Federal Reserve|U.S. Federal Reserve]] decided to raise the base interest rate in the [[United States]] to 19%. High-interest rates attracted wealthy foreign "hot money" into U.S. banks and caused the [[United States dollar|U.S. dollar]] to appreciate. This made U.S. products more expensive for foreigners to buy and also made imports much cheaper for Americans to purchase. The misaligned exchange rate was not rectified until 1986, by which time Japanese imports, in particular, had made rapid inroads into U.S. markets.<ref>{{Cite magazine |author=Marie Christine Duggan |year=2017 |title=Deindustrialization in the Granite State: What Keene, New Hampshire Can Tell Us About the Roles of Monetary Policy and Financialization in the Loss of US Manufacturing Jobs |url=https://www.academia.edu/35530846 |magazine=Dollars & Sense |issue=November/December 2017 |access-date=March 12, 2018 |archive-date=December 24, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211224173113/https://www.academia.edu/35530846 |url-status=live }}</ref> 

From 1987 to 1999, the U.S. stock market went into a stratospheric rise, and this continued to pull wealthy foreign money into U.S. banks, which biased the exchange rate against manufactured goods. Related issues include the decline of the [[Iron and steel industry in the United States|iron and steel industry]], the movement of manufacturing to the southeastern states with their lower labor costs,<ref>{{Cite web |author=Alder |first1=Simeon |last2=Lagakos |first2=David |last3=Ohanian |first3=Lee |year=2012 |title=The Decline of the US Rust Belt: A Macroeconomic Analysis |url=http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/workshops/macro/TheDeclineoftheU.S.RustBelt.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131203001109/http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/workshops/macro/TheDeclineoftheU.S.RustBelt.pdf |archive-date=December 3, 2013}}</ref> the layoffs due to the rise of [[automation]] in industrial processes, the decreased need for labor in making steel products, new organizational methods such as [[Lean manufacturing|just-in-time manufacturing]] which allowed factories to maintain production with fewer workers, the internationalization of American business, and the [[liberalization]] of foreign trade policies due to [[globalization]].<ref>High, Steven C. Industrial Sunset: The Making of North America's Rust Belt, 1969–1984. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003.</ref> Cities struggling with these conditions shared several difficulties, including [[Shrinking city|population loss]], lack of education, declining tax revenues, high unemployment and crime, drugs, swelling welfare rolls, deficit spending, and poor municipal credit ratings.<ref>Jargowsky, Paul A. ''Poverty and Place: Ghettos, Barrios, and the American City''. New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1997.</ref><ref>Hagedorn, John M., and Perry Macon. ''People and Folks: Gangs, Crime and the Underclass in a Rustbelt City''. Lake View Press, Chicago, IL, (paperback: {{ISBN|0-941702-21-9}}; clothbound: {{ISBN|0-941702-20-0}}), 1988.</ref><ref>"Rust Belt Woes: Steel out, drugs in," ''The Northwest Florida Daily News'', January 16, 2008. [http://www.pcnh-d.net/archives/2008/DailyNews/2008_Jan_16/a2.pdf PDF] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160406142300/http://www.pcnh-d.net/archives/2008/DailyNews/2008_Jan_16/a2.pdf |date=April 6, 2016 }}</ref><ref>Beeson, Patricia E. "Sources of the decline of manufacturing in large metropolitan areas." ''Journal of Urban Economics'' 28, no. 1 (1990): 71–86.</ref><ref>Higgins, James Jeffrey. ''Images of the Rust Belt''. Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1999.</ref>