Philadelphia by the Numbers

-A picture from a PHL ghetto. (No, that's not AG or anyone she knows in the photo.)

I have spent a lot of time bemoaning Mississippi and southern states as of late. After reading yesterday's Currents section in the Philadelphia Inquirer, I thought we should discuss Philadelphia. You know, since it's the city I live in:

21% of Philadelphia residents have a college degree. That is compared to 28% (National Average that has climbed 3% over the past five years.) Washington DC is highest at 48% followed closely by Boston at 40% according to the Pew Charitable Trust.

Smoking is on the decline in America going from about 22% of the population to under 20% between 2000 and 2008. Philadelphia went from about 25% to 28% in the same time period. Clearly, we need to create public health campaigns around this issue.

Schools are in decline as the budget crisis rolls on in Philadelphia. The good news is that the perecentage of students considered proficient or advanced in math in reading increased between 2002 and 2008.

Despite the the 19990s being a time of economic boom in America, Philadelphia's number of poor continued to increase. The poor are a majority in the city. The median household income was $25,431 in 2007, which is less than half of the surrounding suburbs income (Mainline and Bucks Co.) and about $15,000 less than the national average.

Nearly 1 in 5 city families and 1 in 4 residents of the city are residing in poverty.

The rest of the report can be viewed here.

What does all of this mean for a city that is in decline and facing a lot of hardships? It means we need to focus beyond casinos, which now Governor Jack Markell (D) in Delaware is talking about too. We need to encourage business and industry growth in the city as more and more companies seek to move out of the high rent district of Manhattan. We need to encourage the students at local colleges like UPENN, Drexel, and Temple to stay in the city after graduating. The manufacturing jobs that were the cornerstone of middle class America left this country. They were replaced by low wage jobs in the service sector. Jobs at McDonald’s, were once just a fringe of the economy. Only kids in high school worked those kinds of jobs. Sadly, these McJobs are a reality for a good portion of the American public. We need to change that.

Most of all, we need to remove Nutter at the city level, expect more out of Governor Rendell at the state level, and remove Senator Specter at the national state level. Largely because Specter (R-PA) came out against card check last week. This was a major blow to unions in America. With less than 25% of residents in the city earning a degree in higher education, there is even more of a need for unions in the state to off set poverty. Unions level the playing field for the undereducated, the poor, and blue collar works. There is more than enough manufacturing here that is not unionized to save the city! It is imperative that Philadelphia and other cities in PA work towards change while preserving unions as a bridge tool.