re: #275 Ian G.

Nah, let’s play the anecdote game.

How come Cleveland, in low-tax Ohio, is so much more of a basket case than Pittsburgh, in high-tax Pennsylvania, especially when there’s so much similarity between the two cities (industrial history, size, higher ed establishments, climate, etc.)?

Maybe, contra what wingers would have you believe, there’s more to how well a metro area is doing economically than just tax rates?

To build on what lawhawk was saying, Pittsburgh and Rochester had to make due with existing infrastructure, unlike Texas, which has almost no regulation and the only path to growth is upwards and outwards.

I’d argue that this the planned nature and the high standard of architecture in these cities make it a lot easier to revitalize than miles of abandoned strip malls and industrial parks.

Pittsburgh and Rochester at their worst still carried a kind of grace that Ft. Worth doesn’t even have in its “prosperity”.