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107 Pol. Sci. Q. 1 (1992-1993)

handle is hein.journals/pclscceqry107 and id is 1 raw text is: Washington Abandons the Cities DEMETRIOS CARALEY The New Federalism of the Reagan and Bush administrations has succeeded in reversing fifty years of American domestic policy by cutting back the constellation of federal grants to local and state governments that the federal government used to help poor people and needy city jurisdictions. These cutbacks accelerated the drift of large cities, especially the older ones of the East and Middle West, into underserviced, violence-ridden, crack-infested, homeless-burdened, bankruptcy-skirting slum ghettos. On top of this, the Bush administration's in- ability to maintain economic prosperity combined with its unwillingness to engage in traditional countercyclical spending through grants to city and state govern- ments has brought many cities their worst fiscal and service crises since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Even at the beginning of the Reagan administration in 1981, the social and economic conditions in the nation's large cities had not been robust. Poverty rates, the percentage of city populations living in poverty areas,' and violent crime rates had been high both in historical terms and in comparison to suburban rings where better-off families and thriving businesses were moving. (See Figures 1 and 2.) Among some subgroups of the central city population, the poverty rate was so high as to be almost unbelievable: for black children under age six in female headed families: 75 percent; for similar white children: 62 percent. The economic bases of central cites had been weak and unable at existing tax rates to generate the revenues needed to maintain-let alone improve-their low I The census bureau defines poverty areas as census tracts where over 20 percent of the population is below the poverty threshold. The rest of the population in those tracts, while not poor itself, is exposed to the many destructive behaviors and attitudes of the poor. DEMETRIOS CARALEY is Janet Robb Professor of the Social Sciences at Barnard College and the Graduate Faculties of Columbia University. He has published books and articles on both national and urban politics and policies. Political Science Quarterly Volume 107 Number 1 1992

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