Keepin’ It Dangerous and Miserable

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Hey everyone, hope you’re having a semi-miserable day! But maybe a shade less miserable than a couple days ago, because Forbes just promoted us: for this year’s installment of the business magazine’s annual round-up of places where icky poors live “America’s Most Miserable Cities,” Cleveland came in at number 17, an improvement from last year’s number 12 slot and our infamous rankings sweep in 2010. The boost may or may not be attributable to Forbes’ withdrawal of sports teams’ success and local government corruption as “metrics of misery” in this year’s study; instead, Forbes focused on violent crime, unemployment, foreclosures, taxes, home prices, commute times, population attrition, and weather. Forbes cites Cleveland’s population decline as a factor in our still-bleak status: “Only Detroit and Flint have had a faster exodus rate out of the city than Cleveland over the past 3 years.”

We’re also the ninth most crime-ridden urban area, according to Forbes’ auxiliary list of “Most Dangerous” U.S. cities. “Cleveland’s economic decline, location on prime interstate drug routes and large population of poor residents keep it among the most violent cities,” the entry elaborates. Because most other large U.S. cities are way out there in the sticks, far from the streams of drugs that course through the benevolent veins of the interstate highways. For instance, residents of Houston, which Forbes deemed the “coolest” U.S. city last summer, have to use an elaborate network of subterranean pulleys, carrier pigeons, paramilitary dolphin armies, covered wagons, and child slaves just to score a gram.

May Forbes deliver us from our miserable plight next year.

This article appears in Feb 20-26, 2013.