County Compared With Downtown

After concentrating on the economic data for Downtown Indy yesterday, I used the US Census website to map the same sort of data for the entire County.  Downtown is both a bit better for income and a bit worse for poverty than the County as a whole.

The map for the estimated 2012 mean household income is below:

To make the maps as large as possible, I had to cut off the County at the very top and bottom.



As you can see, when it comes to average household income, Downtown isn't anything special.  In fact, 5 census tracts in northern Marion County are about twice that of Downtown.  Taking the County average for comparison, Downtown does outperform.

The estimated 2012 per capita income is mapped  next:

Again, the five northern census tracts are about twice the income, this time based on a per capita calculation, than Downtown.  And again, Downtown isn't unusually high or low compared to other areas of the County. 

Turning to poverty rates, we see that Downtown is slightly higher than average.  The map for the estimated percentage of people who fall below the poverty line is below.

The Marion County average is straddled by the three Downtown census tracts.  The worst poverty rates surround Downtown.

Looking at the situation for children in poverty, we find that Downtown doesn't stand out.

The intensity of poverty among children is much higher than the population as a whole, and further spread out beyond the Downtown limits.

It is untenable that a fifth of our people and nearly a third of our children live below the poverty line.  We have literally spent billions of taxpayer dollars on Downtown and we seem to have created, perhaps, a slight oasis in the center of our County, but not by much.

A Tale of Two Downtowns

A brief news item by Jeff Swiatek and a follow-up by Erica Smith over at the IndyStar piqued my interest.

Indianapolis Downtown, Inc., now apparently going by Downtown Indy, on Tuesday, gave its version of how things are going in their namesake area.  I have looked high and low through the Googler, and I have been unsuccessful at finding their report, much less track down the data they relied upon.

The US Census does not have 2013 data for areas as small as downtown and nothing for 2014; the most recent are estimates for 2012.  So, where IDI got its numbers, I can't begin to guess.

According to Swiatek and Smith, IDI reports that downtown is humming along, with thousands of new residents whose household incomes average $90,000 a year, and who are employed in tech jobs.

The 2012 data from the US Census gives us a bit broader and more in depth look at the state of downtown Indy and the areas around it.  I pulled down the numbers and used the mapping function on the Census website for 24 census tracks.

The red line shows the generally accepted perimeter of "Downtown".  The numbers shown are those of the Census Tracts.

Downtown is composed essentially of three census tracts - 3910, 3542, and 3562.


Since Smith effused about all the tax money generated by Downtown residents, I feel I must add that property taxes are also used to fund police, fire, and equally important, schools.  Here is my best effort in sketching the various TIF districts in the Downtown area.  The TIFs are drawn in blue, and the 2012 estimated population is mapped.

The claim of an average household income of $90,000 is a bit high, compared with the 2012 US Census estimates, but not too much higher.

Note that the three Downtown census tracks top the household income in the immediate area.

But, that is only one way to look at income.  Another is a per capita view.  This is mapped below.

Viewed on a per capita basis, the income levels of the three downtown census tracts drop to numbers 1, 3, and 6.

One cannot look at income without looking at poverty rates.  The percentage of people living below the poverty line in each census tract is mapped next.

I find these poverty numbers stunning in how very high they are.  Downtown clearly is not spared residents who live below the poverty line. 

The data are generally worse when you look at the poverty rate among children.  Only three of the 24 census tracts show lower poverty rates for children than the general population, and two of those are Downtown census tracts.

What of the claims of tech jobs?  The Census has a few categories, but the one that seemed to fit the claims best included management, business, science, and art occupations.  The percentage of the workforce engaged in these jobs are mapped below.

The percentage of those in the service industry are mapped next.

So Downtown residents do hold more management and fewer service types jobs than the surrounding areas, generally.

What of the unemployed? The unemployment rate is mapped here.

There are some shockingly high unemployment rates right against Downtown.  The jobs being generated do not appear to be helping much beyond Downtown's perimeter.

While IDI likes to be a cheerleader for Downtown, the entire picture is somewhat different. 

By some indicators, Downtown does appear to have a better financial footing for its resident households.  However, unabated enthusiasm isn't warranted when one looks at per capita incomes, poverty, and unemployment. 

One would hope that the City's goals are to move everyone forward, and not just those who become attracted to new residences springing up thanks to taxpayer funded inducements.  To do that, we need a bigger view of Indianapolis than just the 2.6 square miles of Downtown. 

Indy Income, Wealth, and Poverty - 1990 to 2012

Over the last twenty years, much of the focus of City government has been on downtown.  Of course, we also endured the Great Recession in the last ten years.  So where were we and where are we? 

To get a better feel for things, I went to the Census Bureau's Census Explorer website and found some mapping functions that make the data kind of painless.

I'll go ahead and apologize right now for the quality of the animations - its the best I can do with the programs I have.  I also included crisper single versions of each map that appears in the animations.

The maps illustrate the data from the level of census tracks.  For each map, I added a blue line that shows three sides of the downtown mile square; I-70, the split, and I-65.

So - let's start with median income.  The data are from three Census years - 1990, 2000, and 2012.

Animation of maps of Indianapolis-Marion County, Indiana, showing median household income by census track for 1990, 2000, and 2012.

 What can be seen is that median income increased between 1990 and 2000, but was served a huge setback by 2012 - pushing median income throughout most of Indy back by more than two decades.  The mile square maintained its income base just fine through this time; after the infusion of hundreds of millions of public dollars.  However, there is a lot more to Indy than downtown.

Here are the individual maps with a greater definition - click on one to maximize.


Median Household Income - 1990

Median Household Income - 2000

Median Household Income - 2012

     

 To get another view, I pulled the data for the percentage of households with incomes over $150,000 - the wealthy end of the income spectrum.  Below is the animation of the maps, again from 1990, 2000, and 2012.

Animation of maps of Indianapolis-Marion County, Indiana, showing the percentage of households with incomes over $150,000 by census tract for 1990, 2000, and 2012.

Looking at the trend for the wealthy, we see that the same pattern as before - things got better through the 90's, but were pretty tough through the 00's.  However, between 2000 and 2012, downtown grew in the percentage of those with incomes over $150,000, unlike the rest of Marion County.  The broader maps, showing the donut Counties, have a similar pattern to the bulk of Marion County - suggesting it is not mainly a migration out of Marion County, but rather a lowering of actual income.

Below are the three individual maps used in the animation.

Percentage of Households with income over $150,000 - 1990

Percentage of Households with income over $150,000 - 2000

Percentage of Households with income over $150,000 - 2012

The Census website mapping for the percentage of households below the poverty level only allowed for census years 2009 and 2012 - so it is a very condensed timeline. 

Animated maps of Indianapolis-Marion County, Indiana, showing the percentage of households with incomes below the poverty line by census tracts for 2009 and 2012.

Between the two maps, we can see that things got worse for a lot of folks during those 3 years.  The mile square was affected only slightly - but the ring around downtown, still inside Center Township, suffered great increases in poverty.  All of the donut Townships saw increases in poverty, as well.

Here are the two individual maps.

Percentage of Households below the poverty line - 2009

Percentage of Households below the poverty line - 2012

With this limited information we cannot draw quality conclusions.  The loss of median income could be from net migration in of the poor, a net migration out of the wealthy, a loss of wages across the board, or a shift to lower paying service jobs being offered in the 'new' downtown - or any combination of those factors.  The shift to service sector jobs would have a more structural and permanent hold on Indianapolis than the alternatives. 

Regardless of the causes, which are important to figure out, we can certainly see much more clearly that the entire City needs attention, not just the downtown area.  While the thought that you can't be the suburb of nothing has a ring of truth to it, it is equally true that a downtown requiring a substantial, ongoing infusion of cash from an ever weakening surrounding base cannot long endure either.