"You starve it, or make it operate on a credit card, and you starve the country."
A good case study of this effect is the city of Galveston. In the 1800s, it was one of the wealthiest cities in the country. Per capita, probably the wealthiest. It was the third busiest port in the country. Not only could they afford to rebuild after the Great Hurricane of 1900, they also raised the city by an average of 3 feet. And it has been very influential, some of the companies that were founded by Islanders are well known. American National Insurance, Borden's, Stewart Title and others. But, that isn't the case any more. Unemployment is high, wages are low. Its influence is about what you would expect out of a beach town of around 60,000. The Islanders blame the Great Hurricane for the decline, but, in reality it was on the decline before then. What happened? They stopped investing in the port. They were content with what they had and were satisfied with letting business go to Houston. Eventually, the port of Houston swallowed all of their business and now owns the port in Galveston. Now the biggest employer is UTMB and they came close to shutting it down in the wake of Ike. And that would have been a death blow. |
