The Broken Window Fallacy continues...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/financialcrisis/5516536/US-cities-may-have-to-be-bulldozed-in-order-to-survive.html
I can't wait to see what neighborhoods they'll tear down here in Philly! I bet all the displaced poor people will be rounded up and thrown into projects, hopefully they build a couple towers near me.
Just when the city starts to be gaining a head of steam in revitilizing itself the government decides they can do it better by displacing residents and replacing them with trees. Our last mayor tried something similar, and he funded it using debt. The targeted neighborhoods are still blighted (even more so IMO as many beautiful buildings were torn down) and the city's financial status is even worse than it was before.
Destruction breds prosperity. Quickly! Run to your rooms and destroy them to bring yourselves wealth.
'Men do not change, they unmask themselves' - Germaine de Stael
You know, I was thinking how this is simply a version of the Keynesian paradigm: they will "consume" the cities to create wealth.
We have to destroy the village in order to save it