Camden, New Jersey
in America is not like Camden in England, which is to say a dump or like Camden in Australia which is all right. Camden, New Jersey is seriously bad. It is also seriously black with a smattering of Hispanics. Would you want to live in Camden, the one in America? Nobody else does either. But why take my word for it when you can go to the source; not the Wikipedia but the real thing. Here goes.Directly in the shadow of the glittering skyline of Philadelphia, Camden has long suffered the indignities that poverty breeds. A drive through the streets of the 9-square mile city reveals a moonscape of crumbling infrastructure and abandoned homes, nearly 4,000 in all..........
Camden was once a manufacturing boomtown, home to RCA Victor, Campbell’s Soup and the biggest shipbuilding company in the world. But once industrial jobs began drying up decades ago—as they did in so many other cities across the United States—many people left for greener pastures.
Then came a crushing blow: the race riots of 1969 and 1971, which left the city mortally wounded. In the decades that followed, civic corruption and mismanagement rendered Camden increasingly poor and violent. Three mayors have been indicted in the past few decades, adding to the sense of hopeless among residents........
But it’s hard for people like Rodriguez to scrape together enough funds to leave. Roughly 30 to 40 percent of Camden’s citizens are out of work. {snip} About 42 percent of Camden’s population lives below the poverty line, with the average income hovering around $26,000 a year. {snip} “America has decided to concentrate its poor,” said Father Doyle. “The wall around Camden is very high, it’s an economic wall. You can’t get over it.”
The “walls” of Camden hold in a population that is 48 percent black and 47
percent Hispanic [ leaving 5 percent people - Editor ].
UNQUOTE
They were willing to work but firms went, work went to China.
It is the same all over America.