PG County used to be Ranked 49th Wealthiest County in America (place, contracts)

[truthhurts]

Originally Posted by TuborgP

I am not going to continue the debate because the difference in our opinions to me is not that great. Again as others have said how do you measure wealth and how much wealth does it take to live at a certain standard of living? If we agree on the operational definition of wealth then we agree on the big picture. I think what is/happened is that folks have a different perspective on what constitutes wealth. For me it is the number at the bottom of your balance sheet. I don't care how much you make if your debt exceeds your assets you are poor. There are areas of the country where people are not house poor but are ledger rich. There income is no where as high as Maryland and they leave their cars on the street unlocked at night.

Let me answer this question quality of life and why people move to heavily populated metro areas in particular DC-Metro.

1. White collar Jobs, Blue collar Jobs, Whte collar Jobs, and more white collar jobs
2. Highly educated work-force leads to higher wages paid
3. Higher wages paid leads to wage inflation and price inflation
4. Highly educated work-force leads to highly educated children
5. Leads to highly prized public school system
6. Due to highly educated high earnings work force providing a sufficient tax base to fund high quality schools
7. leads to more highly skilled job seekers lookign to relocate to the area
8. which leads to more growth and higher prices to live (supply and demand)
9. Growth leads to suburban urbanization and puts more pressure on the poor, lower middle class and middle/middle class.
10. Leads to people in the lower middle and middle/middle class taking flight to places that they can better afford

I am I on point thus far?

Anyway, if you're in the upper class or rich non of this affects you to the extent it does the lower middle class and middle/middle class. It is a class warfare issue in the DC area. The people that make 150,000+ really do not care its' the folks that are making between 50k-100k that are being pushed out and to the sides and they're having the quality of life issue.

These people cannot afford to live in the fat cat neighborhoods and buy a 1-2 million dollar house and in some cases when they do like you said they become house poor, but fact is most of the people that live in the "fat cat" neighborhoods are not remotely house poor.

The people that are house poor are lower middle and middle/midde class people attempting to live beyong their means, send their kids to private school, drive in a bmw, and buy a 400-500k house. Those are the people that struggle in a metro area. The poor do not really struggle, because they are subsidized by the county and state hence why they seem to multiple and never leave. It's the lower (working poor) middle class and middle/middle class that suffers.

In that sense I do agree with you and there is a quality of life issue for those individuals in that economic class. I could make 50k in DC plumbing and move to NC and make 50k plumbing which would be me a lot more etc and i could probably afford a house etc.. i get that point, but again you all on here keep attempting to lump the upper middle class into this argument.

I'm stressing the upper middle class and rich are not really all that affected by a lot of the financial issues the lower middle and middle/middle class are affected by.

Upper Middle class areas don't have much crime if any at all
Upper Middle class people tend to own
Upper Middle class people tend to be a lot older and more established
Upper Middle Class people tend to have high duel incomes in professional white collar jobs or own their own businesses

Just in closing it's a working poor (lower middle class issues) and middle/middle class issue, that's all i'm saying. The family that buys a 1.0 million dollars house in Upper Marlboro could have afforded 1.2M dollar house in Great Falls, VA and that's why i'm saying upper class and rich people are not affected by these issues to the same extent.

The guy that bought a 500k house in Springdale could not go to Potomac and purchase the same size house etc or live the same quality life etc....

[TuborgP]

Yup we agree and that brings us to the next crisis and that is Baltimore City filing a suit against Wells Fargo.
Lawsuit by city targets lender -- baltimoresun.com (http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/baltimore_city/bal-te.md.wells08jan08,0,45174.story?coll=bal_tab01_la yout - broken link)

As housing prices skyrocketed loans had to become riskier for people to be able to buy. As the percentage of income increased to buy a house so did risk. Is that the fault of Wells Fargo. If they had refused to make the loans they would have been accused of discrimination. With increased risk for a loan comes increased cost to get the loan. Now if history repeats just like Florida after the hurricanes companies became more conservative doing business there In Maryland. As credit drys up for all so will foreclosures ( no one to buy if you can't get loans). The national economy will love us and so will all you folks who pay your bills and have even more trouble selling your house. So what does that mean equity, shrinks even more and so does wealth.

[Domini24]

TruthHurts: My question is what the hell happend? In that 4 year span? This is a huge drop and i'm surprise (not really), but sort of shock this was not written up in the post etc.

Did the DC poor and immigrant population take over that fast? Pushing out the "affluent" black and white population into Ann Arundel County etc...Anyone have answers???

Actually, that's exactly what happend. You have more latinos, immigrants from Africa, and lower class African-Americans who got off of welfare or really are still on it moving into the county as in DC many projects are being demolished and upperscale, more affluent living spaces are being created. So many of the people who used to live in the lower income housing units are moving to PG. That is what is brining down PG although many areas are nice. As for crime???? Well, I had lived in PG for most of my life and have never, been robbed, had my car stolen, had a break in, been assulted. Nothing. Basically if you use common sense and stay out of certain areas than you are fine. Yeah, I am sure that some parts of PG do have crime but so do other surrounding counties. In fact, I feel more unsafe in N. VA with the MS-13 gangs roving around than I have ever felt in PG.

[lscalder]

Here is the real update on PG county. The county has improve alot. Lower income families can no longer afford to live in PG county. The county is getting rid of all section 8 and low income apartments.
The areas such as Hyattsville,Suitland which use to be considered low income is changing. The government is building upscale communities in those areas and attracting middle class families.

I live in Upper Marlboro and I have only seen maybe 2 hispanic families in the area. Illegals are in areas that is close to metro. Certain areas in PG county do not have access to metro so you find none to very small crime in the areas. If you notice crimes in Montgomery County are usually in the areas that are close to Metro such as Wheaton,Silver Spring,Burtonsville,Takoma Park,etc. As for Germantown and Gaithersburg I do not understand how illegals are taking over those two areas because I always thought the areas are not close to metro.

[North Beach Person]

Iscalder, I don't what part of Upper Marlboro you live in but there are a lot more than "two" Hispanic families in the area. As far as "they live near Metro", no Hispanic families don't necessarily. Look at Calvert County or more to the point, Anne Arundel.

[Camden Northsider]

Originally Posted by truthhurts

2003 49/3071 = Top 1% ....or in other words wealthier than 99.1% of all other counties in this country

2007 250/3071 = Top 8%.....or in other words wealthier than 92% of all other counties in this country.

Did the DC poor and immigrant population take over that fast? Pushing out the "affluent" black and white population into Ann Arundel County etc...Anyone have answers???

LOL - still in the top 8% of the wealthiest counties in America, and worried that it's because the "DC poor and immigrant population" 'took over' - you do realize that top 8% of the wealthiest counties in America = pretty damn wealthy, correct?

[lscalder]

Pg county is in the top 8% wealthiest county in America and people consider the county poor. Ok does that make sense.

think about this if you were in the top 8% wealthiest person in America would you or anyone consider you poor. No

[bowian]

If PG is trying to reduce the section 8 population as DC did (through renewal and gentrification), then it's a day late and a dollar short. PG should have done that right when DC was doing it, by buying the border apartment complexes and upping the rents.

I do agree that lack of commercial development in PG is mainly a race thing. And money is another part of it. Why locate a Nordstrom in PG when PG residents will gladly go to MoCo or AA to shop at Nordstrom. Maybe we need to wear fewer assets on our a___ and patronize more of the stores in PG.

[RFMD]

Originally Posted by CBK521

Hi, new here but just wanted to correct a few things.The county "can not" get rid of section 8 housing,if they take federal money there must be "section 8 housing" oh and the county is not in the real estate business they are not building any communities at all they are all being done by privet firms.I do know that those new upsale communities have a high rate of foreclosure due to the lack of jobs in PG county and there is some question about the PG county education system.

Looks like to me they will be in a better position do so than neighboring Montgomery county:

DataPlace: Chart of Pct. multifamily assisted units w/contracts expiring in 2009-2013 in 2004 in USA (http://www.dataplace.org/charttable/?cid=22949 - broken link)

[lscalder]

Originally Posted by RFMD

Looks like to me they will be in a better position do so than neighboring Montgomery county:

DataPlace: Chart of Pct. multifamily assisted units w/contracts expiring in 2009-2013 in 2004 in USA (http://www.dataplace.org/charttable/?cid=22949 - broken link)

AM I missing something. What are we looking for?