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The Alabama brand is a reason that it isn’t growing like GA, VA TN, FL, SC.
It’s not really their fault. GA, VA and NC basically ran a big campaign about how they’re the “New South” and not like Alabama or Mississippi.
That's true even though it is outdated.I didn't say that it didn't. A previously poster mentioned that the brand is what holding Birmingham back.When the brand is a mental image of Birmingham in the 60's. That outdated brand is not Alabama's fault it's the outsiders ignorance.
The Alabama brand is a reason that it isn’t growing like GA, VA TN, FL, SC.
It’s not really their fault. GA, VA and NC basically ran a big campaign about how they’re the “New South” and not like Alabama or Mississippi.
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Originally Posted by citidata18
It is kind of Alabama's fault though.
They chose not to compete with the other southern states for the economic investment states like GA, NC and TN have benefitted from.
It should be remembered that the idea of the "New South" did not originate in the post-Civil Rights South, but rather the postbellum South as a way to encourage the industrialization of the region in light of the abolition of slavery. No other city was better suited for this task than Birmingham which was founded in 1871 after the Civil War as a center of industry, being named after England's industrial powerhouse at the time. The mining, steel, and railroad industries fueled Birmingham's early rapid population and economic growth. Birmingham was blessed with good geography, having all of the raw materials needed to make steel in the vicinity and being centrally located within the South which made it a natural location for a major railroad hub. However, the downside was that its key industries were controlled one company--first Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Company (TCI) and then U.S. Steel after it acquired TCI--which made it vulnerable to the disadvantages of monopolization. U.S. Steel discouraged economic competition/diversification in order to prevent rising wages and, along with the nationwide extensive media coverage of the extreme political and especially violent resistance to the Birmingham campaign during the Civil Rights movement, constituted an economic double whammy for the city, especially with the decline of the domestic steel industry beginning in the 60s. U.S. Steel was based in the North and its leaders couldn't care less about how Birmingham's increasingly hateful and regressive reputation could harm it economically over the long run.
But to the city's credit, in the post-Civil Rights era, attention was turned towards UAB in helping to redevelop downtown and raising its profile in the medical and health sciences, which has clearly paid off. And it seems like distant history now, but before Charlotte became the undisputed banking center of the South, Birmingham had a legitimate claim to that title being home to sizable regional banks like Regions, AmSouth, and SouthTrust.
Elsewhere in the state, politicians were successful in steering federal investment and installations to Huntsville and private investment followed. However it seems that Mobile might have squandered a good bit of its potential unfortunately. Had it not wiped out a significant chunk of its historic urban fabric, Mobile could've be akin to Charleston and Savannah today in terms of tourism and notoriety.
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For example, when Delta was strongly considering Birmingham for their HQ and hub, the state legislature decided to pass a gas tax on aviation fuel, which any one with sense knows that only repelled them. Also, Alabama has/had this weird structure to their state legislature where the rural areas have even more control of government than the population centers like Birmingham. Again, Alabama failed to address this issue (surely on purpose).
It has also been said that Atlanta was always the frontrunner for Delta's relocated headquarters due to its East Coast location which was a major logistical advantage that Birmingham couldn't compete with. Also, that was during the U.S. Steel era when economic competition/diversification was prevented from occurring. That's why Atlanta also got the Eastern Airline headquarters. As far as the legislature goes, you pretty much nailed it. While pretty much all Southern legislatures have an issue of rural areas having a disproportionate amount of influence (much like how legislators from the rural South wielded a disproportionate amount of influence in Congress throughout much of the 20th century), Alabama was especially resistant to changing state law to be in compliance with the "one man, one vote" principle in the post-Civil Rights era in order to disenfranchise its heavily Black urban areas which became that way after massive white flight occurred.
And even with respect to state banking laws, Alabama was a bit late to the party. NC allowed statewide branch banking in the 1920's or 1930's, whereas Alabama waited until the 1980's to do the same. So by the time the banking industry became deregulated in the late 80's/early 90's to permit interstate banking nationwide, NC's banks were in a much better position to go on massive acquisition sprees--which they did, and several of AL's banks got gobbled up in the years afterwards. It still has Regions and BBVA Compass bank headquarters I believe, but they are no competition for BOA, Truist, and Wells Fargo's East Coast headquarters in the Queen City.
case in point: birmingham tried to pass a law which would increase the city's minimum wage back in 2016... only to have the state legislature pass a bill outlawing such a raise.
case in point: birmingham tried to pass a law which would increase the city's minimum wage back in 2016... only to have the state legislature pass a bill outlawing such a raise.
It's an absolute fact that Birmingham has had to fight its state in ways and over such a long period of time as Lexington, sparring with Kentucky, could only conceive of in its worst nightmares
It should be remembered that the idea of the "New South" did not originate in the post-Civil Rights South, but rather the postbellum South as a way to encourage the industrialization of the region in light of the abolition of slavery. No other city was better suited for this task than Birmingham which was founded in 1871 after the Civil War as a center of industry, being named after England's industrial powerhouse at the time. The mining, steel, and railroad industries fueled Birmingham's early rapid population and economic growth. Birmingham was blessed with good geography, having all of the raw materials needed to make steel in the vicinity and being centrally located within the South which made it a natural location for a major railroad hub. However, the downside was that its key industries were controlled one company--first Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Company (TCI) and then U.S. Steel after it acquired TCI--which made it vulnerable to the disadvantages of monopolization. U.S. Steel discouraged economic competition/diversification in order to prevent rising wages and, along with the nationwide extensive media coverage of the extreme political and especially violent resistance to the Birmingham campaign during the Civil Rights movement, constituted an economic double whammy for the city, especially with the decline of the domestic steel industry beginning in the 60s. U.S. Steel was based in the North and its leaders couldn't care less about how Birmingham's increasingly hateful and regressive reputation could harm it economically over the long run.
But to the city's credit, in the post-Civil Rights era, attention was turned towards UAB in helping to redevelop downtown and raising its profile in the medical and health sciences, which has clearly paid off. And it seems like distant history now, but before Charlotte became the undisputed banking center of the South, Birmingham had a legitimate claim to that title being home to sizable regional banks like Regions, AmSouth, and SouthTrust.
Elsewhere in the state, politicians were successful in steering federal investment and installations to Huntsville and private investment followed. However it seems that Mobile might have squandered a good bit of its potential unfortunately. Had it not wiped out a significant chunk of its historic urban fabric, Mobile could've be akin to Charleston and Savannah today in terms of tourism and notoriety.
It has also been said that Atlanta was always the frontrunner for Delta's relocated headquarters due to its East Coast location which was a major logistical advantage that Birmingham couldn't compete with. Also, that was during the U.S. Steel era when economic competition/diversification was prevented from occurring. That's why Atlanta also got the Eastern Airline headquarters. As far as the legislature goes, you pretty much nailed it. While pretty much all Southern legislatures have an issue of rural areas having a disproportionate amount of influence (much like how legislators from the rural South wielded a disproportionate amount of influence in Congress throughout much of the 20th century), Alabama was especially resistant to changing state law to be in compliance with the "one man, one vote" principle in the post-Civil Rights era in order to disenfranchise its heavily Black urban areas which became that way after massive white flight occurred.
And even with respect to state banking laws, Alabama was a bit late to the party. NC allowed statewide branch banking in the 1920's or 1930's, whereas Alabama waited until the 1980's to do the same. So by the time the banking industry became deregulated in the late 80's/early 90's to permit interstate banking nationwide, NC's banks were in a much better position to go on massive acquisition sprees--which they did, and several of AL's banks got gobbled up in the years afterwards. It still has Regions and BBVA Compass bank headquarters I believe, but they are no competition for BOA, Truist, and Wells Fargo's East Coast headquarters in the Queen City.
Excellent post as usual, Mute.
Two things:
1. (See bolded blue above) The headquarters of Eastern Airlines were in Miami. They put one of their major hubs in Atlanta.
2. (See bolded green above) Georgia was also late to the game with state banking laws - and Atlanta was poised to be a major national banking/finance center. However, like you said, the NC bank's better position allowed them to gobble up strong banks like C&S (the Bank of America Tower in Atlanta began construction as the C&S Tower) and, most recently, Sun Trust.
Unfortunately, you're correct. There's no other historical era in which the state played as prominent a role as the Civil Rights era, with relatively well-known cities (Birmingham, Montgomery, Selma), people (George Wallace, Bull Connor), and events (Montgomery Bus Boycott, Sixteenth Street Baptist Church Bombing, Bloody Sunday) associated with that awful period. The resistance to the movement in Alabama so extremely high and violent to the extent that it effectively displaced other Southern cities and states with their own newsworthy incidents during that period in the minds of many Americans, although most other Southern political leaders did seem to exhibit some type of concern about their the reputations of their cities/states if they pushed back too hard against protests and attempts to desegregate. Furthermore, outside of college football, Alabama just hasn't been in the national spotlight much for positive reasons in the years since, nor does it have any fairly popular tourist destinations or unique annual events that would help to improve its national image (including Mardi Gras seeing as though NOLA stole Mobile's thunder a long time ago).
Two things:
1. (See bolded blue above) The headquarters of Eastern Airlines were in Miami. They put one of their major hubs in Atlanta.
2. (See bolded green above) Georgia was also late to the game with state banking laws - and Atlanta was poised to be a major national banking/finance center. However, like you said, the NC bank's better position allowed them to gobble up strong banks like C&S (the Bank of America Tower in Atlanta began construction as the C&S Tower) and, most recently, Sun Trust.
Thanks for the Eastern Airlines correction. Atlanta was/is well-poised as a midway point for flights from Miami to the Northeast which worked in its favor also.
Charlotte gave many a city whiplash back in the 90's when NationsBank and First Union were gobbling up banks nationwide like Pac Man. Interestingly enough, when First Union announced plans to acquire Wachovia in 2001, SunTrust tried to orchestrate a coup and acquire Wachovia instead but in the end, Wachovia's shareholders decided to go with First Union. The BB&T/SunTrust merger brought it all full circle.
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