Urbanization_Trends

CheckPoint: Urbanization Trends Urban growth trends in the world’s poorest countries are always steadily rising. The population increase in the poorest countries is limiting them. Many poor people are looking for work in the same places because they all usually migrate to bigger cities for a better chance of a new life. Urbanization is migration of an increasing proportion of people from rural and suburban areas into cities. I know my mom decided to leave the south when I was a young child and move to New Jersey because she felt she would have better opportunities up North. She stated the jobs available in her surrounding areas were scarce and that it was hard to raise kids being a single mother with such low pay and little opportunities. She was able to obtain a good job in New Jersey and she was doing better than most her sisters and brothers that lived in the South. Today I see it the other way around. I am thinking about relocating to the south to have a better way of life. The North is getting crowded, the housing prices and taxes are extremely high, and most of the big corporations are moving overseas. As I research some southern states, I am already seeing the difference and many of them have salary ranges similar to the North, I will be getting more for my money as far as housing, and taxes are concerned. The city of Newark, NJ was once a middle class city during post World War II era. Then in 1967 came the Newark riots, which transformed the city in poverty because the city never returned to what it once was after the riots. Newark was known for manufacturing and big businesses and all that was gone. Today Newark is still trying to build the city Blue Cross Blue Shield Co is still a presence in Newark and so is Prudential Insurance but other companies left with the riots and never returned. It is over-crowding in Newark with Hispanics, Portuguese, and African American ethnicities. So many people are out of work and although the city is building and expanding, it seems all the jobs are going to people from other cities. Ref: Society: The Basics, Eleventh Edition, by John J. Macionis. Published by Prentice Hall. Copyright © 2011 by Pearson Education, Inc. From Riot to Renaissance': Prospects for Urban Redevelopment in Newark, NJ and Detroit, MI. Authors:Herman, Max1 maxh@andromeda.rutgers.edu Source:Conference Papers -- American Sociological Association