Trinity students encountering this topic for the first time are astounded to learn about the stark economic disparity surrounding their campus. According to 2009 estimates from the US Census Bureau, Hartford ranks as the 4th poorest city among those with populations over 100,000 in the United States (excluding Puerto Rico), with an average family income of only $42,775 in 2009. Nearly three out of ten families in Hartford live below the current federal poverty line, currently around $22,000 for a family of four. But what is most striking is that this impoverished city is located inside the 13th richest metropolitan statistical area, ranked by more than 350 such areas across the United States. In the Hartford metropolitan region (currently defined by the Census as Hartford, Middlesex, and Tolland counties), the average family income reached $99,597 in 2009. When comparing the two columns in table 1, an income gap of over $56,000 separates the average family living inside the Hartford city boundary from those residing in the Hartford metropolitan area. 1
Click image to view full table of 2009 average family income for large US cities and metropolitan areas in a new tab/window. Source: US Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2009, in Social Explorer table T59.
But the region did not always look this way. In 1876, national headlines declared Hartford to be “the richest city in the United States,” relative to its number of inhabitants. When tabulating the value of all bank deposits, insurance company assets, and taxable property of homes and businesses, Connecticut’s capital city outperformed more famous competitors such as New York and Chicago. To be clear, this claim defined “richest” based on corporate (rather than individual) wealth. By 1903, scholars such as Hartford Seminary sociologist Alexander Merriam pointed out that local wealth varied widely in Hartford, between residences of “wealthier citizens . . . scattered in different parts of the city” and “a slum of almost the first magnitude” along the Connecticut river. Nevertheless, the central city of Hartford served as an economic engine for the capital region well into the first few decades of the twentieth century. 2
View Scribner’s Monthly 1876 feature on Hartford from the Cornell University Digital Library in a new tab/window.
Where did the money go? One way to visualize this spatial economic shift is to compare data maps from two points in time. While we lack income data for the entire region prior to the 1960 Census, one proxy for personal wealth from archival records is the average home value by town in Hartford County. Figure 1 depicts the values of the average residential dwelling in 1910, as reported by town tax assessors (Connecticut Tax Commissioner, 1911) with equalization adjustments, and the average market sale price for single-family homes in each town nearly a century later in 2007 (Capitol Region Council of Governments 2007). To allow for comparison across time, home values have been indexed to the regional average for each year (designated as 1.00), and towns with home values higher than the regional average have been shaded darker. Indeed, there are limitations to comparing historical data on home values from two different sources, and neither considers rental values. But when comparing the two maps side by side, the suburbanization of housing wealth is clearly visible. In 1910, the assessed home value in the city of Hartford (and neighboring West Hartford) stood far above the outlying rural towns. But a century later, the region has experienced a near-reversal of fortunes, as single-family home values have fallen in Hartford, and risen to their highest levels in today’s elite suburbs, such as Avon. 3
Explore an animated time-series map of home value index in Hartford County, 1910-2000, hosted by MAGIC at University of Connecticut Libraries, in a new window.
In some eyes, the once-powerful city-based economic region now resembles a “doughnut,” with a fiscally depressed center surrounded by a yeasty suburban ring. But a closer look at recent data reveals wider variation across suburbs than most assume. The Connecticut Metropatterns report dispelled “the myth of the affluent suburban monolith” by illustrating how some suburbs face high levels of fiscal stress, based on the cost of educating their population of needy children relative to their local capacity to raise tax revenues. 4
Explore an interactive map of racial change in the Hartford region, 1900-2010, in a new tab/window. Source: MAGIC, University of Connecticut Libraries.
Notes:
- “Average Family Income in the Past 12 Months in 2009 Inflation-Adjusted Dollars.” American Community Survey 2009 (1-Year Estimates). U.S. Census Bureau, via Social Explorer, Table SE:T59. ↩
- Charles H. Clark, “The Charter Oak City,” Scribner’s Monthly 13, no. 1 (1876): 1-21; Alexander R. Merriam, The Social Significance of the Smaller City. Hartford, Conn.: Hartford Seminary Press, 1903, reprinted in The Hartford Courant, July 21, 1903, p. 13. ↩
- Connecticut Tax Commissioner, Information Relative to the Assessment and Collection of Taxes as Given to the Connecticut Tax Commissioner by Town Officials: Hartford: State of Connecticut, 1911; Capitol Region Council of Governments. Connecticut Capitol Region Home Sales Price Report, July 2006 – June 2007. Hartford: CRCOG, 2007. ↩
- Myron Orfield, and Thomas Luce, Connecticut Metropatterns: A Regional Agenda for Community and Prosperity in Connecticut (Minneapolis, MN: Ameregis, 2003). ↩
I was shocked to learn how inequality has widened so much over the last few years. Hartford is one of the poorest cities in the United States and located inside one of the most impoverished cities. These cities are one of the greatest economic inequalities. I think that data on wealth tells more than data on income because wealth can be passed down from generation to generation and has a greater impact overall. The visual image of two maps side by side shows clearly how home value index in Hartford has changed over time in an effective way. The map shows that Hartford once had one of the highest home values a century ago.
I have never been able to fully articulate the socioeconomic inequality I see on daily. This short preview chapter just helped articulate some of the language I will use in the future. The data table that illustrates that Hartford has the third lowest averaged income is shocking. It places Hartford next to some of the more well known ‘poverty players’ like Flint, MI and E. L.A., CA. This will play into popular common knowledge when making a case for massive inequality right in our back yard. People think poor and they know Flint, Detroit, Rochester; Hartford is a little further off the radar. In addition, the fact that the Hartford-West Hartford-East Hartford area rates on in the top fifteen highest income areas adds fuel to the fire. This is black and white raw data shows that desperate and shocking economic inequality exists side by side in CT. The comparison to more well known cities will hopefully ignite an understanding that addresses the seriousness of the current situation in Hartford.
It has been an eye opener being a Trinity College student in the city of
Hartford. Though I was aware that Hartford was a poor city when I first
came here, I now understand that it is actually one of the poorest cities in the
United States. In 1876, Hartford was named as one of the wealthiest cities in the country (including corporate wealth), and had a very high home value index in the early 1900’s. The visual image of the home value index in the Hartford region shows how drastic the change was. It would be good to see the comparable recent wealth scale including corporate wealth, since significant industries are located in or near Hartford.
In addition, it is interesting that suburban residents are stressed about the high cost of educating the needy children in their areas. The existence of these needy children may mean that some of the poorer residents in Hartford are moving to the suburbs.
The information that is given in this essay as well as the MAGIC maps presented on this webpage both give valuable insight on inequalities in Hartford and its surrounding suburbs. As Pornpat and Fionnuala have stated, it is shocking to see the intense disparities just between Hartford, West-Hartford, and East-Hartford. Today’s “doughnut” visualization of the home value index is a great way to see how Hartford is incredibly more fiscally depressed than the surrounding areas in comparison to the 1910 map, which is essentially the opposite. The question remains, however, of where all of that money went. It is also shocking to understand the differences between the past and the current day Hartford. The fact that the city is no longer the “economic engine” for the surrounding areas is also an interesting piece of information. The “slums” are no longer located along the Connecticut River, and one has to wonder why the city now draws more individuals of a lower socioeconomic status rather than in the past, where it drew the wealthier citizens.
The map detailing Home Index Values has remained a good indicator of how wealth has shifted around the Hartford area in the last century. I found it interesting that in 1876 Hartford was deemed the richest city in the United States based on value of all bank deposits, insurance company assets, and taxable property of homes and businesses. Did this wealth leave just leave the city or did it leave the state entirely over the last hundred years or so.
The University of Connecticut MAGIC maps provide very clear visual evidence of the phenomenon of suburbanization. The decentralization of American cities in the post WWII years is commonly credited to well known revolutions in society, such as the installation of automobile infrastructure, the outsourcing of industry to foreign countries, improvements in communications technology, and the transition from the blue collar to the white collar as the standard of socially acceptable American labor. However, as evinced in parts 3 and 4, seemingly secondary factors that are seldom highlighted in history, such as school and housing selections, played a surprisingly heavy role in the process of suburbanization. At first glance, housing and school choices seem to be made on a private and independent level and thus have the appearance of not operating on a sweeping sociological scale. However, real estate agencies across Connecticut followed distinct formulas involving the variables of race and schooling to manipulate large groups of people to the suburbs during the post war year. This quiet influence on an institutional level thus played a large part in the draining of Hartford’s affluence to the edge cities that were the suburbs.
I had no clue that Hartford had once been deemed the richest city in America. It is shocking to see how fast Hartford had changed from being rich to poor. The Home Index Value map shows drastic changes from Hartford having some of the most expensive houses in the region in 1910 to having the least value in 2010. These changes happened all within a span of 100 years. All of a sudden families with money started moving out of Hartford and into the suburbs. Unfortunately, the move of money from the city to the suburbs resulted in many other inequalities for those that remained in Hartford.
Before coming to Hartford, I was unaware that it used to be one of the wealthiest cities in the country. However, I do not find it that surprising. Browsing through the Scribner’s Monthly article above, the author references the insurance industry and the Colt manufactory. Both provided immense capital to Hartford. Today, the remnants of a once wealthy city remain (including an array of stately buildings and former mansions), scattered among the realities of urban decay. What I found most shocking are the fiscal realities of the suburbs. I had assumed that the suburbs of Hartford were all relatively white and wealthy. After all, discussions of Hartford’s extreme concentration of poverty and high levels of racial segregation are common in classes. After seeing the home-value-index map and reading the text, I realize that not all suburbs are privileged. Like the disparities between Hartford and its suburbs, there are disparities among suburbs.
Since I started attending Trinity I was always considered the school’s relationship to the city of Hartford strange. I wondered how a school like Trinity, which is so wealthy, ended up in the middle of Hartford which, I have learned, is ranked as the 4th poorest city with a population of 100,000 in the US. Like myself, most Trinity students are aware of this fact. However, not all of us are aware that Hartford used to be considered “one of the richest cities in the US.” This chapter, along with the MAGIC map do a good job of showing just how much Hartford changed over time in terms of economy. The racial change map also goes hand in hand with this map (home index value) explain why the money moved from the city to the suburbs: race. As more people of color moved into the city, more white people moved out to the suburbs, taking their money with them.
I found this piece particularly interesting. As a Hartford resident, I’ve always known that I have always lived in the poorest city of the richest state in the nation. This is clearly evident in the difference of public schooling, and resources between Hartford and West Hartford for example, as many residents of West Hartford often times move into the town in search of a better school system.
As more and more people (of color, for example) moved into Hartford more of the white population moved out. The disparities between Hartford and its surrounding neighborhoods keep getting larger. Over the past few years, the gap has only gotten bigger as Hartford schools continue to produce students which are below grade level and behind in test scores.
Additionally, I saw how differences in child-rearing methods for example, contributed to suburban residents worrying much more about the schooling of their children then urban residents, given the fact that many parents of suburban children had a choice where there children can go, based on their income. Many times, Hartford and other urban residents do not have this choice.
While reading this piece it was interesting to see how drastic circumstances have evolved in the past years and how nationally given titles and spatial meaning have changed. For example when the authors mentioned that in 1876 there were national headlines which declared Hartford to be “the richest city in the United States” in the mist of outperforming more famous competitors such as New York and Chicago in value of bank deposits, insurance company assets, and taxable property of homes and businesses. These headlines were clearly based on a corporate level of wealth rather then individual wealth. I then went on to use the provided map of the home value in the Hartford Region, from 1910-2010 it was made very clear how the average home value decreased over time. What I found interesting is that this shift in economic wealth literally moved right next door. Home values in the neighboring towns of West Hartford and Bloomfield increased, while that of Hartford decreased. What I wish this article had touched upon is the exact migration patterns which have occurred in the State of Connecticut and how that correlates with the differentiating home values in specific time periods. For example the magic map illustrates that in 1920 the average home values were high, but why is that? What were the demographics of the residents at that point in time? What was the income bracket at the time? Then move forward to the year 2000 where Hartford home values are less then 1.00 and ask the same exact questions.
What were some of the underlying reasons for people moving out of Hartford (taking the wealth with them) and into suburbs?
What are some possible solutions to bring the wealth back to Hartford?
Besides housing value, what else contributed to the “demise” of Hartford?
All schools in the United States should provide a quality education whether they are urban or suburban. Hartford city schools are not as good as suburban schools because they cannot raise equal funding. The population is economically impoverished. Why is the city so ecomonically depressed? What efforts are being made to bring good jobs to Hartford? If Hartford could raise more funding, would school shopping be eliminated? No one should have to shop for a school. People deserve access to good, neighborhood education.
Thanks for your comment, which raises a common misperception among Trinity students about city versus suburban public school spending in the Hartford region today. For example, many of my students are surprised to learn that total expenditures per pupil were higher in Hartford ($15,951) than the wealthier suburb of Avon ($11,575), according to the CT Dept of Education CEDAR database for 2008-09. I teach about this in my Ed 200 Analyzing Schools course because the data challenge us to rethink our assumptions about what causes inequality, and perhaps I should incorporate the lesson into this public history web-book, too.
If Hartford has experienced the doughnut affect where it is a ring of affluent suburbs and a povety stricken city in the middle, how do we fix it? Would bringing resources and activities from the suburbs into Hartford help the property value/economic pitfall of the city?
Do you think the fact that the vast majority of people who work in Hartford don’t actually live in the city, contributed to the “demise” of Hartford?