Controlling a City ' s Wealth

Oakland, California, is the "urban crisis" in microcosm. Unemployment is high and average incomes low. The city has more than its share of hard-core poor, who hardly get by on welfare payments, and a. large number of blue-collar workers, who live only a· little above the poverty line. Housing and education are deteriorating. Public transportation is inadequate, medical care hard to come by, the environment increasingly foul. The city, so runs the conventional wisdom, is too "poor" to ·provide what its citizens need. As with Oakland, so with most American cities: hence the "urban crisis." Yet a glance at Oakland, while confirming that there is a good deal of poverty, would turn up a good deal of wealth as well. Many of those who work in Oakland earn substantial, even handsome, salaries. More to the point, Oakland is by no means economically underdeveloped. It is a leading transportation, commercial, and industrial center, and it boasts more than the usual complement of banks, insurance companies, and real e~tate developers. Few of theie are on the verge of bankruptcy, as the impressive downtown offices testify. Wages and salaries are being