The Center Street Neighborhood — a tight-knit, predominantly Black community — was destroyed by highway construction and city urban renewal projects. Families and businesses went into debt, shifting from entrepreneurship and owning to renting, which had a lasting effect on generational wealth.
Our sense of community is tied to economic opportunity and we explore this by starting with Richard Duncan, a former resident of the Center Street neighborhood, and his wife and documentary partner, Madison Deshay-Duncan. They have an upcoming documentary, The Center Street Story: Urban Renewal Retrospective.
Then, economist and historian Joshua Rosenbloom joins the conversation to reflect on the wealth inequality of the Gilded Age and what that era has in common with our own times.
Finally, we look at how rural jobs in meat packing and manufacturing have changed over the last several decades as unions have lost power and laborers aren't able to reach middle class security on their wages. Iowa Federation of Labor AFL-CIO President Charlie Wishman shares that there is still resentment left over from the pandemic, when he said essential workers were treated as expendable.
Guests:
- Madison DeShay-Duncan, president at Community Legacy Matters, co-director of The Center Street Story: Urban Renewal Retrospective
- Richard Duncan, historian, narrator and co-director of The Center Street Story: Urban Renewal Retrospective
- Joshua Rosenbloom, research associate, National Bureau of Economic Research, professor in the Department of Economics at Iowa State University
- Charlie Wishman, president, Iowa Federation of Labor AFL-CIO
