It's time to retire the 'Rust Belt' slur. They don't call it the Great Lakes for nothing

It’s time to retire the ‘Rust Belt’ slur. They don’t call it the Great Lakes for nothing

Mark Phelan
Detroit Free Press


Note to the national political press corps: Enough with the Rust Belt.

The term’s implication of exhaustion and decay may have fit the Great Lakes and industrial Midwest in the 1970s and ‘80s.

I wouldn’t know. I was in elementary school when my family moved to Michigan a couple of generations ago. I’m about to vote in my 12th presidential election, and, like me, the region stretching from western New York and Pennsylvania to the edge of the Great Plains, from the Canadian border to the mid South, has changed a bit.

Today, the region is home to tech hubs, thriving cities, leading research universities, billions of dollars in tourism — and the 21st century’s most precious natural resource, 21% of the planet’s fresh water.

....(snip)...

The Battery Belt and the Blue Economy

But still, the political press corps dusts off the dismissive “Rust Belt” label every election cycle, like hauling a 1970s leisure suit out of the closet.

News alert: It doesn’t fit any more. The region is enjoying billions of dollars investment to produce electric vehicles, while its abundance of fresh water stands in sharp contrast to increasingly parched regions of the West. .................(more)

https://www.freep.com/story/money/cars/mark-phelan/2024/10/10/rust-belt-label-great-lakes/75368166007/