Grand Rapids brags its a great place to start a career, while ignoring the fact that nearly half the population is living paycheck to paycheck

On May 14th, the City of Grand Rapids posted on their Facebook page and their website a story that makes the claim, Grand Rapids named one of the best places in America to start a career.

The source of this claim is WalletHub, which is market/finances-driven tool that is utilized by the professional and capitalist classes. Back in 2022 WalletHub made the claim that Michigan was the safest city in Michigan to live in, although their methodology for making such a determination is deeply problematic.

For the claim that Grand Rapids is one of the best places to start a career, WalletHub states:

WalletHub compared the relative market strength and overall livability of more than 180 U.S. cities. We examined each city based on 25 key metrics that range from the availability of entry-level jobs to the average monthly starting salary to housing affordability.

If you are looking at housing affordability, then Grand Rapids is the worst in Michigan. According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition for the average cost of rent for a two bedroom place people need to earn a wage of $26.33 per hour to afford to live in Grand Rapids.

Entry level jobs are also significantly low in Grand Rapids, partly because the minimum wage in Michigan is $13.73 an hour and Grand Rapids is home to the ethos of screw the workers and start your own business, which is what they mean by entrepreneurs. According to a recent ALICE report – ALICE stands for Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed – 47% of Grand Rapids households are living paycheck to paycheck. With this kind of economic data, how can WalletHub claim that Grand Rapids one of the best places in America to start a career?

For the past several decades Grand Rapids has been advocating for professionals to move here, which is why there has been such a push to invest so heavily in the downtown. Grand Rapids wants upwardly mobile professionals to locate here, which is also connected to the Grand Action 2.0 projects like the Amphitheater and the Soccer Stadium. If this city has more amenities, it will attract people who are part of the professional class.

In the City’s post about the WalletHub claim, their post includes comments from City Manager Mark Washington and Mayor David LaGrand. LaGrand is quoted as saying:

Grand Rapids continues to grow because our business community keeps creating opportunities for the next generation. With a younger and more diverse talent base than much of the country, our city is in a strong position for long‑term success. I’m grateful to the employers who are investing here and helping young workers build their futures in Grand Rapids.”

This commentary is instructive, since it makes the standard capitalist claim that businesses are the ones providing opportunities to works, when in fact workers are the ones that actually do the labor, which makes profits for the owners. Besides the Class Consciousness 101 observation, the other problem I have with the claim from Mayor LaGrand is that he doesn’t cite any source or data to support such a claim.

Lastly, it is worth noting how the Mayor uses the term “talent base”, which is what the business community refers to as students. A few years ago GVSU developed a program to partner with several major businesses in Grand Rapids to develop a talent pool.  In fact, this is exactly what the group Talent First does, which is to see education as developing talent.