Two recent reports measuring health and socioeconomics suggest that Los Angeles, long the place where dreams come to flourish, can be a tough place to live.
The reports, one by the local United Way and the other by a national community health advocacy group, paint the city of sunshine and palm trees as a place in which people lead unhealthy lives and where over the past decade there has been little improvement for the working poor. And another recent study found that Los Angeles residents living close to freeways had higher levels of hardening of the arteries, or atherosclerosis.
"While there have been improvements over the last 10 years with increased health coverage, improved test scores and reduced crime, I find it discouraging that we are seeing little or no gain in key indicators like wages and graduation rates," Elise Buik, president and CEO of the United Way of Greater Los Angeles, said in that group's report, "A Tale of Two Cities: One Future."
Mark Ralston, AFP / Getty Images
People line up for free Thanksgiving turkeys Nov. 24 in Los Angeles. A report by the local United Way said the city was the national "capital of homelessness" and that too many residents were mired in poverty.
The report concluded that there are "too many failing to make it economically, too many struggling to make rent or cover mortgage payments, too many without the assurance of health care, too many without the education needed for tomorrow's jobs."
Among other things, the report, which measured change from a decade ago, found that:
- One in five kids in Los Angeles County lives in poverty.
- Los Angeles County has 250,000 millionaires among its 10 million residents.
- The county also has 1.4 million people living in poverty, with minorities -- Latinos and African-Americans -- particularly affected.
The United Way report described Los Angeles as the nation's "capital of homelessness," with nearly one in three full-time workers earning less than $25,000 a year. It found that more than 93,000 families live on less than $10,000 a year. It said the county exceeded national averages in most of those categories, but it did not compare it to other major cities.
The health study ranked Los Angeles 26th among the state's 56 counties for "health outcomes," measuring how healthy people are and how long they live. But the county dropped to 44th in "health factors," dragged down by access to health care and by the physical environment of living in crowded, smoggy neighborhoods. Again, that study did not rank major cities nationally.
Such issues, said one economist, are hard to fix in a region as sprawling and with as many separate governments as the Los Angeles area. Los Angeles County alone has 88 incorporated cities, said Jack Kyser of the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp.'s Kyser Center for Economic Research.
Some of those cities focus on economic development, and some -- like the city of Los Angeles -- don't, he said. Add to that the steady stream of new immigrants, many of them with relatively little formal education and with low odds of climbing the economic ladder.
"I go to a fast-food restaurant and see a young person working behind the counter or whatever, and I wonder what that person is going to be doing 20 years from now," Kyser said. "Probably much the same thing."
Yet many smaller cities do focus on economic development, he said.
Yet many smaller cities do focus on economic development, he said.
"We still have the opportunity to create a lot of good-quality jobs," Kyser said. "But you've got to have a trained work force. That's the challenge -- getting young people to understand they have to stay in school."
Still, Los Angeles County's population has held steady during the recession, suggesting that there's more to a place than the sum of its studies.
"It's the openness of the place," Kyser said. "Anybody can come here and fit in. It's open to new people and new ideas. With a little bit of skill, you can do interesting things."
"It's the openness of the place," Kyser said. "Anybody can come here and fit in. It's open to new people and new ideas. With a little bit of skill, you can do interesting things."
