The Middle-Class...As Seen From Hamilton

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Lines-Hamilton.mp3

February 15, 2013

As middle-income neighborhoods vanish from Baltimore, the northeast corner is holding on a little more tightly--just barely, though.

We picked two Census tracts near the Hamilton neighborhood from our "Lines Between Us" animated neighborhood income map (see below).

As you can see to the right, one has slipped from high-middle income to poor (the one with the red dot); the other has remained low-middle income (just to the left of the one with the dot).

Maryland Morning producer Lawrence Lanahan went out to Hamilton to see what the neighborhood's middle class prospects look like to two residents.

Demetric Farmer bought a rowhouse on Century Road in 2010 when he was working for a carpet cleaning company. Last year he got a bump up in pay when the Bureau of Solid Waste hired him to work at city transfer station.

Sheilah Ebelein is president of the Glenham-Belhar Community Association. She says the mix of jobs in the neighborhood hasn't changed that much, but that a middle-class income doesn't go as far these days. Her family, as she describes it, is "the struggling middle class."

Below, you can see an animated map of neighborhood income levels. It's from the US2010 research project. In an earlier segment, we spoke with one of their researchers, Sean Reardon.

Also part of this episode of "The Lines Between Us" is an essay from Maryland Morning senior producer Lawrence Lanahan. He looks at income inequality numbers for Maryland--and explains why our series "The Lines Between Us" has taken four months to start examining income inequality.

You can hear the full episode here.