Add This to Your Vocabulary: The Grey Belt
I always love learning new lingo. I’ve heard parts of the US described as the “sun belt”, the “rust belt” and the “corn belt” to name a few. Now I’ve learned that I live in the “sun belt” and next door to the “Grey Belt.” Thanks to my friend and colleague Professor Mark Bauer for sending me the Associated Press article, Fla.’s ‘Gray Belt’ a glimpse at nation’s future.
According to the article, Citrus County, Florida is the heart of the “Grey Belt” in which “more than a third of residents are senior citizens, one of the highest rates in the nation… The county isn’t simply a stereotype of Florida, where in just 15 years, one in four residents will be 65 or older. It’s a peek into the not-too-distant future of the nation, where the number will be one in five.”
So what’s the implication of living in the “Grey Belt?” The article notes that the businesses reflect the population and the economy shows the effect of such a population. For example, the story notes that the “economy based on low-skill jobs such as health-care aides, retail clerks and food service workers.” The result of a community where people move in to retire, rather than age-in place? “[Those who move into an area generally aren’t eager to fund schools … whereas those who remain in the communities where they worked and raised their families tend to support education and other public spending that doesn’t benefit them directly. Citrus County voters lived up to that thesis as recently as two years ago when they decisively rejected a referendum to raise property taxes to fund schools.”
The article discusses the dilemma these cities face-they need younger folks to work in the service jobs that cater to the elder residents, but these folks don’t always want to move to a community that is primarily elder residents. One pastor even described his church as a “hospice church” because “congregants either die or move back north to spend their last years near relatives. Changes that might attract younger families for the almost 500-member congregation often meet resistance…”
Although Citrus County might be the center of the Florida Grey Belt, the phrase actually refers to a swath of 8 counties with “among the oldest populations in the nation, not to mention in Florida, which has long had the highest rate of seniors in the nation, and will for decades yet… [with] Sumter [county] … home to the largest concentration of seniors of any county in the nation…”
Ok but really–is Florida the only location of the “Grey Belt”? We all know the US population is aging, so what about it–do we have more grey belts? Depends on how you look at it. According to the AP article, “North Dakota, Texas, and Michigan have pockets of seniors on par with the Gray Belt counties in Florida. But unlike the Florida counties, which have grown from the migration of new seniors, they have gotten grayer as a result of younger residents leaving.”
Keep in mind that the Florida grey belt only encompasses 8 counties. The state is a bit of a hodgepodge, demographically speaking, since the grey belt “contrasts starkly with the state’s younger and more diverse major metro areas … and the interests of Gray Belt residents will diverge politically, socially and economically from Florida’s more youthful cities.” Competing interests based on age will show up at the ballot box as well–talk about a tightrope for state leaders!
According to an economist with the U. of Florida (“in the nieghborhood” of the grey belt), “[s]ince voting power will tilt in favor of the older residents because of their higher voter-participation rates, the key to keeping both sides happy is to devolve all kinds of governmental decisions on taxes, planning and education from the state level to the local level so that residents in areas with both high and low concentrations of seniors will feel like their voices are being heard.”
Here we go….and please, no jokes about Florida and voting. Deal?