Couldn't help but be annoyed by a recent article in The Times on the decline of Detroit's population in the recent census. The article conflates the decline of the auto industry and of the inner city in the most simplistic way, ignoring a number of salient facts - that until the last decade, greater Detroit thrived while the inner city collapsed; that the decline of Detroit began long before the auto industry went into terminal decline.

In fact, it was the vigor of the industry in the 1940s and 1950s that laid the foundations for the inner city's decline. High wages allowed employees to seek a better standard of living in the suburbs, while technological innovation demanded new, larger factories on greenfield sites.

And, incidentally, Kid Rock and Emninem haven't decamped to the suburbs; they are from the suburbs.