![]() ![]() The phrase is born of loss, but has acquired texture, depth, and decades’ worth of meaning. And while the term may lack geographical strata, it has historical layers, and they are thick and redolent. Since the election, the term has continued to appear even more often in the mainstream media, usually in articles seeking to understand the appeal of Trump in the so-called Rust Belt region - again, despite Trump’s equal or greater support elsewhere in the country.Īnd so the term “Rust Belt” continues to define the region, to the consternation of both those who have never liked it and those who wish the economy - any economy - would show up and turn “Rust Belt” from open sore to quaint artifact. Although Trump’s support was strong in the South, the West, and many areas of blue states like New York and California, Trump used the Rust Belt as an example of America’s fall from prior greatness. Starting with the 2016 presidential election, the term was used more than it had been in recent memory by the American press, usually to describe the then-surprising popularity of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, who were campaigning, just like Walter Mondale before them, for more restrictive trade policies. This is true internationally, too - China and Russia and Germany and just about any country with a history of manufacturing have rust belts where economies were once based on industry and now no longer are at least, that is how such declining regions are described in news headlines. Louis, as well as abutting regions such as Appalachia, can be fun to debate over beers - just how rusty are they? - but in the end, anywhere an economy was previously based on manufacturing and has since been losing population can be part of the gang. “As far west as Milwaukee and as far east as Buffalo” usually works. Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania are central to the region, as well as parts of Illinois, Wisconsin, and New York. “Post-industrial Midwest” can serve as a synonym (along with its cousins, “industrial Midwest” and “formerly industrial Midwest”). “Rust Belt” is a historical term, like “New England” and “Sun Belt” (even “Midwest” is as much historic as geographic). There are no natural borders, as there are with the East and West Coasts, say, or topographic features, as with the Great Plains or the Rocky Mountains. The term was not invented by geographers but by a politician and the media. ![]() Definitions of where, exactly, the Rust Belt is are also often debated. ![]()
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