> Since this was mostly contained within one city (Detroit)

It's concentrated in Detroit but also distributed throughout the state, as you can observe in the census.gov slides.

The devastation is regional. It's been a wild experience, watching it all fall apart over the last 40+ years. The decay is immense and impossible to convey to someone from a rich state. Someone from the Eastern Bloc might get it, but I've never been able to communicate it to a Californian. Hop in a car and drive from town to town. Once-prosperous communities are boarded up and gradually reclaimed by nature. Department stores are converted into soup kitchens or marijuana dispensaries.

"Things will work themselves out" is not a law of nature, unless we broaden our definition of "things working out" to include outcomes like "everyone young enough flees, everyone else clutches their savings until they eventually die impoverished."

But with AI, even outcomes like that might be overly optimistic. Where will young people flee to? Where can they go, what trade can they learn, to be safe enough to eventually die in comfort?

When I look at Michigan I see both the past and the future, and I am planning accordingly.