The U.S. economy is booming — just not where 50 million Americans live

I was in high school in the early 1990s when the timber town where I grew up took it on the chin. Mill closures and job losses left workers and families who had done everything right scrambling just to survive. Local stores struggled, schools tightened budgets, and public services shrank. For many, lost paychecks led to lost faith in the system in the country.Recommended Video During 12 years in Congress and now at The Rockefeller Foundation, I have seen that my hometown is similar to too many others. More than 50 million Americans live in economically distressed communities, marked by inadequate jobs, poorer health outcomes, higher crime, and frayed civic life. We tend to lose sight of those distressed communities because overall job numbers are excellent.

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Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at Fortune.