Detroit's decline actually started in the 1950's as more and more auto production moved out of the city and into the suburbs as more and more freeways were being built. Then in 1967, came the Detroit riots and that sped up the white flight, which had already been occurring but in greater numbers after the riots. Thousands of businesses permanently closed or moved to the safer neighborhoods in the suburbs. Detroit took a huge economic hit and was slowly dying from there.

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Knowing what a wasteland Detroit has turned into over the last few years
It has been a wasteland for decades.
Don't put the devil in the picture, cause' the religious groups won't wanna see it.

LOL I was thinking exactly of those 2 jokes from that movie.
Detroit has had serious problems for a long long time.

Detroit's decline goes back much further than the mid 80's.
This was a joke in The Kentucky Fried Movie (1977):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ny4a-oxOndo

It started B4 1984 in the 70's The D started to fall apart.
Spoiler alert for them spoil sports out there! Y'all like spoiled milk, stop crying over it!