Should Dave Bing impose a moratorium on fast-food restaurants in the city?

[iheartthed]

Both sides are wrong. The city would be insane to impose a moratorium on one of the only commercial enterprises that is willing and able to survive in the city. The tax base is obvious reason, but also these are jobs - not great jobs, but for every one of them you take away you create a potential drug dealer, gang banger, prison inmate, or body at the morgue in a city where inner-city employment is virtually non-existent. It is also nice to have some functioning businesses in a city that is 1/3 vacant, and more eyes and ears and lights makes for a safer city.

I highly doubt that the relationship between the prevalence of fast food restaurants and illegal economic activity is inverse [[i.e. increase in # restaurants <=> decrease in crime). But even if it were it would take a fast food joint on every corner in Detroit to significantly lower Detroit's crime rate.

I don't think this is the answer to Detroit's [[or America's) obesity problem, but I also don't see why the city shouldn't place restrictions on the number of fast food restaurants that operate there. Same goes for bars, liquor stores, gas stations or whatever else they feel the need to regulate.