These Are The 10 Most Ghetto Cities In America For 2017

This article is an opinion based on facts and is meant as infotainment. Don’t freak out.

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There are lots of people who throw the term ‘ghetto’ around. But which of the largest cities in America are the most ghetto of all?

How do you decide if a place is ghetto or not? You ask the internet. According to the Urban Dictionary, a ghetto is defined as:

“urban; of or relating to (inner) city life” and “poor; of or relating to the poor life.”

Using that criteria, it’s not hard to scrape the internet, run some scientific data on where ghettos might exist, and then put out a list.

After analyzing the largest cities in America with a population over 100,000, we came up with this list as the most ghetto places to live in the good ole US of A:

In case you’re wondering, the city of Naperville, Illinois is the least ghetto city of all 270 we measured.

Read on below to see where your city ranks and why. Or feel free to check out the most dangerous cities in America.

What ghetto criteria did we use?

In order to rank the most ghetto places in America, we had to determine what criteria defines a ghetto city or neighborhood.

Since a ghetto is defined as a poor area, we used income levels, crime and education levels as a guide to determine where the most broke citizens of a state live.

Additionally, the staples of inner city life include cheap and discounted retail outlets.

We started by making a list of all cities in America that are listed on the 2011-2015 American Community Survey with over 100,000 people. That left us with 269 cities to rank.

We threw a lot of criteria at this one in order to get the best, most complete results possible. Using Yelp and Area Vibes, this is the criteria we used:

Household income levels
High school graduation rates
Number of convenience stores
Number of drug stores
Number of discount stores
Crime

Note: For the sake of getting reliable numbers, we counted places within a city’s border, as well as within a short driving distance.

All of these results are listed in a per capita basis. Meaning number of stores per person in a state. Additionally, high school graduation rates are determined by looking at the total number of people who live in a city who have no graduated from high school, not the current graduation rate of an area’s high schools.

1. Cleveland

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 392,114
Median Income: $26,179 (3rd worst)
Crime Per Capita: 6.8% (19th worst)

2. Miami

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 416,432
Median Income: $30,858 (8th worst)
Crime Per Capita: 5.9% (40th worst)

3. Detroit

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 695,437
Median Income: $26,095 (2nd worst)
Crime Per Capita: 6.8% (18th worst)

4. Hartford

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 125,211
Median Income: $29,313 (5th worst)
Crime Per Capita: 5.3% (59th worst)

5. Dayton

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 141,776
Median Income: $28,174 (4th worst)
Crime Per Capita: 6.4% (23rd worst)

6. San Bernardino

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 213,044
Median Income: $38,774 (40th worst)
Crime Per Capita: 5.3% (61st worst)

7. Birmingham

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 211,705
Median Income: $31,217 (9th worst)
Crime Per Capita: 8.2% (5th worst)

8. St. Louis

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 318,727
Median Income: $34,800 (26th worst)
Crime Per Capita: 7.9% (6th worst)

9. Jackson

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 173,631
Median Income: $33,080 (17th worst)
Crime Per Capita: 6.9% (16th worst)

10. Brownsville

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 179,834
Median Income: $32,288 (13th worst)
Crime Per Capita: 4.4% (109th worst)

Now You’re Full Ghetto

If you’re measuring the locations in America where there are a high number of poor and uneducated residents, this is an accurate list.

Detailed List Of The Most Ghetto Cities In America

Rank	City	Population	Median Income	Crime Per Capita
1	Cleveland	392,114	$26,179	6.8%
2	Miami	416,432	$30,858	5.9%
3	Detroit	695,437	$26,095	6.8%
4	Hartford	125,211	$29,313	5.3%
5	Dayton	141,776	$28,174	6.4%
6	San Bernardino	213,044	$38,774	5.3%
7	Birmingham	211,705	$31,217	8.2%
8	St. Louis	318,727	$34,800	7.9%
9	Jackson	173,631	$33,080	6.9%
10	Brownsville	179,834	$32,288	4.4%
11	Buffalo	259,959	$31,668	6.0%
12	Memphis	656,715	$37,099	7.7%
13	Flint	100,569	$24,679	5.6%
14	Kansas City	147,598	$38,073	5.6%
15	North Charleston	102,143	$39,446	6.2%
16	Springfield	153,836	$34,731	4.9%
17	Milwaukee	598,078	$35,489	6.1%
18	Rochester	210,461	$30,784	5.0%
19	Syracuse	144,648	$31,566	4.8%
20	Cincinnati	297,117	$34,002	6.5%
21	Chattanooga	171,863	$39,683	7.3%
22	Baltimore	622,271	$41,819	6.1%
23	Pueblo	107,706	$34,889	7.3%
24	Stockton	297,223	$45,347	5.7%
25	Providence	178,562	$37,514	4.3%
26	Laredo	245,048	$39,408	4.2%
27	Newark	278,750	$34,012	3.9%
28	Rockford	151,290	$38,231	5.5%
29	Waco	127,796	$32,864	4.3%
30	Houston	2,167,988	$45,728	5.7%
31	Winston-Salem	234,469	$40,480	6.1%
32	Knoxville	181,759	$33,494	7.4%
33	South Bend	100,422	$34,656	5.4%
34	Fresno	506,132	$41,455	4.6%
35	Springfield	162,333	$32,473	8.8%
36	New Haven	130,553	$37,508	5.0%
37	Hialeah	232,311	$29,959	3.1%
38	Paterson	146,341	$33,964	3.5%
39	Beaumont	117,543	$39,191	5.6%
40	Columbus	198,247	$41,362	7.0%
41	Miami Gardens	110,867	$39,545	4.7%
42	Indianapolis	835,097	$42,076	6.1%
43	San Antonio	1,385,438	$46,317	6.0%
44	Waterbury	109,887	$41,136	4.6%
45	Allentown	118,793	$36,578	3.7%
46	Pompano Beach	103,234	$40,534	5.2%
47	New Orleans	368,471	$36,964	5.2%
48	Philadelphia	1,546,920	$37,460	4.4%
49	Evansville	120,220	$35,996	6.2%
50	Dallas	1,240,985	$43,359	4.3%
51	Toledo	283,932	$33,485	nan%
52	Akron	198,492	$34,139	5.3%
53	Bridgeport	146,680	$41,204	3.8%
54	Shreveport	200,692	$38,413	5.3%
55	Columbia	131,331	$41,454	6.1%
56	Grand Rapids	190,739	$39,913	nan%
57	Baton Rouge	229,353	$38,790	5.4%
58	Oakland	402,339	$52,962	7.6%
59	Richmond	211,063	$41,331	4.4%
60	Abilene	120,776	$42,766	4.9%
61	Elizabeth	126,964	$43,966	3.9%
62	Mcallen	135,048	$43,476	3.7%
63	Salt Lake City	189,267	$45,833	9.2%
64	Modesto	205,984	$47,607	5.3%
65	Inglewood	111,133	$42,249	3.1%
66	West Palm Beach	102,283	$45,027	5.5%
67	Tulsa	395,599	$41,957	5.9%
68	Amarillo	194,930	$47,053	5.4%
69	Lafayette	123,528	$45,682	6.1%
70	Las Cruces	100,360	$40,658	4.8%
71	Orlando	250,224	$41,901	7.3%
72	El Monte	115,243	$38,906	2.2%
73	Mobile	194,942	$39,241	5.2%
74	Montgomery	204,095	$43,535	5.0%
75	Salinas	154,077	$49,728	4.0%
76	Pasadena	152,171	$46,585	3.4%
77	Victorville	119,603	$47,142	4.1%
78	Corpus Christi	312,680	$49,675	5.1%
79	Fort Lauderdale	171,137	$48,898	5.9%
80	Independence	117,160	$44,038	6.0%
81	Gresham	108,250	$47,706	5.2%
82	Lubbock	236,868	$44,139	5.3%
83	Spokane	210,142	$42,814	9.1%
84	Phoenix	1,490,758	$46,881	4.3%
85	Pomona	151,142	$48,993	3.4%
86	Lansing	114,382	$35,675	4.3%
87	Everett	104,708	$48,562	6.9%
88	Oklahoma City	600,729	$47,004	5.2%
89	St. Petersburg	248,429	$45,483	6.5%
90	Kansas City	465,005	$45,376	6.1%
91	Topeka	127,660	$41,412	5.4%
92	Atlanta	440,641	$46,439	7.0%
93	Richmond	106,469	$54,857	4.7%
94	Wichita Falls	104,771	$43,751	4.5%
95	El Paso	669,771	$42,037	2.5%
96	Little Rock	196,188	$46,409	8.6%
97	Santa Maria	101,468	$50,753	3.4%
98	Odessa	107,325	$56,119	4.7%
99	Chicago	2,712,608	$47,831	4.0%
100	Mesquite	142,552	$49,837	4.3%