BorderLand 8
LAREDO, TX. Doubts come in the night. They come at odd moments and I am not sure why. One night here, for instance, the entire three miles of highway from my motel room to the bridge is lined with 18-wheelers waiting to cross the border. It is a massive display of capital, a gigantic standing stock of goods and equipment, yet it is only a fraction of the thousands of trucks that cross here each month. As portals go, Laredo is up there with AOL and Yahoo, but the flow is measured in pounds and tons, not bytes and page views.
What is strange is that so little money seems to have rubbed off on either Laredo or its Mexican counterpart, Nuevo Laredo. While Laredo has expanded wildly, scattering franchise pads and roadside businesses willy-nilly on the roads outside the old city, the pre-NAFTA parts of the city— the ones closest to the border— are remarkably drab and shabby.
This is not a sin. What is troubling is that businesses are stretched so tight. There is a sense that every dollar that can be squeezed out of a business and taken home is taken home, that money for inventory and reinvestment— whatever is needed to grow and develop an enterprise— is scarce to non-existent.
The impression is reinforced in Nuevo Laredo. There, walking the blocks immediately over the bridge, I pass small food shops that only grudgingly offer worn plastic chairs, retailers with hand made signs, and storefronts that seem to have selected their patchwork of goods by lottery or blind chance. In a plaza with a bus depot at the east end, I stop to watch and listen, concentrating on the sound of birds and the constant movement of people. The number of children is surprising, given the late hour. Suddenly, I feel as though I have stepped into a Mexican translation of Edward Hopper’s haunting painting, Nighthawks
. The walk back across the bridge is a somber one.
But impressions aren’t facts.
The facts are that the entire border zone is a magnet, that the unemployment rate has dropped significantly in the past three years, and that personal income is rising. Per capita income in Webb County, the county in which Laredo is located, is $12,999 a year. That’s about half of the per capita income in the rest of the country. The figures are very similar for Cameron county (Brownsville) and Hidalgo county (McAllen). Per capita income in Starr country, directly west of McAllen, is the lowest on the border, $7,550 a year. That’s only 30 percent of the national average. It is poorer than any of the border counties in New Mexico.
What do figures like that mean in something other than dollars? Simply this: in fast growing McAllen, Texas, over half the children still live in poverty. In Laredo the figure is only slightly lower, 45 percent. Nationally, the figure is “only” 19 percent. There is plenty of room— and need— for income to grow.
Small wonder that the walking around evidence also says that the dominant financial institution along the border isn’t the local bank. It’s the pawnshop. They are so prominent in every city along the border that I decide to do a reality check and examine the yellow pages for the Rio Grande Valley. Sure enough, the directory has 5 pages under “pawnbrokers”. It also has seven pages of “loan companies” offering “30 minute service” and loan amounts “to $450.”
There are only four pages under the listing “banks.”
EZ-Pawn, which has a large display ad, has 18 offices in the Valley. First Cash Pawn has 16 while Cash America Pawn has only seven and Amigo Pawn and Jewelry has only four. The Sun Loan Company advertises that its Brownsville office is “across from Whataburger”, its Pharr office is “behind Bus Station”, its McAllen office is “next to Payless Shoes”, and its Mission office is “Next to Dollar General.”
A visit to a Laredo pawnshop reveals a mixture of jewelry, consumer electronics, and the inevitable bass guitars and amplifiers. With the exception of one Glock, there is also a predictable assortment of 38 caliber handguns.
Financial transactions are different on the border. One study by Texas A&M, for instance, showed that only 15 to 45 percent of adults in the colonias— unincorporated housing communities that often lack water, sewer, and utility services— had Texas bank accounts, figures wildly different from the national numbers. According to the 1998 Survey of Consumer Finances done by the Federal Reserve Board, more than 90 percent of all households in America have a checking account.
In Del Rio, I visit Jerry Simpton. He is Executive Vice President of the Del Rio National Bank with 35 years of experience on the border. He has a different interpretation.
“The pawn shop proliferation has happened in the last few years. Most are chain operated and have multiple locations. I think they are more visible here (than elsewhere). They have a strong marketing push but I don’t think it is different from other cities.”
I asked if consumer credit had changed.
“In the past, lower income people might have a small loan with the bank and a Sears charge account. We don’t see those customers anymore. They probably have any number of credit cards. I see it across the board. Now everyone uses the cards,” he said.
The greatest danger to understanding the border may be the comparisons that we bring. If we look at it through experiential glasses that were made elsewhere— whether in Portland, Maine or Portland, Oregon— we are likely to see weakness and vulnerability at near apocalyptic levels. But I think that would be a mistake. Like the desert, the strength and power of the border comes from the tenacity of life in want, from the obdurate will to continue with what is rather than what is wished for. The border, some have said, isn’t America and it isn’t Mexico. It is the Border, a place of mind, a third country, a different place.
Border Land
Next: Big Bend and the bridge at Presidio
Soon: Marfa—Herds of Tomatoes
Borderland
Starting the journey: Riding into Laredo
A statistical picture of life along the border
Austin: The incredible disappearing Slacker
San Antonio: High Times and Low Water
Yturria Land and Cattle and El Canelo Ranch: Where’s the Beef?
Brownsville: Lifeguard on the Rio Grande
McAllen: Fields of dreams
All roads lead to Crystal City
Big Bend and the bridge at Presidio
Marfa: Herds of tomatoes, as far as the eye can see
Tucson: Containing growth
Tucson: Born to be wild?
Yuma and the dusty road to Mexicare
San Diego: The Ultimate Crop
Notes, mile marks and pictures
This information is distributed for education purposes, and it is not to be construed as an offer, solicitation, recommendation, or endorsement of any particular security, product, or service.
Photo: Scott Burns/ A bar in Nuevo Laredo
(c) A. M. Universal, 2000