Portlanders, it's not your imagination. The recession has hit harder here than just about anywhere else in the world.

The economic downturn that was barely felt in many of the bustling cities of China, India and South America delivered a body blow to the economies of developed Western World, according to a study of 150 major metro-area economies around the world released today by the

and the

.

Portland plummeted from a pre-recession rank of 45th to 139th during the worst of the recession, one of the steepest declines among metro areas included in the survey. Study author Alan Berube dubbed Portland one of the "housing-bubble metros," places where an over-reliance on the residential real estate industry made it particularly vulnerable when the sector crashed.

"Hey you're not Las Vegas," Berube said by way of consolation. Once high-flying Sin City suffered the steepest decline amongst the 150 cities, from 14th in the pre-recession years to 146th in 2009-2010.

The Brookings study based its rankings on annualized employment and income growth in three different time periods: the pre-recession years of 1993-2007, the recession years of 2007-2009 and the recovery period, 2009-2010.

The study paints a portrait of Asia as the world's ascendant economic superstar. Shenzen was one of four Chinese cities ranked in the top 10. A rapidly industrializing city in China's south, Shenzen powered through the economic quicksand of 2007-2009, boasting 2.3 percent employment growth and 4.6 percent income gains while the economy was freezing up in the much of the rest of the world.

Cities in India and Australia also passed through the recession relatively unscathed, as did Rio de Janeiro, Lima, Peru and several other South American cities.

"These other cities, they're not as wealthy, they're not as productive as the U.S. economy," said Berube, a Brookings Institution senior fellow. "But if this keeps up, they're going to eat our lunch. We have to get a little bit smarter about how to build our economy."

Critics of globalization argue that it is a zero-sum game -- the gains of the emerging world come at the expense of the develped world. Outsourcing and off-shoring both helped the developing cities sustain their economic momentum, the study said.

The vast, amorphous pool of capital prowling the globe for opportunities also contributed to the emerging cities' gains. "During the Great Recession and its immediate aftermath, many of these metros were havens for capital that fled weakened markets in the United States and Europe," the study said.

Governments in these countries will inevitably face challenges as their citizens demand the creature comforts and greater political freedom that typically accompanies economic prosperity. Moreover, this influx of global capital creates the possibilities of artificial bubbles in some of the emerging cities, noted Tim Duy,

economics professor and director of the

.

The developed world faces a perhaps more difficult challenge: Regaining economic vitality when many of its citizens and governments are broke.

"Consumption-led growth in the run-up to the recession left these countries with significant debt overhangs, and many of their major metros with a glut of housing, diminished productive capacity, or both," the study said.

The fall was particularly hard for cities like Portland that became overly reliant on residential construction. Only Las Vegas and Riverside, Calif., two of the housing-bubble hotbeds, lost more ground than Portland during the recession.

In the pre-recession years of 1993-2007, the study pegs Portland's average yearly employment growth at 1.6 percent and income growth at 4.1 percent. That put Portland at 45th of the 150 cities in the study, nestled between Istanbul and Bogota.

Then came the recession, driving down Portland's employment to negative 5.1 percent per year and income to negative 7.8 percent annually.

In 2009-2010, Portland's employment grew 0.3 percent and income fell another 0.6 percent.

Interestingly, manufacturing hubs like Detroit and Cleveland, at times dismissed as blue-collar wastelands, have bounced back faster than Portland and other bubble cities.

Duy said it's only becoming apparent today how dangerously exposed Portland was to housing. "You look at late 1980s and early 1990s, manufacturing was really important, particularly high-tech manufacturing," he said. "But in this last decade, it was all about housing."

The study lists governance as another significant concern for Portland and the rest of the developed world. Many of these city governments are "ill-suited for keeping pace with fast-paced global economic changes," the study said.

The debt issues facing the U.S. and Europe will only exacerbate the challenge.

A bright-side offered up the study is that while these emerging cities continue to "close the gap" with the developed world, their citizens will become enthusiastic consumers.

It's vital that U.S. cities "embrace the potential of exports -- most of which originate in these very metros -- to generate wealth and high-quality jobs," the study said.

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