system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
[Batman] How much does Gotham suck?

The Batman lore in this is very varied and sometimes inconsistent.

At times it seems that Gotham is unredeemable, and the decades of the Bat's crusade have been essentially useless, in fact perhaps made it worse, with the explosion of costumed supervillains taking inspiration from the city's first mask, namely the Bat. There are countless stories in which old-fashioned mob bosses complain that "ever since the bat came along this town has gone crazy."

Other times it seems that Wayne's crusade is bringing some results. I remember one story, Batman 24h I think, in which an off-duty cop went out for a walk with his wife, leaving his gun at home, saying "there's a rumor going around that Batman is watching this neighborhood tonight. It may not be true, but it's enough for criminals to go elsewhere."

In short, what is the condition of Gotham like after so many years of Bat-family activity? Still the same shithole where the Wayne's were murdered or has it improved? One explanation may be that Gotham, like all big cities in the world, has good neighborhoods and badder neighborhoods. The Bat Crusade has made it so that, living in the quiet areas, it is much harder to turn down the wrong alley and get killed just outside one of the main theaters. And even in the bad areas things have improved a little bit. It's just that, of course, the stories focus on those and we get the impression that Gotham always sucks.
gpt
Gotham is cursed - literally. As in, Zatanna and other people have actually found several of the curses Gotham is under. Once or twice a curse has been lifted. It just doesn't help much, because there are, at all times, multiple curses active.

This is why Batman's work hasn't shown the effect it should have. In any other city on earth, Bruce Wayne's many charity works and Batman's crime-curbing efforts would have rendered the city peaceful and prosperous. It CAN'T work in Gotham, because of the curses... but if Batman wasn't around to hold the cursed city in check, things would be SO MUCH WORSE. And it would spread.