New Geography

Category: Demographics

  • Migration: Geographies In Conflict

    It’s an interesting puzzle. The “cool cities”, the ones that are supposedly doing the best, the ones with the hottest downtowns, the biggest buzz, leading-edge new companies, smart shops, swank restaurants and hip hotels – the ones that are supposed to be magnets for talent – are often among those with the highest levels of net domestic outmigration. New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston, Miami and Chicago – all were big losers in the 2000s. Seattle, Denver, and Minneapolis more or less broke even. Portland is the only proverbially cool city with a regional population over two million that gained any significant number of migrants.

    Those who find this an occasion for a schadenfreude moment attribute it to tax and regulatory climates. Clearly, things like cost of doing business are clearly very important. And indeed this is often under-rated by cool city proponents. And other things equal, people do prefer low tax jurisdictions. Still, is this the only answer, or is there another explanation? Could it be that rather than high costs driving migration, both costs and migration are being driven by other underlying factors?

    Perhaps the root problem is structural change in the economy in the age of globalization. As business became more globalized and more virtualized, this created demand for new types of financial products and producer services – notably in the law, accounting, consultancy, and marketing areas – to help businesses service and control their far flung networks. Unlike many activities, financial and producer services are subject to clustering economics, and have ended up concentrated in a relatively small number of cities around the world.

    These so-called “global cities” serve as control nodes for various global networks and key production sites for these services, along with other specialized niches they long had. In effect, more distributed economic activities requires increasing centralization of select functions, particularly the most highly value-added functions. Yet these activities are not set in stone; for example, areas that were once centers for global business, like Cleveland or Detroit, are fading; others like Houston and Dallas are rising.

    Yet unlike the Texas cities, which retain a strong middle-class and middle-echelon economy, many of the more elite, established urban centers – for example New York and London – increasingly create parallel economies and labor markets in those cities. These cities now generally contain two kinds of people and firms: those who are part of the global city functions and those who are not. Those who are engaged in global city functions operate in a world of very high value-added activities; specialized, niche skill markets; and rising demand conditions. Those skills are not readily acquired outside of global cities. Often, they are sub-specialized to particular places as different global cities specialize in different niches.

    In many cases, these functions have not yet migrated to India or China or often even another global city. This tends to inflate salaries significantly for these specialized, niche skill jobs.

    On the other hand, many people who once thrived in these cities have not benefited from these economic forces. They often are in occupations where labor arbitrage is feasible, and their jobs can either be off-shored, or readily transferred to lower cost locales in the US. This includes manufacturing work, but also important but less specialized white collar occupations like basic accounting, loan officers, corporate IT, and HR. In short, the routine side of the traditional monolithic corporate headquarters and services firm.

    In effect, in these global cities, two economic geographies share the same physical geography – and those economic geographies are in conflict. One set requires catering to high skill, highly paid workers and firms where cost is a secondary concern. The other involves occupations and industries where cost is very much a concern. The occupants of these two geographies have very different public policy priorities. Which of them will win out?

    In a global city, particularly a mature and expensive one, the elite geography wins. It is generating the most money, and with money comes power and influence. Additionally, the high wage workers in these industries are simply able to pay more for real estate and other items. Their mere paychecks are driving up costs in the city they live in. They are re-ordering the city in their own high income image, aided and abetted by a speculative financial fueled housing bubble.

    The prestige of these industries burnishes the civic brand, making them attractive to civic boosters. What’s more, leaders in global cities feel that these are their businesses of their future. For them the attractiveness of concentrating in areas where you think you can create a “wide moat” advantage makes sense.

    This is why cities like Portland, Minneapolis, Denver, and Seattle haven’t fared nearly so badly – they aren’t really full metal global cities and thus, while not always cheap, have remained relatively affordable versus places like San Francisco and New York.

    At the same time it is not easy for these more expensive cities to adopt a low tax, low cost approach. For many reasons, places like San Francisco, New York, and London will never, no matter what they do, be able to match Atlanta, Houston, or Dallas, or even Chicago in a war on costs. That would be a suicide mission. Their logical strategy is to follow the law of comparative advantage, and specialize where you have the best competitive position in the market, and that’s global city functions.

    Many other cities have followed this strategy, but with differing success. Fearing to end up like the next Michigan and Detroit pair, many states and cities have invested heavily to build up urban amenities to cater to the global city firms and their workers: transit systems, showplace public buildings, art and culture events, bike lanes, and beautification. Cost fell by the wayside as a concern, as did investments in priorities of the traditional middle class.

    This explains why, for example, not only have taxes gone up, but things like schools and other basic services have declined so badly in places like California. Traditional primary and secondary education is not important to industries where California is betting its future. Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and biotech draw their workers from the best and brightest of the world. They source globally, not locally. Their labor force is largely educated elsewhere. Basic education and investments in poorer neighborhoods has no ROI for those industries. With the decline of high tech manufacturing in Silicon Valley, even previously critical institutions such as community colleges are no longer as needed.

    The same goes for growth and sprawl. They are playing a game of quality over quantity. They specialize in elite urban areas and elite suburbs or exurbs. For example, San Francisco also has Marin, Palo Alto and Los Altos Hills. New York has, in addition to Manhattan, Greenwich and northern Westchester. The only thing they need size for is sheer scale in certain urban functions, and they already have it. Growth is unnecessary for them and only brings problems.

    It also explains the highly pro-immigration stance of these cities, as a large service class is needed for globalization’s new aristocrats. Immigrants are needed as low cost labor in the burgeoning restaurant and hotel business. In America’s global cities immigrant housekeepers, landscapers, and nannies are common. They may not dress like His Lordship’s butler, but that doesn’t make them any less servants.

    Lastly, it explains why we have seen the same polarizing class pattern so consistently despite broad geographic and socio-political differences between places like Los Angeles, Boston, and Chicago, to say nothing of overseas locales like London. A common global phenomenon probably has a common underlying cause.

    The traditional middle class, feeling the squeeze, is simply moving to where its own kind is king and its own priorities are catered to. In a battle of conflicting economic geographies, the one with higher value added wins, displacing others in what Jane Jacobs termed the “self-destruction of diversity”. First, an attractive environment draws diverse uses, then one becomes economically dominant and, through superior purchasing power, displaces other uses over time. The story ends when that dominant economic activity exhausts itself – the true danger facing global cities, though fortunately they are generally not dependent on just one small niche. It’s basic comparative advantage.

    If you are just an average middle class guy, why live in one of those global cities anyway? Unless you have roots there that you value, take advantage of something you can’t get anywhere else such as by having a passion for world class opera, or are one of globalization’s courtiers – a hanger on like a high end chef, artist, or indie rocker, perhaps – why put up with the high cost and hassles? It makes no sense. You’re better off living in suburban Cincinnati than suburban Chicago.

    And frankly, the folks on the global city side prefer it if you leave anyway. Immigrants are unlikely to start trouble, but a middle class facing an economic squeeze and threat to its way of life might raise a ruckus. That won’t happen if enough of them move to Dallas and rob the rest of critical mass and resulting political clout.

    Many of those leaving are college educated, especially, when they get older, get married, and start having families. A relatively large number of these people could be replaced by a smaller number of elite bankers, biotech PhDs, and celebrity chefs. In that case, both “narratives” could hold simultaneously. One type of talent moves in, while a greater number of a different kind moves out. As with trade generally, this could even be viewed as a win-win in some regard.

    Again, it is easy to blame the costs and public policy. Clearly there is room for improvement in governance such as reigning in out of control civil service pay and pensions in places like California and New York. But what is more pernicious is the rising income gap in America, and the likely outcomes it drives when a city acquires a small elite economic class with incomes that far outstrip the average, and lacks strong economic linkages to the rest of the city other than for personal services. It sets in motion economic logic that undermines the traditional middle class, which then starts leaving, exacerbating the gap.

    For years we worried that a large, stable middle class with a permanent, largely minority underclass constituted an unjust order. As it turns out, the alternatives are sometimes worse. Ultimately some American cities have come to take on the cast of their third world brethren, a perhaps somewhat less extreme version of Mexico City or São Paulo, where vast wealth and glitter exist side by side with the favelas.

    This explains why America’s global cities often feel more kinship with their international peers than with many of the places in their own country. The global cities, which now enjoy something of a political ascendency, are also sundering the American commonwealth. Taking steps to prevent a further widening of the income gap may be the only way to save these cities’ middle class – and maintain the solidarity of the country.

    Aaron M. Renn is an independent writer on urban affairs based in the Midwest. His writings appear at The Urbanophile.

  • Boomer Economy Stunting Growth in Northern California

    The road north across the Golden Gate leads to some of the prettiest counties in North America. Yet behind the lovely rolling hills, wineries, ranches and picturesque once-rural towns lies a demographic time bomb that neither political party is ready to address.

    Paradise is having a problem with the evolving economy. A generational conflict is brewing, pitting the interests and predilections of well-heeled boomers against a growing, predominately Latino working class. And neither the emerging “progressive” politics nor laissez-faire conservatism is offering much in the way of a solution.

    These northern California counties–which include Sonoma, Napa, Solano and Marin–have become beacons for middle- and upper-class residents from the Bay Area. These generally liberal people came in part to enjoy the lifestyle of this mild, bucolic region, and many have little interest in changing it.

    “The yuppies have insulated themselves here for the long term,” notes Robert Eyler, a director at the Center for Regional Economic Analysis at Sonoma State University. “The boomers have blocked everyone else different in age and skill from rising up and making their place.”

    Nowhere is this more evident than in the “green,” anti-growth movement so prevalent in these places. Strong restrictions of business growth, bolstered by California’s draconian land-use regulations, have turned these areas into business no-go zones. This has become increasingly clear after the collapse of the real estate boom, which created thousands of jobs for agents, mortgage brokers and construction workers.

    Hard times have come to paradise. Unemployment in Sonoma now tops 10%, up from barely 3% two years ago, notes Eyler. The rate is slightly higher in neighboring Solano County but a bit lower in wealthy Marin and Napa. Across the region, vacancy rates for offices and other commercial buildings have reached as high as 30%. Overall, by some estimates, the vacancy rate is higher in Sonoma than in Detroit.

    These conditions, local business leaders suggest, seem to have no effect on the region’s well-organized and well-financed greenies, who often see any growth as a threat to their quality of life

    Of course, economic reversal can sometimes hurt the balance sheets of wealthy yuppies and early retirees, but Eyler suggests the change could prove most devastating to the next generation of residents. In 2000 these counties were almost 70% white; Eyler projects that by 2030 they will be majority minority, with the Latino percentage more than doubling to almost one-third the population.

    At the same time, the predominant white population will be getting older and even less supportive of economic growth. The boomers who moved to paradise may not have “put up a parking lot” as much as rooted themselves firmly into the ground. Already Marin, the wealthiest county, is among the oldest in California, vying with other high-end places like San Francisco and Orange and Ventura Counties.

    Today in Marin, there are still more people aged 40 to 55 than over 65. But by 2025 the over-65 crowd will be as large as the prime working-age population (which comprises those in their 30s and 40s) and should be larger than the under-25 population. The old and young also will diverge greatly in their ethnicities. In virtually all North Bay areas, the bulk of the codgers will be white, while most young people will be Hispanic or other minorities.

    In the past, besides construction, these young workers might have found employment in the area’s once-burgeoning electronics and telecommunications industry. But many of these companies have moved operations to more business-friendly regions or overseas. “When these kids who are in school now grow up, we are going to have a huge job crisis here,” Eyler warns. “But when the boomers are gone, what happens when all the jobs have moved to Des Moines?”

    Of course, the widely accepted solution to this dilemma comes in the color green–that environment jobs will provide the new employment. Indeed by some accounts, most embarrassingly in a recent Time magazine cover, the shift to green technologies has already created a “thriving” economy.

    This would be news to a state that suffers 12% unemployment, massive outmigration and among the worst business climates in the country. Time extols Google, Apple, Facebook, Twitter and the other Silicon Valley companies as exemplars leading to a glorious prosperity; somehow the article missed the empty factories, vacant offices and abandoned farms across the state.

    Not surprisingly, California’s middle class is getting hammered, and has for years. Since 1999, according to research at the California Lutheran University forecast project, the state has experienced a far more dramatic drop in households earning between $35,000 and $75,000, than the national average. At the same time California’s poverty rate has grown at a more rapid pace than the national average, with a huge spike since 2006.

    This reflects a strange disjunction between the optimism of the top-tier boomers–venture capitalists, academics and the self-described progressives–and the realities facing most Californians. For Apple’s Steve Jobs, Google’s Eric Schmidt and venture capitalists connected to Al Gore, these could well be the best of times. Fed policy prints money for investment bankers to speculate; stock prices rise as people have nowhere else to invest. And for the much celebrated venture community, there’s also an Energy Department that pours hundreds of millions into “green” start-ups that build things like expensive electric cars.

    California’s high-tech greens may talk a liberal streak in terms of diversity and social justice, but their prescriptions offer little for those who would like to build a career and raise a family in 21st century California. Their policies in terms of land use regulation and greenhouse gas emissions will make it even harder for existing factories, warehouses, homebuilders and other traditional employers of the middle- or working class. “In effect,” Eyler notes, “the progressives have become regressives.”

    In the real world hype and enthusiasm are not sufficient to create a sustainable economic model. In order to grow a “green” economy, you first have to have an economy. To be sure, there are potential opportunities in the development and implementation of energy-saving technologies in the next decade, including wind and solar energy, but it’s doubtful that many jobs can be generated without a major shift in the economic climate here.

    One key problem, as suggested in a recent analysis by Rob Sentz at Economic Modeling Specialists, is that green is not really about “what” you make but about “how” you make it. Green jobs, for the most part, will come from growth in construction, manufacturing and warehousing industries.

    Yet the “greenest” parts of the country–places like the northern end of the Bay Area–are among the toughest places to build or manufacture anything, without huge public-sector subsidies. Indeed, California’s new green requirements, compared with places like Texas or China where manufacturing has other advantages, would further undermine an already struggling sector. Few businesspeople see much growth in the near future in office or residential construction.

    This leaves “green” industries reduced to largely improving the energy footprint of existing structures, an effort that will no doubt be further undermined by the deteriorating picture for many commercial mortgages. At best, Eyler notes, this may create a small temporary surge in jobs, but the long-term effects will likely be limited.

    Ultimately, the only way out of this looming crisis lies with the boomer gentry doing something totally out of character: getting past their self-interest and self-love for the good of the next generation. In the process, they do not have to give up preserving paradise, but focus as well on creating economic opportunity for the emerging working and middle class majority. If not, their Eden will end up as a green version of a gated community.

    This article originally appeared at Forbes.com.

    Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and is a distinguished presidential fellow in urban futures at Chapman University. He is author of The City: A Global History. His next book, The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050, will be published by Penguin Press early next year.

  • Bowling Alone or Bowling Along?

    It has long been cultural sport to mock or to misunderstand the social life of suburbs. More recently, however, sport itself has been identified as a major arena for social decline in suburbia.

    In his Bowling Alone, published with an almost apocalyptic sense of timing at the beginning of the present century, the esteemed social scientist Robert Putnam focused upon the decline of the American bowling leagues as symptomatic of a lost America. League bowling took off during the fifties and peaked during the sixties before its decline set in after 1970. From this downward trajectory, Putnam widens his analysis to raise serious and important questions about the culture of civic engagement in the USA. In other works, Putnam has also viewed the localised politics of northern Italian towns in a more favourable light than the sprawling suburbs of the USA.

    Putnam worries that both community involvement and church attendance is lower in the central cities and suburbs of major metropolitan areas than in the smaller towns of the USA of which he is clearly enamoured. He places this in the wider context of the more mobile, privatised and suburban way of life that has developed in America and other countries, including Britain, since the fifties. Somewhat ironically, perhaps, the decade that was once diagnosed as bringing about the Organisation Man and the Lonely Crowd of tract suburbia, is now viewed as a decade of suburban neighbourliness. What Putnam terms the ‘compulsive togetherness’ of the fifties has been eroded, apparently, by atomised isolation, self-interest and ever widening widths of commuting and social connectivity.

    Yet Putnam’s own statistics do not support the widely cited assertion of declining suburban sociability as compared to urban centers. In his argument that “community involvement is lower in major metropolitan areas” we find from tables in Bowling Alone that in the central areas of cities with one million or more people, about 7 per cent had served in a local community group, and almost 9 percent had attended a public meeting on town or school affairs. In the suburbs of that same-sized metropolis, over 10 per cent had served in a local community group, and over 15 percent had attended a public meeting on town or school affairs.

    In communities between 250,000 and 1 million people – quite a range of cities – again the suburbs manifest higher levels of civic engagement than the city centres. In the town of 50,000 to 250,000 however, we find a slightly more mixed picture: 14 percent living in central areas had served in a local community group compared to 13 percent in the suburbs. This is a paltry differential. However, whereas over 15 percent in central cities of this size had attended a public meeting on town or school affairs, it was over 20 percent in the suburbs, a much wider gap.

    When Putnam analyzes church attendance, his findings tend to exonerate suburban living. In the ”major metropolitan area of more than 2 million”, the “non-central city” manifests higher levels of regular church attendance than the central city. Yet in smaller metropolitan areas and towns both central and non-central areas have almost identical levels of church attendance.

    Surely this all raises a significant questions about the common notion that suburbanisation is bad for local community life. Of course, these figures may also be qualified by ethnicity, gender, occupational class and tenure. For example, home owners tend to be more rooted than renters, says Putnam. But most people living in the American suburbs are home owners, whereas rental levels are higher in downtown areas. Perhaps there is a weaker relationship between faith and tenure than between tenure and community participation?

    So what about sports? Over time-spans of decades, people learn to like other sports, or new ones, and the younger generation does not always emulate the interests of its parents or grandparents. Interests and disposable income are shifted onto other pursuits. Baseball leagues and American football may be declining, but Putnam pays only lip service to the growing popularity of sports such as skating, snowboarding, fitness walking and going to the gym. These are sports that now bind young people together via discussion on social networks and in media like fuel.tv in terms of fashion and popular events.

    For his part, Putnam sees these as symptomatic of a modest demise in team sports as more individualised pursuits become increasingly common. Yet he may be missing the social aspects of the new “extreme” sports.

    He also seems oblivious to the growing social role of soccer, particularly in the suburbs. He gives it three mentions in Bowling Alone. Relative to other countries, soccer may be a relatively small team sport in the USA, encouraged by immigration from soccer-loving countries, and cheered on by the soccer moms of America. But more important is the expansion of amateur soccer which attracts more young people. I would argue that the relative vitality of local soccer leagues is more important than the success of the professional leagues. After all, the issue is grassroots, volunteer social interaction, not mass behavior.

    Soccer was originally born in England, and remains a vital force of social cohesion, particularly in suburban working-class council estates. The Old Left thinkers, many of whom have embraced Putnam’s ideas remain woefully ignorant of the energy and diversity of working-class suburban life.

    Soccer remains the working-class sport that has refused to die, even when the English working class has been diagnosed with terminal decline. Whether at grassroots amateur level, in the lower professional leagues, and in the glamorous world of the Premier League and international competitions, the game continues to draw people together in parks, at football stadiums, around their television sets, and in a million and more websites dedicated to the sport.

    The internet brings people together not just across the world but also in a local context. Online communities, and formal and informal emailing, are mechanisms not of isolation but of interaction. For example, in some research I have been doing on a poor suburban council estate in Southern England, the local tenants’ groups have established and maintain websites. And local amateur soccer in the English provinces has no shortage of websites dedicated to the sport and the teams who play it. And poorer working class areas are currently viewed by politicians and cultural commentators as possessing historically low levels of social capital.

    Ultimately, Putnam is saying little that is new. In both England and the United States of America writers, film directors and metropolitan journalists have long played the game of bashing the suburbs. This elitist lineage can be traced back from the late-Victorian Diary of a Nobody to the nobodies at The Office, and from Babbit to American Beauty. The message takes on different emphases and tones but at its heart is contempt or faux sympathy for the allegedly alienated and privatised suburbanite. Films such as Backfield in Motion or Bend it Like Beckham give us a different take, but they aren’t as widely popular as American Beauty. Why is that? Perhaps their message is too optimistic. The chattering classes continue to want to paint suburbs as bastions of privatism rather than as a flexible and sociable context for community and association. The fact that they are, on the whole, woefully wrong is likely not to change their opinions, but should inform those who have not yet closed their minds.

    Mark Clapson is a social historian, with interests in suburbanisation and social change, new communities in England and the USA, and war and the built environment.

  • Urban Youth Deserve Chance to Hear About Service Academies

    Here’s a disturbing thought as Veterans Day approaches: Some teachers and administrators of the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) refuse to allow visits to high school campuses by representatives of the service academies that train young officers.

    The service academies have all earned reputations as fine academic institutions that go further on training future officers. There is the U.S. Military Academy; the U.S. Naval Academy; the U.S. Air Force Academy; the U.S. Coast Guard Academy; and the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. They all offer full scholarships and require five years of service after graduation.

    Candidates must meet demanding standards on academics, physical fitness, and extra-curricular activity. They are generally required to secure a nomination from a member of the U.S. Congress, the president, or the vice president.

    The merit involved in gaining a nomination, along with the geographic apportionment by Congressional districts, offers the chance to draw candidates from across the socio-economic spectrum. Graduation from a service academy offers young officers from every corner of society the chance to reach significant rank.

    Measure that against the LAUSD teachers and administrators who deem a career as a military officer to be unworthy of a hearing at high school campuses. Some will tell you that they object because our wars are fought by too many young persons of color. Others view the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy on gays in the military as contemptible prejudice.

    These objections are absurd. Our civilian leadership decides the actions and policies of the military. War or peace? That’s in the hands of the president and Congress. Gays in the military? Same story.

    It’s true that our military stands ready for war if so directed by the civilian leadership of our democracy. It’s also notable that never in the course of history has any institution possessed the war-making might of the U.S. military. And never has an institution in such a position yielded so loyally to the will of unarmed leadership. This sense of duty has lasted through good and bad, gallant victories and horrific mishaps. Never has there been a serious challenge to civilian oversight.

    All of that is overlooked by LAUSD teachers and administrators—and their boycotts have an effect. Some members of Congress who represent Los Angeles have chronic difficulty in filling the number of nominations they are allowed to make to the service academies each year. They aren’t coming up short on qualified candidates. They can’t even get that far—not enough young achievers know about the possibilities of the service academies.

    It’s time that someone gave these alleged educators who forbid any discussion of service academies a lesson on the honorable history of our military. They should also be reminded that it will require representatives from throughout our society—rich and poor, all colors and creeds, town and country—to keep this line of honorable service intact.

    Keeping knowledge of the service academies away from youngsters in our city is nothing short of demographic censorship. It is time for LAUSD to put an end to the practice.

  • Numbers Don’t Support Migration Exodus to “Cool Cities”

    For the past decade a large coterie of pundits, prognosticators and their media camp followers have insisted that growth in America would be concentrated in places hip and cool, largely the bluish regions of the country.

    Since the onset of the recession, which has hit many once-thriving Sun Belt hot spots, this chorus has grown bolder. The Wall Street Journal, for example, recently identified the “Next Youth-Magnet Cities” as drawn from the old “hip and cool” collection of yore: Seattle, Portland, Washington, New York and Austin, Texas.

    It’s not just the young who will flock to the blue meccas, but money and business as well, according to the narrative. The future, the Atlantic assured its readers, did not belong to the rubes in the suburbs or Sun Belt, but to high-density, high-end places like New York, San Francisco and Boston.

    This narrative, which has not changed much over the past decade, is misleading and largely misstated. Net migration, both before and after the Great Recession, according to analysis by the Praxis Strategy Group, has continued to be strongest to the predominately red states of the South and Intermountain West.

    This seems true even for those seeking high-end jobs. Between 2006 and 2008, the metropolitan areas that enjoyed the fastest percentage shift toward educated and professional workers and industries included nominally “unhip” places like Indianapolis, Charlotte, N.C., Memphis, Tenn., Salt Lake City, Jacksonville, Fla., Tampa, Fla., and Kansas City, Mo.

    The overall migration numbers are even more revealing. As was the case for much of the past decade, the biggest gainers continue to include cities such as San Antonio, Dallas and Houston. Rather than being oases for migrants, some oft-cited magnets such as New York, Boston, Los Angeles and Chicago have all suffered considerable loss of population to other regions over the past year.

    Much the same pattern emerges when you look at longer-term state demographic patterns. A recent survey by the Empire Center for New York State Policy found that the biggest net losers in terms of per capita outmigration between 2000 and 2008 were, with the exception of Louisiana, all blue state bastions. New York residents lead in terms of rate of exodus, closely followed by the District of Columbia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and California.

    An even greater shock to the sensibilities of the insular, Manhattan-centric media, the report found that most of the movement from the Empire State was not from the much-dissed suburbia, but from that hip and cool paragon, New York City. This can not be ascribed as a loss of the unwanted: According to the report, those leaving the city had 13% higher incomes than those coming in.

    How can this be, when everyone who’s smart and hip is headed to the Big Apple? This question was addressed in a report by the center-left, New York-based Center for an Urban Future. True, considerable numbers of young, educated people come to New York, but it turns out that many of them leave for the suburbs or other states as they reach their peak earning years.

    Indeed, it’s astonishing given the many clear improvements in New York that more residents left the five boroughs for other locales in 2006, the peak of the last boom, than in 1993, when the city was in demonstrably worse shape. In 2006, the city had a net loss of 153,828 residents through domestic out-migration, compared to a decline of 141,047 in 1993, with every borough except Brooklyn experiencing a higher number of out-migrants in 2006.

    Of course, blue state boosters can point out that the exodus has slowed with the recession, as opportunities have dried up elsewhere. True, the flood of migration has slowed across the nation. Yet it has only slowed, not dried up. When the economy revives, it’s likely to start flowing heavily again.

    More important, the key group leaving New York and other so-called “youth-magnets” comprises the middle class, particularly families, critical to any long-term urban revival. This year’s Census shows that the number of single households in New York has reached record levels; in Manhattan, more than half of all households are singles. And the Urban Future report’s analysis found that even well-heeled Manhattanites with children tend to leave once they reach the age of 5 or above.

    The key factor here may well be economic opportunity. Virtually all the supposedly top-ranked cities cited in this media narrative have suffered below-average job growth throughout the decade. Some, like Portland and New York, have added almost no new jobs; others like San Francisco, Boston and Chicago have actually lost positions over the past decade.

    In contrast, even after the current doldrums, San Antonio, Orlando, Houston, Dallas and Phoenix all boast at least 5% more jobs now than a decade ago. Among the large-narrative magnet regions only one–government-bloated greater Washington–has enjoyed strong employment growth.

    The impact of job growth on the middle class has been profound. New York City, for example, has the smallest share of middle-income families in the nation, according to a recent Brookings Institution study; its proportion of middle-income neighborhoods was smaller than that of any metropolitan area except Los Angeles.The same pattern has also emerged in what has become widely touted as America’s “model city”–President Obama’s adopted hometown of Chicago.

    The likely reasons behind these troubling trends are things rarely discussed in “the narrative”–concerns like high costs, taxes and regulations making it tough on industries that employ the middle class. One clear culprit: out of control state spending. State spending in New York is second per capita in the nation (anomalous Alaska is first); California stands fourth and New Jersey seventh. Illinois is down the list but coming up fast. Over the past decade, while its population grew by only 7%, Illinois’ spending grew by an inflation-adjusted 39%.

    The problem here is more than just too-large government; it lies in how states spend their money. Massive public spending increases over the past decade in California, New Jersey, Illinois and New York have gone overwhelmingly into the pockets and pensions of public employees. It certainly has not flowed into such basic infrastructure as roads, bridges and ports that are needed to keep key industries competitive.

    The American Association of State Highway Transportation, for example, ranked New York 43rd in the country and New Jersey dead last in terms of quality of roads. Some 46% of the Garden State’s roads were rated in poor condition, compared with the national average of 13%, even as the state’s spending reached new highs. The typical New Jersey driver spends almost $600 a year in auto repairs necessitated by the poor conditions of the roads.

    In contrast, states in the South and parts of the Plains tend to pour their public resources into productive uses. Cities like Mobile, Ala., Houston, Charleston, S.C., and Savannah, Ga., have been investing in port facilities to take advantage of the planned widening of the Panama Canal. The primary goal is to take business away from the increasingly expensive, overregulated and under-invested ports of the Northeast and West Coast. Similarly, places like Kansas City and the Dakotas are looking to boost their basic rail and road networks to support export-heavy industries.

    Even in the face of the Obama administration’s strongly urban-centric, blue state-oriented economic policy, these generally less than hip places appear poised to grow as the economy recovers. Virtually all the top 10 economies that have withstood the recession come from outside the “youth-magnet” field: San Antonio; Oklahoma City; Little Rock, Ark.; Dallas, Baton Rouge, La.; Tulsa, Okla., Omaha, Neb.; Houston and El Paso, Texas. The one exception to this rule, Austin, also benefits from being located in solvent, generally low-tax Texas.

    This continued erosion of jobs and the middle class from the blue states and cities is not inevitable. Many of these places enjoy enormous assets in terms of universities, strategic location, concentrations of talented workers and entrenched high-wage industries. But short of a massive and continuing bailout from Washington, the only way to reverse their decline will be a thorough reformation of their governmental structure and policies. No narrative, no matter how well spun, can make up for that reality.

    This article originally appeared at Forbes.com.

    Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and is a distinguished presidential fellow in urban futures at Chapman University. He is author of The City: A Global History. His next book, The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050, will be published by Penguin Press early next year.

  • New York Migration Study, the State Continues to Lose Residents

    The Empire Center for New State Policy has released “Empire State Exodus,” which details New York’s continuing loss of people and their incomes to other states. The report was authored by E. J. McMahon, senior fellow with the Manhattan Institute and director of the Empire Center and me.

    Since the beginning of the decade, New York has experienced a net domestic migration loss of more than 1,500,000, the largest loss in the nation. The extent of this loss is illustrated by the fact that Katrina/Rita/defective dike ravaged Louisiana lost a smaller share of its population than New York, which also led in relative terms.

    The report uses the latest Census Bureau and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) data to examine how many New Yorkers have left the state, where they have gone and how much income they have taken with them. It includes detailed breakdowns of population migration patterns at a regional and county level.

    More than 85% of the domestic migration loss was from the New York City region (combined statistical area) of New York State and more than 70% of the loss was from New York City itself. The data shows a continuing exodus from the city, to the suburbs and to elsewhere in the nation.

    The annual net loss of New Yorkers to other states has ranged from a high of nearly 250,000 people in 2005 to a low of 126,000 last year, when moves nationwide slowed down sharply along with the economy.

    Households moving out of New York State had average incomes 13 percent higher than those moving into New York during the most recent year for which such data are available. In 2006-07 alone, the migration flow out of New York drained $4.3 billion in taxpayer income from the state. New York taxpayers moving to other states had average incomes of $57,144, while those
    moving into New York averaged $50,533 as of 2007, according to the report.

    “Even with its large domestic migration losses, New York’s total population has grown slightly since 2000, thanks to a large influx of immigrants from foreign countries,” the report says. “But New York’s share of U.S. population is still shrinking. A continuation of the domestic migration trends highlighted here will translate into slower economic growth and diminishing political influence in the future.”

    The report is available at EmpireCenter.org.

  • The White City

    Among the media, academia and within planning circles, there’s a generally standing answer to the question of what cities are the best, the most progressive and best role models for small and mid-sized cities. The standard list includes Portland, Seattle, Austin, Minneapolis, and Denver. In particular, Portland is held up as a paradigm, with its urban growth boundary, extensive transit system, excellent cycling culture, and a pro-density policy. These cities are frequently contrasted with those of the Rust Belt and South, which are found wanting, often even by locals, as “cool” urban places.

    But look closely at these exemplars and a curious fact emerges. If you take away the dominant Tier One cities like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles you will find that the “progressive” cities aren’t red or blue, but another color entirely: white.

    In fact, not one of these “progressive” cities even reaches the national average for African American percentage population in its core county. Perhaps not progressiveness but whiteness is the defining characteristic of the group.

    The progressive paragon of Portland is the whitest on the list, with an African American population less than half the national average. It is America’s ultimate White City. The contrast with other, supposedly less advanced cities is stark.

    It is not just a regional thing, either. Even look just within the state of Texas, where Austin is held up as a bastion of right thinking urbanism next to sprawlvilles like Dallas-Ft. Worth and Houston.

    Again, we see that Austin is far whiter than either Dallas-Ft. Worth or Houston.

    This raises troubling questions about these cities. Why is it that progressivism in smaller metros is so often associated with low numbers of African Americans? Can you have a progressive city properly so-called with only a disproportionate handful of African Americans in it? In addition, why has no one called these cities on it?

    As the college educated flock to these progressive El Dorados, many factors are cited as reasons: transit systems, density, bike lanes, walkable communities, robust art and cultural scenes. But another way to look at it is simply as White Flight writ large. Why move to the suburbs of your stodgy Midwest city to escape African Americans and get criticized for it when you can move to Portland and actually be praised as progressive, urban and hip? Many of the policies of Portland are not that dissimilar from those of upscale suburbs in their effects. Urban growth boundaries and other mechanisms raise land prices and render housing less affordable exactly the same as large lot zoning and building codes that mandate brick and other expensive materials do. They both contribute to reducing housing affordability for historically disadvantaged communities. Just like the most exclusive suburbs.

    This lack of racial diversity helps explain why urban boosters focus increasingly on international immigration as a diversity measure. Minneapolis, Portland and Austin do have more foreign born than African Americans, and do better than Rust Belt cities on that metric, but that’s a low hurdle to jump. They lack the diversity of a Miami, Houston, Los Angeles or a host of other unheralded towns from the Texas border to Las Vegas and Orlando. They even have far fewer foreign born residents than many suburban counties of America’s major cities.

    The relative lack of diversity in places like Portland raises some tough questions the perennially PC urban boosters might not want to answer. For example, how can a city define itself as diverse or progressive while lacking in African Americans, the traditional sine qua non of diversity, and often in immigrants as well?

    Imagine a large corporation with a workforce whose African American percentage far lagged its industry peers, sans any apparent concern, and without a credible action plan to remediate it. Would such a corporation be viewed as a progressive firm and employer? The answer is obvious. Yet the same situation in major cities yields a different answer. Curious.

    In fact, lack of ethnic diversity may have much to do with what allows these places to be “progressive”. It’s easy to have Scandinavian policies if you have Scandinavian demographics. Minneapolis-St. Paul, of course, is notable in its Scandinavian heritage; Seattle and Portland received much of their initial migrants from the northern tier of America, which has always been heavily Germanic and Scandinavian.

    In comparison to the great cities of the Rust Belt, the Northeast, California and Texas, these cities have relatively homogenous populations. Lack of diversity in culture makes it far easier to implement “progressive” policies that cater to populations with similar values; much the same can be seen in such celebrated urban model cultures in the Netherlands and Scandinavia. Their relative wealth also leads to a natural adoption of the default strategy of the upscale suburb: the nicest stuff for the people with the most money. It is much more difficult when you have more racially and economically diverse populations with different needs, interests, and desires to reconcile.

    In contrast, the starker part of racial history in America has been one of the defining elements of the history of the cities of the Northeast, Midwest, and South. Slavery and Jim Crow led to the Great Migration to the industrial North, which broke the old ethnic machine urban consensus there. Civil rights struggles, fair housing, affirmative action, school integration and busing, riots, red lining, block busting, public housing, the emergence of black political leaders – especially mayors – prompted white flight and the associated disinvestment, leading to the decline of urban schools and neighborhoods.

    There’s a long, depressing history here.

    In Texas, California, and south Florida a somewhat similar, if less stark, pattern has occurred with largely Latino immigration. This can be seen in the evolution of Miami, Los Angeles, and increasingly Houston, San Antonio and Dallas. Just like African-Americans, Latino immigrants also are disproportionately poor and often have different site priorities and sensibilities than upscale whites.

    This may explain why most of the smaller cities of the Midwest and South have not proven amenable to replicating the policies of Portland. Most Midwest advocates of, for example, rail transit, have tried to simply transplant the Portland solution to their city without thinking about the local context in terms of system goals and design, and how to sell it. Civic leaders in city after city duly make their pilgrimage to Denver or Portland to check out shiny new transit systems, but the resulting videos of smiling yuppies and happy hipsters are not likely to impress anyone over at the local NAACP or in the barrios.

    We are seeing this script played out in Cincinnati presently, where an odd coalition of African Americans and anti-tax Republicans has formed to try to stop a streetcar system. Streetcar advocates imported Portland’s solution and arguments to Cincinnati without thinking hard enough to make the case for how it would benefit the whole community.

    That’s not to let these other cities off the hook. Most of them have let their urban cores decay. Almost without exception, they have done nothing to engage with their African American populations. If people really believe what they say about diversity being a source of strength, why not act like it? I believe that cities that start taking their African American and other minority communities seriously, seeing them as a pillar of civic growth, will reap big dividends and distinguish themselves in the marketplace.

    This trail has been blazed not by the “progressive” paragons but by places like Atlanta, Dallas and Houston. Atlanta, long known as one of America’s premier African American cities, has boomed to become the capital of the New South. It should come as no surprise that good for African Americans has meant good for whites too. Similarly, Houston took in tens of thousands of mostly poor and overwhelmingly African American refugees from Hurricane Katrina. Houston, a booming metro and emerging world city, rolled out the welcome mat for them – and for Latinos, Asians and other newcomers. They see these people as possessing talent worth having.

    This history and resulting political dynamic could not be more different from what happened in Portland and its “progressive” brethren. These cities have never been black, and may never be predominately Latino. Perhaps they cannot be blamed for this but they certainly should not be self-congratulatory about it or feel superior about the urban policies a lack of diversity has enabled.

    Aaron M. Renn is an independent writer on urban affairs based in the Midwest. His writings appear at The Urbanophile.

  • Eros Triumphs…At Least in Some Places, Mapping Natural Population Increases

    As with other advanced capitalist societies, the US population is aging. About 30 percent of US counties experienced natural decrease – more deaths than births – in the 2000-2007 period.

    Nevertheless, the most exceptional feature of the United States remains its unusually high level of natural increase, and significant degree of population growth. This is often attributed to the high level of immigration, especially from Mexico, illegal as well as legal, and their high fertility. This process is indeed critical, even though most of the migration is in fact legal, and the share from Mexico is not as high as commonly perceived. Also most of the Hispanic population in the United States is native, not immigrant.

    Perhaps a more important feature of US society contributing to a smaller decline in fertility than in most other advanced countries is the extraordinary cultural traditionalism of perhaps half the American population. This is reflected in the so-called “culture wars”: a more educated modernism, pejoratively dubbed as “secular humanist,” versus a more traditional, religion-observing “moral majority.”

    Conservatives campaign against abortion and even contraception, and maintain an amazingly high level of religiosity and skepticism of science, creating a climate favorable to a level of fertility above replacement levels (2.1 per female). The super pro-child Mormon Church alone claims millions of members, and evangelical groups boast even more. This creates a fascinating, future-influencing tension between a younger-growing, more educated population choosing lower fertility on average, and a more traditional population more successful at reproducing themselves!

    Natural increase, then, can be expected in the following kinds of areas. One is heavily Hispanic areas. Those with more recent immigrant stock have higher fertility, but above replacement fertility seems to persist for several generations. Another lies in Native American Indian areas. The explanation here is controversial, but there is perhaps a sense of the need for more children as a reaction to a perceived threat of loss of identity.

    For areas with more vibrant economic growth, attracting and maintaining young workers constitute another focal point for natural increase. These are overwhelmingly urban, even metropolitan. Note that these areas may not have above replacement fertility, but will have natural increase, simply because of the younger age structure of the population.

    Other strong candidates for natural increase include military base areas, because of the prevalence of young families. Likewise Mormon areas, and fundamentalist religion areas, at least where there remain sufficiently young populations.

    Seventy percent of counties had natural increase, differing from counties with natural decrease by higher immigration, much higher levels of urban population, a much younger population, and far higher levels of racial and ethnic minorities, especially Hispanics.

    A little more than half (1193) of counties with natural increase had net domestic out-migration – more people leaving than moving into the county, and of these the majority (702) lost population, while in the other 492 natural increase was greater than the out-migration loss, resulting in population gains. Out migration counties differ from in-migration counties ONLY because of the markedly higher ethnic and racial minority shares, obviously reflecting much weaker economic performances. The population losing counties had especially high African American population shares and were more rural.

    The net in-migration counties (1093) are usefully separated into those in which natural increase exceeded the net in-migration (only 272 counties) and those in which net in-migration was dominant (821). The former had slightly higher minority shares, and were somewhat more urban.

    Geography of Natural Increase

    Figure 1 maps natural increase by five levels, with cooler colors having a small natural increase (here in the simple sense of the excess of births over deaths as a share of the base population), and warm colors indicated high levels of natural increase. Rates of over 10 percent are really startlingly high.

    Natural increase prevails over much of the country, with the exception of much of the Great Plains, from Texas to Canada, and northern Appalachia. High levels of natural increase, over 6 percent (orange and magenta on Map 1) occur in five kinds of areas that are really highly predictable.

    • First, areas of high Hispanic population, mainly from Texas to southern and central California, but also in parts of eastern Washington and southwestern Kansas.
    • Second, Native American Indian reservation areas, most obviously in Alaska, New Mexico, South Dakota, Arizona but also Montana and North Dakota.
    • Third, the Mormon “culture belt,” spreading from the “Zion” of Utah to Idaho, Nevada and Wyoming.
    • Fourth, rapidly growing suburban and exurban counties, most notably around Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Austin, Atlanta, Washington DC, Chicago, Minneapolis, Charlotte and Denver, and
    • fifth, in counties with military bases, for example, in North Carolina, Georgia, Kansas, Oklahoma and several other states.

    Above average natural increase, from 4 to 6 percent, is typical of many modestly growing metropolitan areas, both central and suburban and exurban counties, and in a scattering of rural-small town counties, especially in the west (western Colorado is notable). Low natural increase, under 2 percent, is very widespread across both urban and rural areas, and is often indicative of slow-growing economies with out-migration (please see Map 2), and in areas moderately attractive to older migrants, thus depressing births, but not enough to cause natural decrease.

    Map 2 sorts counties according to in or out migration, population gain or loss, and the role of natural increase versus net in-migration. Four basic types are mapped, but then divided into high or low natural increase. Rapidly growing counties with net in-migration even greater than high natural increase (dark pink) are especially typical of suburban and exurban counties of large metropolises, and of fast-growing smaller metropolitan areas. Lower natural increase is more common for rural and small town amenity areas, as well as far exurban counties. Natural increase greater than in-migration (yellow) is not very common, and tends to occur in rural-small town counties, including several counties with high Mormon shares. Counties with out-migration but enough natural increase to permit overall population growth (green) are common in three kinds of areas. First are large central metropolitan counties – such as those containing Los Angeles, Houston, Dallas, and Miami – with high non-Hispanic white out-migration, but high Hispanic in-migration. The second type are border region counties with high Mexican in-migration, and the third are Native American Indian areas. Those counties experiencing population loss (purple) are much more like counties with natural decrease: dominantly rural or declining rust belt metropolitan areas.

    Finally, what areas have the highest rates of natural increase? These see increases of 16 to 19 percent from the base population. They are Wade-Hampton, Alaska (west of Bethel); Webb, Texas (Laredo); Utah (Provo); Hidalgo, Texas (McAllen); Loudoun, Virginia (Leesburg, northwest of Washington DC); Starr, Texas (Rio Grande City); and Madison, Idaho (Rexburg). Three are Hispanic, two Mormon, one Alaska native, and one fast growing suburban.

    Natural increase has remained higher than forecast 40 years ago due to far higher immigration, above replacement fertility even among the affluent and educated, and high teenage pregnancy in connection with constraints on abortion – i.e., America’s very high religious traditionalism. The unknowns ahead include the rate of future immigration, whether 2nd and 3rd generation Hispanics will reduce fertility markedly and whether education and modernism will reduce the power of tradition.

    See Richard’s similar piece on natural decreases in US population.

    Richard Morrill is Professor Emeritus of Geography and Environmental Studies, University of Washington. His research interests include: political geography (voting behavior, redistricting, local governance), population/demography/settlement/migration, urban geography and planning, urban transportation (i.e., old fashioned generalist)

  • Our Euro President

    Barack Obama’s seemingly inexplicable winning of the Nobel Peace Prize says less about him than about the current mentality of Europe’s leadership class. Lacking any strong, compelling voices of their own, the Europeans are now trying to hijack our president as their spokesman.

    There’s a catch, of course. In their mind, Obama deserves the award because he seems to think, and sound, like a European. In everything from global warming to anti-suburbanism to pacifism, Obama reflects the basic agenda of the continent’s leading citizens–in sharp contrast to former President George W. Bush.

    Indeed it’s likely that if Obama wanted to run for presidency of the E.U., he could mail it in. Unfortunately for him, he presides over a country that faces a very different future from that of Europe.

    This is not to say we cannot learn from Europe in certain areas–namely fuel economy and health care. Republicans dropped the ball on both of these issues, and as a result both our health care system and automobile efficiency pale next to those of the continent.

    Still, the reality is that America and Europe are very different, which would necessitate disparate policy approaches. Our growing divergence with Europe spans everything from demographics to economic needs and basic values. In all these areas, the gap is likely to increase over time.

    This is why the Obama Administration’s Europhilia, now likely to become more pronounced, represents a dangerous temptation. For one thing, Europe’s generally ultra low birth rates–compared with those in the U.S.–imposes structural limits on how their economies can grow and even if they even need growth.

    If our core problems come from over-consumption and irrational financial-sector exuberance, Europe’s sluggishness stems from the lack of an expanding workforce and consumer base. This means Germany–by far the most important E.U. country in terms of population and gross domestic product–must rely on exports to maintain its generally slow growth rate. More important, as the current generation in their 50s retire, the workforce is likely to shrink dramatically in almost all European countries, making even modest growth difficult.

    In a rapidly aging society like Germany’s and those of other E.U. countries you can make a case for slow growth, limited work hours, early retirement and a strict regulatory regime. But for America, with its growing workforce and population, slow economic growth simply is not socially sustainable.

    More broadly, we are talking about two different mindsets. As one writer puts it, Europeans “emphasize quality of life over accumulation” and “play over unrelenting toil.” In contrast, most Americans seem ill-disposed to relax their work ethic, which has been central to the national character from its earliest days.

    Of course, the European approach is celebrated by some Americans, particularly those who already have achieved a high level of affluence. It plays very well in “little Europes” of America, cities like San Francisco, Portland and Boston, places with relatively few children and generally slow-growing populations.

    But most Americans do not seem ready for a lifestyle buffeted by regulations and limitations. Still attached to their aspirations, they seem no less satisfied with their way of life than do Europeans. Even amid the recession, 70% of Americans still embrace the idea that they can get ahead through hard work.

    There are other critical differences. Americans remain more religiously minded. One analyst, David Hart, has spoken of Europe’s “metaphysical boredom.” Half or more of Europeans never attend church, compared with barely 20% in the U.S.

    Among younger Europeans, the loss of traditional Christian identity–with its focus on long-term commitments, sacrifice and responsibility–is virtually complete: According to one Belgian demographer, barely one in 10 young adults in the E.U. maintains any link to an organized religion. In contrast roughly 60% of Americans, according to a Pew Global Attitudes survey, believe religion is “very important,” twice the rate of Canadians, Britons, Koreans or Italians and six times the rate of French or Japanese.

    Some observers, both in America and abroad, see this spiritualism, particularly among evangelical Christians, as reflecting a kind of social retardation. Yet belief in America is remarkably varied, extending beyond groups that are easily classified as liberal or conservative. In America, a broad “spiritual” focus–dating from the earliest founders and continuing through the transcendentalists and Walt Whitman–persists as a vital force. Even President Obama, whose base tends to be secular, has made much of his religious ties.

    In Europe, the only truly rising faith appears to be the secular religion of the environmental zealots. Often almost theocratic in its passion, the green movement tends to be hostile to even modest population growth and economic progress. It’s no coincidence that the last American to win the Nobel Prize was the climate change high priest himself, former Vice President Al Gore.

    To be sure, Americans also care about the planet, but they seem more disposed to see technological innovation, not abstinence, as the best way to confront ecological problems. The kind of highly restrictive regulatory environment common in Europe–and sadly in such places as California—simply is not well-suited for a country that must produce much more wealth and millions more jobs in order to sustain itself.

    Even though they may espouse secular ideals, this more growth oriented mentality also attracts a sizable number of talented and ambitious young Europeans to the U.S., as well as Australia and Canada. Although influential social commentator Richard Florida has claimed that the bright lights and “tolerance” of Europe are luring large numbers of skilled Americans, actual migration trends tell quite the opposite story. By 2004 some 400,000 E.U. science and technology graduates were residing in the U.S. Barely one in seven, according to a recent European Commission poll, intends to return.

    Perhaps the president should speak to these young Europeans. They still buy the notion of America as a country open to innovation and striving for upward mobility. Europe, in contrast, perhaps as the result of two debilitating wars in the last century, understandably craves peacefulness and social stability over all else.

    When he goes to Oslo next month, Obama should remember that America’s future is not to become a bigger version of Norway, a tiny country fat with fossil fuels that can afford its air of moral superiority. We are also not latter day versions of Britain, France, Germany or Russia–all of them worn empires exhausted by history.

    Ultimately America is about hope and aspiration. It is, if you will, a country based on an ideal, not a race or cultural legacy. As the British writer G. K. Chesterton once put it, the U.S. is “the only nation…that is founded on a creed.” That creed is not so much religious as aspirational, and it will become more important as we attempt to cope with our own growing diversity as well as the rising powers from the developing world.

    So even as he enjoys his popularity on the continent, Obama must be careful not to succumb to those who urge him to reshape America in Europe ‘s image. Take this prize, Mr. President, and then shelve it.

    This article originally appeared at Forbes.com.

    Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and is a distinguished presidential fellow in urban futures at Chapman University. He is author of The City: A Global History. His next book, The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050, will be published by Penguin Press early next year.

    Official White House photo by Pete Souza

  • Go to Middle America, Young Men & Women

    A few weeks ago, Eamon Moynihan reviewed economic research on cost of living by state in a newgeography.com article. The results may seem surprising, given that some of the states with the highest median incomes rated far lower once prices were taken into consideration. The dynamic extends to the nation’s 51 metropolitan areas with more than 1,000,000 population (See Table).

    There is a general perception that the most affluent metropolitan areas are on the east coast and the west coast. Indeed, 8 of the 10 metropolitan areas with the highest nominal per capita income in 2006 were on the two coasts. These included San Francisco, San Jose and Seattle on the west coast and Washington, Boston, New York, Hartford and Philadelphia on the east coast. Middle-America is represented by Denver and Minneapolis-St. Paul. However, as anyone who has lived on the coasts and Middle America knows, a dollar in New York or San Francisco does not buy nearly as much as a dollar in Dallas-Fort Worth or Cincinnati.

    Per Capita Income: Purchasing Power Parity
    US Metropolitan Areas over 1,000,000 Population
        2006 Per Capita Income  
    Rank Metroplitan Area Purchasing Power Adjusted Nominal Nominal Rank
    1 San Francisco $46,287 $57,747 1
    2 Washington $45,178 $51,868 3
    3 Denver $44,798 $44,691 8
    4 Minneapolis-St. Paul $44,326 $44,237 9
    5 Houston $42,815 $43,174 11
    6 Boston $42,571 $50,542 4
    7 Pittsburgh $41,716 $38,550 20
    8 St. Louis $41,613 $37,652 27
    9 Milwaukee $41,572 $39,536 19
    10 Baltimore $41,451 $43,026 12
    11 Seattle $41,448 $45,369 6
    12 Kansas City $41,329 $37,566 28
    13 Hartford $41,104 $44,835 7
    14 New Orleans $40,935 $40,211 16
    15 Philadelphia $40,725 $43,364 10
    16 Dallas-Fort Worth $40,643 $39,924 17
    17 Cleveland $39,997 $37,406 30
    18 Indianapolis $39,843 $37,735 26
    19 Chicago $39,752 $41,591 14
    20 Richmond $39,282 $38,233 22
    21 New York $39,201 $49,789 5
    22 Birmingham $39,057 $37,331 31
    23 Cincinnati $38,691 $36,650 36
    24 Nashville $38,680 $37,758 25
    25 Detroit $38,670 $38,119 24
    26 Charlotte $38,632 $38,164 23
    27 Miami $38,555 $40,737 15
    28 San Jose $38,505 $55,020 2
    29 Jacksonville $38,413 $37,519 29
    30 Louisville $38,262 $36,000 41
    31 Oklahoma City $38,156 $35,637 42
    32 Las Vegas $37,691 $38,281 21
    33 Salt Lake City $37,381 $35,145 45
    34 San Diego $37,358 $42,801 13
    35 Rochester $37,066 $36,179 38
    36 Columbus $37,058 $36,110 39
    37 Atlanta $36,691 $36,060 40
    38 Memphis $36,501 $35,470 44
    39 Tampa-St. Petersburg $36,260 $35,541 43
    40 Portland $36,131 $36,845 35
    41 Buffalo $36,091 $33,803 48
    42 Norfolk (Virginia Beach metropolitan area) $35,418 $34,858 46
    43 Raleigh $35,087 $37,221 32
    44 San Antonio $34,913 $32,810 50
    45 Providence $34,690 $37,040 34
    46 Austin $33,832 $36,328 37
    47 Phoenix $33,809 $34,215 47
    48 Sacramento $32,750 $37,078 33
    49 Los Angeles $32,544 $39,880 18
    50 Orlando $32,095 $33,092 49
    51 Riverside-San Bernardino $25,840 $27,936 51
    Source:        
    http://www.bea.gov/scb/pdf/2008/11%20November/1108_spotlight_parities.pdf

    Purchasing Power Parity: Things change rather dramatically when purchasing power is factored in. Some years ago, international economic organizations, such as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund began using costs of living by nation to compare national economic performance, rather than currency exchange rate. This practice, called “purchasing power parity” is based upon the recognition that there may be substantial differences in the cost of living between nations.

    This can be illustrated by comparing Switzerland and the United States. For years, Switzerland has had a higher per capita GDP than the United States on an exchange rate basis. Switzerland’s gross domestic product per capita was $53,300 in 2006, nearly 30% above that of the United States ($42,000). However price levels in Switzerland are so high that incomes do not go nearly as far as the exchange rate would suggest. Once adjusted for purchasing power parity, the Swiss GDP per capita in 2006 drops to $39,000, well below that of the United States. Much of the difference has to do with regulation. The more liberal economy of the United States produces a lower cost economy than in Switzerland, or for that matter most of Western Europe. The US economic advantage would be even greater measured on a household basis, since US households include nearly 10% more members (generally children) than those in Western Europe.

    The same concept was applied by the Department of Commerce Bureau of Economic Analysis researchers in their review of purchasing power parities between US metropolitan areas in 2006. When purchasing power is factored in, five of the top metropolitan areas in nominal per capita income (not adjusted for purchasing power) drop out and are replaced by other metropolitan areas rarely thought of as among the nation’s most affluent.

    Among the three west coast nominal leaders, San Francisco remains as #1, in both nominal and purchasing power adjusted per capita income. Seattle dropped from 6th to 11th position. However, the real surprise is San Jose, which dropped from 2nd position to 28th.

    The east coast regions ranked among the top 10 metropolitan areas in nominal income also were decimated by their high costs, with only Washington (which rose from 3rd to 2nd) and Boston (which fell from 4th to 6th) remaining. New York fell from 5th to 21st, Hartford from 7th to 13th and Philadelphia from 10th to 16th.

    The two non-coastal metropolitan areas in the nominal top 10 remain, with Denver rising from to 3rd and Minneapolis-St. Paul rising from 9th to 4th.

    It can be argued that Middle-America replaced the five metropolitan areas dropping out of the top ten. Houston, long one of the most disparaged metropolitan areas among urbanists, occupies the 5th position (compared to its 11th ranking in the nominal list). Three of the new entrants are confirmed members of the Rust Belt: Pittsburgh (7th), St. Louis (8th) and Milwaukee (9th). Finally, there is a new east coast entrant, blue-collar Baltimore (10th).

    The Impact of Taxes: But that is just the beginning. Taxes also diminish the purchasing power of households. Unfortunately, there is virtually no readily available information on state and local taxation by metropolitan area. There is, however state and local government taxation data at the state level. If it is assumed that this data is representative of metropolitan differences (weighted proportionately by state in multi-state metropolitan areas), there would be changes in rank among the top 10. Denver would displace Washington in the number two position, closing more than one-half the gap with San Francisco. Even more surprisingly, St. Louis would move ahead of both Boston and Pittsburgh to rank 6th. Kansas City would leap over #11 Seattle, Baltimore, Milwaukee and Pittsburgh to rank 8th, trailing #7 Boston by $25, not much more than the price of a Red Sox standing room ticket. Pittsburgh would occupy the #9 position and Milwaukee #10 (See Figure).

    More than Housing: The largest differences in purchasing power stem from housing, with east coast and west coast metropolitan areas having generally higher housing costs. As a result of the housing bust and the larger house price drops in those areas, purchasing power adjusted incomes could recover relative to those of Middle America. However, the high cost of living on the east and west coasts extend to more than housing prices. Generally, according to proprietary (and for sale) ACCRA cost of living data, the west coast and east coast metropolitan areas have higher costs of living even without housing. These differences are largely in grocery costs, which probably reflects the anti-big box store planning regulations and politics that exist in many of these areas. Grocery costs in the more affluent middle-American metropolitan areas tend to be lower.

    Other Surprises: Outside the top 10 most affluent metropolitan areas, there are other surprises. Urban planning favorite Portland ranks 40th, just above Buffalo. Rust Belt Cleveland ranks 17th, a few positions above New York. Kansas City, with its highly decentralized civic architecture, ranks 12th, just behind Seattle. Indianapolis (17th) is more affluent than Chicago (18th) and both are more affluent than New York.

    Five of the bottom 10 metropolitan areas are in the south, including Virginia Beach, Raleigh, Austin, San Antonio and Orlando. But perhaps the biggest surprise of all is that four of the five lowest ranking metropolitan areas are in the southwest: Phoenix (47th), Sacramento (48th), Los Angeles (49th) and Riverside-San Bernardino (51st).

    The Dominance of Middle America: But among the 10 most affluent metropolitan areas in the nation, six or seven may be counted as Middle-America (depending on how Baltimore is classified). Only three are from the original group that supplies 8 of the top metropolitan areas when purchasing power is not considered.

    Related articles:
    Gross Domestic Product per Capita, PPP: World Metropolitan Regions
    Gross Domestic Product per Capita, PPP: China Metropolitan Regions

    Photograph: Pittsburgh

    Wendell Cox is a Visiting Professor, Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers, Paris. He was born in Los Angeles and was appointed to three terms on the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission by Mayor Tom Bradley. He is the author of “War on the Dream: How Anti-Sprawl Policy Threatens the Quality of Life.”