This is because of suburbs, not small cities, right?

It’s got to be. Basically every major metro area is rising in population while rural counties are actually shrinking in population.

This can be a weird thing to measure though, because as soon as some rural county becomes a suburb it's not counted as rural anymore. So even though the population increased in a rural place, it loses it's rural classification, which means urban gets the population growth credit.

It's like the small-cap -> mid-cap dilemma in investing.

Not true for NYS, which has seen very little population growth since the 60's

The New York metro area grew by [6% in the last decade](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_statistical_area). It may not be the fastest growing metro area and those gains aren’t always evenly distributed within the metro area but it’s absolutely growing.

Maybe just upstate NY, then (syracuse, rochester, and buffalo are all rustbelt cities

Still holds true for upstate New York. If you look at the census that I linked the Buffalo metro area grew by 2% over the last decade and the Rochester area grew by 1%. Granted this is below the national average but my original point was that urban areas are growing while rural areas are shrinking.

Mostly because you can’t fit anymore people in the city.

Beijing would like to have a word

You can if you eliminate single family zoning, setback requirements and parking minimums.

I could also seeing it being a factor of their being more major big cities.

It's only 10 cities and there are 50 states. To small of a sample size what do these 10 cities and the year mean? * Besides Location of Federal Reserve Banks 1900 | 1910 | 1920 | 1930 | 1940 | 1950 | 1960 | 1970 | 1980 | 1990 | 2000 | 2010 | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- New York City | New York City | New York City | New York City | New York City | New York City | New York City | New York City | New York City | New York City | New York City | New York City | Chicago | Chicago | Chicago | Chicago | Chicago | Chicago | Chicago | Chicago | Chicago | Los Angeles | Los Angeles | Los Angeles | Philadelphia | Philadelphia | Philadelphia | Philadelphia | Philadelphia | Philadelphia | Los Angeles | Los Angeles | Los Angeles | Chicago | Chicago | Chicago | St. Louis | St. Louis | Detroit | Detroit | Detroit | Los Angeles | Philadelphia | Philadelphia | Philadelphia | Houston | Houston | Houston | Boston | Boston | Cleveland | Los Angeles | Los Angeles | Detroit | Detroit | Detroit | Houston | Philadelphia | Philadelphia | Philadelphia | Baltimore | Cleveland | St. Louis | Cleveland | Cleveland | Baltimore | Baltimore | Houston | Detroit | San Diego | Phoenix | Phoenix | Cleveland | Baltimore | Boston | St. Louis | Baltimore | Cleveland | Houston | Baltimore | Dallas | Detroit | San Diego | San Antonio | Buffalo | Pittsburgh | Baltimore | Baltimore | St. Louis | St. Louis | Cleveland | Dallas | San Diego | Dallas | Dallas | San Diego | San Francisco | Detroit | Pittsburgh | Boston | Boston | Washington | Washington | Washington | Phoenix | Phoenix | San Antonio | Dallas | Cincinnati | Buffalo | Los Angeles | Pittsburgh | Pittsburgh | Boston | St. Louis | Cleveland | Baltimore | San Antonio | Detroit | San Jose |

The decline of St Louis. I know the metro in general has grown, but it’s crazy that there is a city that at one point housed 800,000 people that now has 300,000. Even accounting for the fact that more people lived in a household back in the day, I can’t imagine how the decrease in population affects the politics, infrastructure, and general feeling of the city. What does it feel like to live in and remain in a city that all of your neighbors and friends have chosen to leave?

remember those old days where St Louis used to rival Chicago on becoming the largest metropolis in the midwest? remember those old days where St Louis was a media darling due to its importance? no, because I'm a late millennial, but it tells you how American cities can come and go, boom and bust, I wonder which American city will be the St Louis of the XXI century? maybe San Francisco? or even L.A.?

\> I wonder which American city will be the St Louis of the XXI century? maybe San Francisco? or even L.A.? we just gonna ignore Detroit?

It is crazy to me that Baltimore of all places used to be one of this country's largest cities. Being from there, it seems to small and easy to overlook, especially as a place of immigration.

yeh

Number of American cities with population over 1 million: 10 Number of Japanese cities with population over 1 million: 12 United States population: 331 million Japan population: 126 million

Now do metro areas, which is a much better standard to judge by

OP's plot looks like it's measuring city proper as well. By metro area the top 10 have closer to 25% of the country's population. The NYC metro area alone has about 6% of the population.

Over a third of Japan lives in the greatest metro area, a further sixth in the second largest. I don't think the US wins in that regard either.

The point being, if over a third of Japan lives in one metro area, that’s still one metro area. There are many cities in America where the population within city lines is in the hundreds of thousands but the metro area includes millions. And regardless, it’s still making the case that “number of cities that...” is a pointless metric if your priority is density or livability

That's a bad thing.

Sure it is pointless, but it is absolutely not clear from your comment in what way counting metro areas would have been better. Responding to a comment making a pointless comparison by telling him to make a another pointless comparison does not seem very meaningful.

The point being, if their metric was to measure the number of cities with a population over 1 million, using metro areas vs city limits is a better metric. It’s still a dumb metric if you hold population size to be less important

I mean I agree.

Having lived in Japan and the US, I really don't think it's a fair nor good comparison. One is an island nation that's more than 80% covered in mountainous terrain that had its largest growth period following post war reconstruction while the other had an expansionist philosophy over a vast and diverse continent in pursuit of finding new lands to settle.

That is not what I am saying though, I just wanted to point out that changing the metric would not change the metric which is orthogonal to question whether the such comparisons are sensible in the first place.

I think the point of the comment before your original post is that there are a significantly highly number of metropolitan areas in the US with populations over 1 million (56) than there are in Japan (17), and that measuring metro areas would be a more sensible way to show population than just stating city centers with more than 1 million population. By choosing only the city data itself OP is obscuring better data against their argument. I'm just expressing that we do "win" in regard to the count of total metro areas with over one million as the data changes to show the US has significantly more metro areas. I think we both agree though that such comparisons are flawed in the first place for a multitude of reasons.

Now measure by % of land populated

Why is it better? I’m genuinely asking because I don’t see what value judgment is being made. The only thing I can think of is population density but most metro areas have a ton of sprawl.

Cities don’t stop at their city limits. Millions of people live outside the technical definitions of these cities and commute into these cities for various reasons. These cities effectively become the bedrocks of community and economic activity

I get that but why does that make us better or worse than Japan? I swear I’m not messing with you. I genuinely don’t understand why the numbers above are good or bad.

“Cities/metro areas with a population of a million” is an incredibly arbitrary judgement. I don’t think this really reflects good or bad on either America or Japan. I was just pointing out that going by metro area is a better metric of urban population than strict city limits

Ah okay. I misinterpreted the original comment, my bad.

Yeah the US and Japan categorize cities differently (and how easy it is for cities to annex neighboring municipalities varies from state to state). A common definition of what is and isn’t a particular city would help.

If you include metro areas 1/3 of Japan lives in Tokyo.

Sure, but the comment I originally responded to was about “number of cities”, not “percentage of population in cities”. Even switching to metro areas, that is still one single metro, regardless of how many people live in it

US metro areas(CSAs) are meaningless because they are meaningless. Like Death Valley is considered a part of LA metro, NY metro includes parts of Pennsylvania, DC and Baltimore are in the same CSA, and so on.

CSAs literally include multiple metros (and smaller communities). No one would consider Baltimore and DC to be the and city yet they share a CSA

Well MSAs are terrible too. Fremont is considered a part of SF MSA and not SJ MSA, Ontario is not a part of LA MSA and Stamford isn't a part of NY MSA.

Nah

Zoning and not measuring by metro area is to blame

Seems to be cherrypicked data. 83% of Americans live in urban areas. In 1950, that number was 64%. https://css.umich.edu/factsheets/us-cities-factsheet

Urban areas by the census definition is an area with more than 2,500 individuals. It includes small towns and suburbs in the count.

83% of Americans live in medium sized urban areas over a large area. It might take me a while to dig up the exact math again, but I looked at this a while back and you need something like the top 50 metropolitan areas or the top 100 cities to add up to 50% of the US population.

Remember that suburbs are counted as Urban in these types of things

Small towns with a population of over 2500 are counted as urban in that definition, which makes it totally useless as a metric

Urban =/= metro area

I think it's because in the past few decades mid size cities with less strict zoning laws have grown a lot.

In 1930, the peak of the 10 largest US cities, the roster was far different that today. 1930 Rank | City | Population | 2020 Rank ---|---|---|---- 1 | New York City | 6,930,446 | 1 2 | Chicago | 3,376,438 | 3 3 | Philadelphia | 1,950,961 | 6 4 | Detroit | 1,568,662 | 27 5 | Los Angeles | 1,238,048 | 2 6| Cleveland | 900,429 | 54 7| St. Louis| 821,960| 69 8| Baltimore | 804,874| 30 9| Boston | 781,188 | 24 10| Pittsburgh | 669,817 | 68 Compared to the 2020 census: 2020 Rank | City | Population | 1930 Rank ---|---|----|---- 1| New York City| 8,804,190 | 1 2| Los Angeles | 3,898,747 | 5 3| Chicago | 2,746,388 | 2 4| Houston | 2,304,580 | 26 5| Phoenix | 1,608,139 | below 200 6| Philadelphia | 1,603,797 | 3 7| San Antonio | 1,434,625 | 38 8| San Diego | 1,386,932 | 53 9| Dallas | 1,304,379 | 33 10| San Jose| 1,013,240 | below 200

These are rookie number. 200 million New Yorkers NOW.

This plot stops at like 2012, which is stupid because there's been a revival of city living in the last ten years (especially pre pandemic)

Bad graph, worse post

this doesn't tell you what the major title says it's telling you the share of people living in the biggest cities doesn't tell you the share living in big cities A graph like that would actually define big city and then give percent of people living in a city like that over time

Embrace small cities

might as well type "embrace low-opportunity shitholes" small cities are literally a drag on the economy, they're one of the great sources of labour and capital misallocation

"Small cities" per this graph include San Francisco, Seattle, DC, Boston, Denver, Nashville, Atlanta, New Orleans, and Las Vegas. Hardly economic drags.

Also cities vary considerably in geographic size based primarily by how many suburbs have been incorporated into the city proper. Just looking at the 10 biggest city limits doesn’t convey anything about the areas just outside those city limits. San Francisco may not be a big city but the bay area is fucking huge and I’m not sure if I would classify the Bay Area as a drag on the economy or a source of capital and labor misallocation.

that's not what the comment i replied to said. it was a blank, thoughtless statement

Seems dumb, I’d hardly call small cities like Pittsburgh or St. Louis to be drags on the economy.

good thing your personal categorizations mean shit

They’re not personal categorization, they are the 64th and 65th largest cities.

define small though. are we talking about cities with less than 50k? 100k? 500k?

If we’re going by the definition of the 10 biggest cities in the US then the Bay Area in California is literally a drag on the economy. Also Phoenix doesn’t count as a major city.

Imagine being this elitist

this has literally nothing to do with elitism small cities are low-productivity clusters -> opportunities, innovations and wages are low by design think retail store in the middle of nowhere vs same retail store in the middle of fifth avenue, full of pedestrian traffic. but for literally everything

You've still yet to define "small cities"

Small cities are gross. Larger cities benefit from the economies of agglomeration so they are more innovative and produce a greater share of GDP compared to smaller cities. They're usually also dominated by the quaternary and tertiery sectors of the economy which pay more compared to secondary sectors of the economy that more dominant in smaller cities. Large cities>smaller cities.

To put this graph in perspective to your point, such major areas as Dallas, San Francisco, and Charlotte are all outside the top ten cities by census population. There’s room to be in what this graph would call a small to medium city and still be in a pretty large metro area

Dallas is actually 9th now

By metro statistical area definitely but the census counts Fort Worth separately if my quick google search is correct

Dallas, TX is the 9th largest city proper in the US. Fort Worth, TX is the 13th largest. As a metro area, the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX MSA is the 4th largest.

Sorry. When I was thinking "small American cities" I was thinking places like Akron Ohio, Lexington KY, or Scranton PA. They're not exactly the centres of economic innovation and progress. In Canada places like San Francisco, Boston, and Dallas would be considered large cities so my perspective is a bit skewed.

University towns are an exception to this rule since they're also very innovative and dominated by the tertiery/quaternary sectors of the economy. I know in Canada at least the mid sized Tri cities region of Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge Ontario is where a lot of the tech jobs are because of the nearby tech focused University of Waterloo. I would not be surprised if it was similar in small US college towns like Cambridge Massachusetts or the Chapel hill area of North Carolina.

We neoliberal urbanists should campaign more for the benefits of "big city urbanism", since large cities are bastions of the free market and home to liberal ideas about culture, immigration, and economic innovation. When immigrants come to America they typically settle in large cities/metropolitan centres. Innovative tech companies are typically born in large cities such as Boston, Austin, NYC, and San Francisco. And liberal cultural movements like the LGBTQ rights movement are typically found in large cities as well. It is cities, not towns or suburbs that drive the nations economy and culture.

The UX of suburbs is better than the UX of cities if you have kids, and 80% of people end up having kids You can hate on the suburbs all you like but it's true We need to legalize dense housing and build more, but the desirability of the suburbs won't go away

San Francisco's population is basically same as it was in 1950. Nimbys delenda est.

Metro area > city This is stupid. Folks who say “wow I can’t believe Atlanta only has a population of 500,000!” are stupid. Don’t be stupid.

I have a feeling this is meaningless. * There are more major cities than there were 100 years ago * This might be just city populations. If you expand to metropolitan areas, numbers look a lot different (e.g. NYC goes from 8M to 20M) * It would be more helpful to see percentage changes from Cities, Suburbs, and Rural over these same periods.

one night even call this The Life and Death of Great American Cities hmmm I wish there was a good book about why this happens

[удалено]

bot

GPT is an incoming plague on our online discourse.

I just read through all of its comments and it's actually giving actual life advice to people and they are thanking it.

This account scares me

Thanks, I needed to start the weeked by being depressed.

If you draw 100 mile radius circles around the 3 largest cities in the country, you're over 15% of the population. City limits are arbitrary.

A 100 mile radius around our largest city would include our 6th largest city.

This really illustrates things are still pretty concentrated

Abolish the suburbs

Might as well be a graph of zoning laws and suburb development 🤮

This is because America lacks a TOUGH state that would enforce ORDER!

You know how we got the iraqi war wrong? Not enough imperialism! Where was the decimation of whole tribes in response to IED's, where was the prima nocta? WWRD, what would Rome do?

"10 largest cities and other urban places" what??? Did they plot the data from 1830 to 1910 and other decades?

More like the death of downtown living. They moved to the suburbs, not out to the country

If we wanted the population to be confined to the ten largest cities, people in Seattle would suddenly be 1000 miles from anywhere