This series of maps shows the classification of the state's 159 counties along a continuum from urban to rural.  This classification was developed by the US Department of Agriculture (by a fellow named Beale originally) and now is standardized by the US Office of Management and Budget (OMB).  It is based on urban population and commuting patterns for a county's workforce.  Thus, a rural county where a large percentage of the workforce commutes to a metro area would be classified as more urban than if its workers didn't access a more urban area regularly.

This map is a little rough.  I need to clean up some of the borders.  Here though is a map showing the Peach State's MSAs.  A Metropolitan Statistical Area is defined by urban population and workforce commuting.  

Empty Homes in America's Cities

This map shows the percentages of vacant housing units in the 363 metros in the Lower 48 states.  It appears to highlight vacation homes.  Popular beach destinations such as Fort Myers (FL), Naples (FL), Panama Beach (FL), and Wilmington (NC) all show 25-50% of their housing units as vacation.  In one oceanside metro (Ocean City, NJ), 58% of housing units were recorded as vacant in April 2010.

Longevity and Urban America?

This map is somewhat challenging to decipher.  It shows the percentage of the population who are 85 years of age or older for each of the lower 48 state's 363 metro areas.  The purple areas have in some cases nearly double the senior populations of the orange metros.  These purple areas have 2-4% of their population consisting of Americans who have lived 5-10 years longer than the average life expectancy of about 75.  Some areas popular with retirees like Florida's metro, Prescott (AZ), Santa Barbara (CA), and Asheville (NC) show up as purple.  So do wealthier areas in Massachusetts, Maine, and Connecticut where health care may be more accessible.  There is also a fair sprinkling of old Rust Belt and upper Plains metros where there has been a large out-migration of younger workers.  So, while intriguing to ponder whether residents of some cities live longer than their peers in other cities, this map has too many possible variables to show a clear pattern.

Urban Native America

For at least 15 millennia Native Americans made up all or the vast majorities of peoples living in the area that is now the United States.  Today all the metro areas in the eastern US and Hawaii have fewer than 5% of their populations who identify as Native American on the US Census.  In Oklahoma (the former Indian Territory), New Mexico, Arizona, Alaska, and South Dakota there are 9 metro areas where Native Americans make up 5% or more of the population.  In Flagstaff (AZ) and Farmington (NM) at least 1 in 4 residents are Native American.

Black Urban America

One of my former students once asked me which cities had the highest percentage of unmarried African-American professional men.  She was a young, unmarried African-American woman in graduate school and wanted to find a similar man.  I told her I didn't actually know.  Her guess was Atlanta or Chicago.

I still don't know the answer to my student's question, but this map shows the metro areas where African-Americans make up a larger percentage of the population.  In Alaska (not shown), Hawaii (not shown), much of the West, and in many of the urban areas of Appalachia, Black Americans make up fewer than 1 in 20 residents.  In fact, only in Las Vegas and Vallego-Fairfield (CA) do the percentages of African-Americans top 1 in 10 people.

From Louisiana to Maryland, however, Black residents constitute at least a quarter (1 in 4) of the population.  In only one metro (Albany, GA) Blacks are the majority.

Race and Ethnicity in America's Metropolitan Areas

This map shows the cities with the largest percentages of a particular race or ethnicity.  Whites, Blacks, and Hispanics all form majorities in one or more metro areas.  Asians, Native Americans/Alaska Natives, Hawaiians/Pacific Islanders, and multi-racial Americans are not the majority in any metro in 2010.

America's Hispanic Majority Metros

Seventeen of America's 366 metro areas have populations whose majority are Hispanic.  All 17 of these metros are found in the American Southwest from central California to Texas.  Historically these 17 urban areas have been part first of Spain's New World colonial empire and later Mexico.

America's most Hispanic metro area is Laredo, TX, where 97% of the population are Hispanic.

America's Only Majority Black Metro

The majority of Black Americans live in urban areas, but African-Americans make up the majority of the population in only one metropolitan area:  Albany, GA.

Women Dominate American Metro Areas

Females make up the majority of Americans in part because women tend to outlive men.  This pattern holds true as well for most metro areas.  Indeed, females outnumber males in most metro areas.  There are, however, exceptions.  A number of metros in southern California and Utah have male majorities.  All the metro areas in Alaska and Hawaii are also majority male.  Some of the other male majority metros are college towns such as Blacksburg (VA), Columbia (MO), and Austin (TX).  Others such as Jacksonville (NC) and San Diego (CA) have large military bases.

Big Differences in Urban Americans' Ages

This intriguing map shows the median age in the United States' 366* metro areas.  Most metro areas have a median age somewhere in the 30s.  Eighteen metro areas, however, have populations whose median ages are under 30.  These include college towns like Ithaca (NY) and Athens (GA) as well as areas with large military bases such as Jacksonville (NC).  On the other end of the spectrum is the Punta Gorda metro area, a Florida retirement mecca where the median age is 55.8 years.  Another 71 metros -largely a mix of retirement/tourist areas and aging industrial towns- have median ages between 40-50 years.


*Some earlier maps show 366 metros but report there are only 365.  I miscounted.  There are 366.

Some Cities Are Just More City-Like

Some cities are...well...more city-like than others.  Population density is a big factor.  Out in Flagstaff, AZ, the metro area is big and relatively empty with only 7 people per square mile.  A couple of hundred miles west, however, is Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana where 2,652 people per square mile soak up that southern California sunshine.  I was frankly surprised.  I thought New York City would be America's most dense metro area, but it is now #2 behind LA.  Still, the eastern seaboard cities, Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago, Tampa, south Florida, and the San Francisco Bay area still pack in the people to provide that yummy urban goodness.

Urban Heavyweights: The Metro Areas Outproducing for Their Populations

27 metro areas produce over half of the United States' GDP.  The largest is New York City both in terms of population and GDP production.  Similarly, Los Angeles ranks #2 in both population and GDP.  The same with Chicago at #3.  This general trend holds except for a number of metro areas whose GDP production outperforms cities with larger populations.  This table compares GDP rank with population size rank.

With its oil refineries, Houston is the first of the outperformers.  With a population ranking at 5th largest in the country, it ranks 4th in GDP production.  The huge wealth produced by Silicon Valley also shows up in how San Francisco and especially San Jose rank economically higher than their population size.  The same holds true for the Seattle metro home to Microsoft.  Charlotte and Indianapolis also pull more economic weight than other, larger metro areas.

There are some 'slackers' too.  While Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario ranks as the 12th largest metro area in the US population-wise, its GDP ranking is only 26.  Similarly, Orlando, Cincinnati, Sacramento, and Nashville all rank in the top 27 largest metros in terms of population but do not rank in the top 27 metros in GDP rank.  

The Amazing Economic Power of America's Cities in Six Maps

According to the World Bank, the United States is the world's largest economy with a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of $16,244,600 MILLION.  This is almost double the GDP of China, the second largest economy on the planet.

America's 365 metropolitan areas produce 87% of the United States' GDP.

America's Metropolitan Areas

If you visited a different metropolitan area each day, it would take you a full year to visit each one.

From the Big City Subway to Merica: Election 2012

Eight of every 10 Americans now lives in a city or its suburbs.  As these maps hint, I believe many of the political divisions between the "Blue" and "Red" states are manifestations of growing cultural differences between urban and rural Americans.  

First, there are the economic differences.  The 10 largest metropolitan areas produce a whopping 34% of the country's total GDP (Gross Domestic Product).  In every state except three -Montana, Wyoming, and Vermont- metro areas produce the majority of each state's economic output according to an analysis by the Brookings Institute.  The Brookings Institute study also finds 93% of scientists and engineers live in metro areas.  In 30 states, the bulk of international exports are produced in metro areas.  Cities large and small are America's economic engines.  

Merica, the mostly rural, Republican-voting counties of the United States, tend to be older, less educated, and poorer.  There is an on-going debate over the nature of net dollar transfers of Federal tax dollars that I will discuss in future posts.  Ironically, -to quote recent political rhetoric- the counties of rural Merica are the 'Takers' who receive more Federal tax dollars in entitlement programs and other Federal programs than the wealthier, Democrat-leaning 'Makers' in urban areas.  Urban areas do not pay higher taxes into the Federal coffers, but they do contribute more in total dollars because of higher incomes among city-dwellers and a greater production of the nation's GDP.  Most -though not all- rural areas produce less and have older, sicker, and poorer residents who use more Medicaid, Medicare, and other Federal programming dollars.  

So, from an economic perspective, rural voters should be supportive of programs that help rural areas and the poors by maintaining or raising taxes.  These are more the positions supported by Democrats.  Yet, rural voters -as the maps below show- in areas except of New England, New York, Illinois, Maryland and California voted Republican in the 2012 Presidential election.  In turn, the urban voters who pay in more than they get back should economically do better in theory by supporting politicians who seek to lower Federal taxes and cut social safety net programs.  Again though, urban voters heavily supported the Democratic candidate over the tax-and-social-programs-cutting Republican candidate in 2012.  Clearly, other factors around economic and cultural values outweigh voting based on how much you pay in and get back from the Feds.

The 2012 Presidential 

Alaska to New Jersey

Are you more a city or country person?  Well, this map and the graph below can help you decide where to move.  In 2012 the median number of residents per square mile in the US was about 98 people per square mile.  Alaska on the other hand had just over 1 person pers square mile.  On the other extreme is DC with 9,927 people per square mile and New Jersey with 1,169 people per square mile.

The graph below may help you to better grasp the huge differences between Alaska and New Jersey.  If each of these blue squares is a square mile, then each person symbol represents the number of people per square mile in each of these two states and the median population density for the US as a whole.

Urban America

Four out of five of we Americans live in cities.  In fact, most demographers believe the majority of humans on this planet now live in cities; an amazing shift.  For most of our species' history, most of us have lived in the country; in forests and on farms.  So the growth of huge metropolitan areas in the past century or two is a relatively new experiment among our kind.

This week I begin a re-posting of a series on urban America.  I hope you enjoy it.