[KB0679]

I just couldn't resist:

WHY AMERICA’S YOUNG AND RESTLESS WILL ABANDON CITIES FOR SUBURBS (http://www.newgeography.com/content/002349-why-america%E2%80%99s-young-and-restless-will-abandon-cities-for-suburbs)

by Joel Kotkin 07/20/2011

Some demographers claim that “white flight” from the city is declining, replaced by a “bright flight” to the urban core from the suburbs. “Suburbs lose young whites to cities,” crowed one Associated Press headline last year.

Yet evidence from the last Census show the opposite: a marked acceleration of movement not into cities but toward suburban and exurban locations. The simple, usually inexorable effects of maturation may be one reason for this surprising result. Simply put, when 20-somethings get older, they do things like marry, start businesses, settle down and maybe start having kids.

An analysis of the past decade’s Census data by demographer Wendell Cox shows this. Cox looked at where 25- to 34-year-olds were living in 2000 and compared this to where they were living by 2010, now aged 35 to 44. The results were surprising: In the past 10 years, this cohort’s presence grew 12% in suburban areas while dropping 22.7% in the core cities. Overall, this demographic expanded by roughly 1.8 million in the suburbs while losing 1.3 million in the core cities.

http://www.newgeography.com/files/0719_chart-population-age-25-34-core-vs-suburban_400x300.jpg

[osmo]

What junk. Anybody with half a brain can see WHY this trend happened. The housing bubble made many young couples (Mostly white, but of all colors to be frank). Move out to scoop cheaper homes they could get loans for.

Show me a graph with money tied to it, you will still see a influx of more wealthy young people moving back into core areas. this has been the trend, I have seen this in research and with my own bloody eyes. I know the OP doesn't by this mess of a report either. ;) So I will proceed to print this off, and go use it as toilet paper. ciao.

[hammersklavier]

We've been through this before.

The key shift occurred 2005-8, which means the statistical sample timeframe is just too big to sort out changes that happened within the decade. As such, Census evidence can be cherry-picked to support whatever argument. By relying on Census evidence to make his argument, Kotkin is implicitly demonstrating that his claim is weak.

Also, strong market evidence shows that exurban migration has stopped (or at least massively slowed down). Building those houses has ceased to be profitable. By contrast, new construction is going up at an accelerated--and accelerating--rate in many inner-city neighborhoods--as are these neighborhoods' price points. This shows strong demand for urban living.

Ergo Kotkin's argument ignores supply and demand. Suburbs are oversupplied, which is causing prices to drop and a (possible) phantom "migration" would thus be caused not by any destination factors per se but rather because of being priced out of the city; conversely, urban demand is sky-high and even at the scale of neighborhood turnover we're seeing (note: a phenomenon that was essentially nonexistent even as recently as 1990) rehabs and new construction rapidly appreciate to the $500k+ range.

This current apparatus will continue until enough neighborhoods have turned over to support a full demand ecology, all the way from starter houses ($300k dwellings) up to high-end townhouses--the urban form of starter castles (in Philly, $1m+--prices peak at $5m).

Corollaries of this model include urban ascendant stability (newly "safe" urban neighborhoods) and suburban declining stability (neighborhoods where "safety" is more a veneer than an actuality).

[KB0679]

I know the OP doesn't by this mess of a report either. ;) So I will proceed to print this off, and go use it as toilet paper. ciao.

LOL, if Joel Kotkin or Wendell Cox told me the sky is blue I wouldn't believe it. I just couldn't help posting something here from the guy we love to hate.

[mhays]

Yeah, using 2000-2010 is pretty lame. A cabbage knows that trends shifted in the past few years as proximity became more important and central cities gained catchet. And great points about prices and demand hammersklavier. Even in 2000, "driving til you qualify" wasn't the same as prefering to be far out.

[Hayward]

While the statistics may show some legitimacy I've never liked the way Wendell Cox interprets then reports his findings. I think an analysis eventually done between 2010-2020 will show very different results. I believe in the later half of the past decade, the trend of young married couples moving from the city to the burbs have begun to show some reversal. It's proven by increased enrollment in both city private and public schools in gentrified neighborhoods as well as increased sale of family size condos and apartments in multi-unit housing.

I can't say with ultimate certainty, but at least with the data I've seen it shows some promise for cities.

[brian_b]

Some demographers claim that “white flight” from the city is declining, replaced by a “bright flight” to the urban core from the suburbs. “Suburbs lose young whites to cities,” crowed one Associated Press headline last year.

Yet evidence from the last Census show the opposite

No, the evidence did not show the opposite. The evidence provided in the article does not have racial or educational information. Kotkin and the Associated Press could both be right for all we know.

[Chef]

It is possible that the price difference between the suburbs and the city will become so great that it drives people to suburbs even though they would prefer to live in the city. Part of trigger for urban revitalization in the 70s and 80s was that most city neighborhoods were much cheaper than the suburbs. This situation has largely reversed. I am thinking about buying something in Minneapolis, but you can now buy a a decent sized house with a yard in the suburbs for the same price as a 1000sf condo in a good neighborhood in the city. My choice would still be the city but if the price differential was a bit larger it would be harder to justify.

[Cirrus]

Golly gee willickers. Joel Kotkin and Wendell Cox, two lobbyists with long histories of semi-literate attacks on urban living who are bought and paid for by suburban interests, think urban living will lose out to suburbs.

I'm shocked... SHOCKED!

[202_Cyclist]

I have not read the Joel Kotkin article but it's little surprise that people will leave cities for suburbs when 35-44 because of the poor quality of schools in cities. What is more significant, however, and this has been noted repeatedly by Christopher Leinberger of Brookings, is that this demographic is an increasingly small part of the population. People are delaying having families until later in life and childless households make up a majority of all households.

Additionally, from a metropolitan perspective, it would be interesting to see which suburbs this age cohort is moving to. As Richard Florida wrote recently in the Atlantic, the distinction between cities and inner suburbs is blurring (http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/07/how-the-great-reset-has-already-changed-america/241200/). I would not be surprised at all if many of the people in the 35-44 age cohort are leaving cities for the inner suburbs (Arlington/Bethesda/Silver Spring in the DC area, Santa Monica/Pasadena in LA) at the expense of the auto-oriented outer suburbs.

[UrbanImpact]

by Joel Kotkin 07/20/2011


:whip: Joel Kotkin

[fishrose]

Golly gee willickers. Joel Kotkin and Wendell Cox, two lobbyists with long histories of semi-literate attacks on urban living who are bought and paid for by suburban interests, think urban living will lose out to suburbs.

I'm shocked... SHOCKED!

http://www.edspresso.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/shocked.jpg

[urbanactivist]

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-rodriguez-whitecities-20110725,0,7955238.column

Op-Ed

Rodriguez: White flight — to the city

By Gregory Rodriguez

July 25, 2011
For nearly half a century, the term "inner city" has been code for poor and minority. But now white flight — the decades-long trend of affluent Anglos leaving the urban core for leafier suburban cul-de-sacs — has run its course. And "inner city" is about to take on a whole new meaning.

New census data reveal that Washington, where the population has been more than 50%black since the early 1960s, has lost its black majority. Likewise, due to a decline in the presence of blacks, Latinos and Asians, for the first time since the 1970s a majority of Manhattan's population is white. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, which prided itself on being overwhelmingly African American (remember Mayor C. Ray Nagin and his "chocolate city" speech?), has seen the percentage of black residents drop precipitously. Even Atlanta, long a stronghold for the African American middle class, is projected to lose its black majority this decade.

[urbanactivist]

I guess Kotkin prefers his numbers over the actual Census ones.

[202_Cyclist]

urbanactivist:
I guess Kotkin prefers his numbers over the actual Census ones.


Joel Kotkin, is a hack, although perhaps not as big of a hack as Randall O'Toole or Bob Poole from ExxonMobil/Reason Foundation, Inc.

Who needs facts when you have ideology? As my friend said, "I don't understand the facts or the question, but the answer is Ronald Reagan."