[Capsicum]

Originally Posted by Crawford

The point is that Toronto isn't doing something different than other metros. It happens to be booming because it gets a crapload of skilled immigrants. If Cleveland got the same level of annual immigration, it would be largely the same.

I think we on SSP are WAY too eager to ascribe credit or blame to cities for macro issues. Take NYC. NYC isn't "better run" or "more progressive" than in the horrible 1970's. The city makes all kinds of idiotic and self-defeating decisions. Bill DeBlasio isn't a better mayor than Ted Lindsay. The difference is that immigration boomed, the financial industry soared, and there was a return to urbanity, which obviously benefits North America's most urban city.

Similarly, in Toronto, there has been all kinds of clownish leadership like Rob Ford, all kinds of bizarre decisionmaking, like building subways in cornfields while ignoring transit in the core, but Toronto is a massive, unabashed, almost unparalleled success story, because it's a gigantic immigrant mecca. It's basically impossible to F up a metro getting like 100k+ skilled immigrants every year. There's really nothing to "learn" from Toronto (or NYC, or other successful cities).

But it clearly can't be as simplistic as just opening the doors to attract and allow massive immigration being able to boost the growth of any city, Toronto or NYC style. Otherwise, every city struggling to grow would do it if it were such a silver bullet, and nationwide, there would be tons of economically depressed areas such as the Rust belt cities that would be clamoring for and recruiting for skilled immigrants all around, and opting for population growth by international growth (rather than domestic migration) would be super popular and desired by these cities' leaders and citizens and obviously that's not what we see in these places or struggling cities nationwide.