The great sorting out: U.S. cities polarized along income, education

[Sun Belt]

Originally Posted by Crawford

That link is talking about cities, not metros. And it's wrong (or at least deceptive). Chicago isn't close to the nation's best educated city (or metro).

It's probably Seattle, Bay Area, or DC, if you want city proper, MSA or CSA.

I would put my money on D.C. There are a whole lot of people with round eye glass frames there.

[JManc]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

This is true, but Zillow still is pretty inaccurate.

The valuation, yes. We have a second home and they are way off on that thing.

[UrbanRevival]

Several things to consider with this kind of data for context:

1. I couldn't uncover anything related to a margin-of-error, so that's a bit problematic. As with any study or analysis, there should be some sense of how accurate the data is, which is NEVER 100%.

2. Keep in mind this is only domestic migration, which of course does not include international migration. I suspect, if you considered migration as a whole, these numbers would be fairly different.

3. Many of the supposed "net gainers" of folks of greater income and educational attainment are cities that also have massive net domestic migration losses (e.g., cities like New York, Chicago, California generally, etc.). Which begs the question: how much are these cities truly gaining when the out-migrants far outpace the in-migrants?

4. Migration obviously does not exist in a vacuum. The most significant "sorting" that occurs, by far, is among the vast majority of each city's/metro area populace that doesn't migrate at all. That is, to what extent is the native, or longer-established, population gaining in terms of income and educational attainment?

That being said, you absolutely cannot draw any conclusions about "winners" or "losers" from this type of data without considering the above.

[LouisVanDerWright]

Oh god, this is going to turn into another "argue with Crawford while he makes up 'facts' thread" isn't it...

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

This is true, but Zillow still is pretty inaccurate.

Zillow not only estimates home values but maintains a data base of closed sales—comps—which it gets from public records. My guess is that is the data from Zillow: Actual sales prices, not value estimates. That is NOT inaccurate (unless you think public records are inaccurate).

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by JManc

The valuation, yes. We have a second home and they are way off on that thing.

Well I have one too and they seem pretty close. But, as I said, I think that’s not the point because I don’t think it’s Zillow’s guesses about home values being used but their compilation of comps or actual sales.

Attacking Zillow as a source of some data is really just a straw man and a diversion from the points the study makes.