Any US cities where core is wealthier than suburbs?

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Of course it's possible. Much of Manhattan's far west side was post-industrial wasteland until the past 20-30 years (TriBeCa, Meatpacking District, Chelsea, Hell's Kitchen, etc). Now most of those areas require a million dollar net worth just to get your foot in the door.

Its incredible how much that area of NYC has changed in the last 20 years.

[Docere]

NYC area

Manhattan $78,771
Morris $58,981
Fairfield $58,851
Hunterdon $58,795
Somerset $58,021
Westchester $57,953
Monmouth $53,886
Nassau $53,363
Bergen $52,800
Putnam $47,533
Suffolk $46,466
Sussex $46,124
Hudson $42,822
Union $42,606
Dutchess $42,309
Middlesex $40,933
Rockland $39,923
Essex $39,695
Staten Island $38,096
Ocean $37,041
Brooklyn $36,295
Orange $35,616
Passaic $33,863
Queens $33,626
Bronx $22,749

[Cory]

Originally Posted by JManc

Houston has poverty everywhere. Some of the most crime ridden areas are just outside the Houston city limits.

Examples? I’m having a hard time naming a town or city outside the Houston city limits but within the metro known for high crime.

[craigs]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Yes, but L.A. has a lot of suburban areas inside the city limits. Most/all of L.A.'s affluent areas are car oriented and low density.

That's not saying much, considering the fact that most of LA's middle class and poor areas are also car-oriented and low-mid density.

Originally Posted by Yuri

Is it possible for Downtown LA to attract really rich people from the region, or it will be always a young upper-middle class thing?

Of course it is possible, if the kind of towers that appeal to the wealthy are constructed. There's a $7M downtown condo up for sale right now. Most condos downtown cost much less than that, of course, and rightly so. The wealthy already have plenty of places to live in LA and surrounding communities.

[softee]

Originally Posted by Doady

Definition of "core" is a good point to bring up, because if we are talking about the older, pre-war parts of the city, then Toronto's "core" is very small, like that of a Sunbelt city, so the low-income neighbourhoods have no choice but to spread out beyond that into the suburbs. Even the city proper of Toronto itself is mostly post-war suburbia and can't really be compared to cities like New York City, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, Detroit, Baltimore, etc.

Show me a sunbelt city besides maybe Los Angeles that has a prewar core of 50 square miles with 1000,000 people and a population density of over 20,000 ppsm.

Some of those above listed cities cores are in part a hollowed out shadow of their former selves and large swaths of them could hardly be called "urban" anymore.

[memph]

Originally Posted by Docere

Per Capita Income

Manhattan $78,771
Staten Island $38,096
Brooklyn $36,295
Queens $33,626
Bronx $22,749

NYC $41,625
Hudson (aka 6th borough) $42,822

So if you took the core to be like 500k from Hudson (basically exclude Bayonne, Harrison, Secaucus and Kearney), the inner half of Brooklyn, all of Manhattan, and the inner third of Queens, then assuming the incomes of those subsections of those counties are the same as the county average, that would give an average of around 53k.

Outer 40% suburbs maybe 50k depending where you draw the line.

The inner ring, which would include the rest of Brooklyn/Queens/Hudson, all of State Island and The Bronx, and most of Union and Essex county, plus inner parts of Passaic/Nassau/Bergen/Westchester would average around 37k.

So the difference between Core and Outer suburbs isn't huge - to try to get to a population of 4m+ in the core, you'd have to take in lower income neighbourhoods like Bed-Stuy, Williamsburg, Corona, Bushwick, Crown Heights and Sunset Park, and parts of Hudson County above the Palisades... but Manhattan is still wealthy enough to bring the average a bit above the outer suburbs.

[memph]

So the average per capita income of Toronto's core after tax is the same as the average per capita income of Toronto's outer suburbs... before tax. And you know that Canadian taxes are nothing to sneeze at.

Core: Parkdale-High Park, Beaches East York, Davenport, Eglinton-Lawrence, University-Rosedale, Toronto-St Paul's, Toronto-Danforth, Spadina-Fort York, Toronto Centre, Don Valley West, Etobicoke-Lakeshore, York-South Weston

Inner Ring: Scarborough, Don Valley East, North York north of the 401, Etobicoke Centre, Etobicoke North, Mississauga, Markham-Thornhill, Thornhill, Vaughan-Woodbridge, Richmond Hill (Electoral District), Markham-Unionville

Outer Ring: Brampton, Durham Region, Halton Region, Markham-Stouffville, Aurora-Oakridges-Richmond Hill, Newmarket-Aurora, King-Vaughan, Caledon, Orangeville, Mono, New Tecumseth, Bradford-West Gwilimbury, East Gwilimbury, Brock, Georgina

Population
Core: 1,383,109
Inner Ring: 2,691,308
Outer Ring: 2,764,916
Total: 6,839,333 (this is everything that's either in the GTA or CMA)

Pre-tax average income of population aged 15+
Core: $76,499
Inner Ring: $51,103
Outer Ring: $58,361

After tax average income of population aged 15+
Core: $58,012
Inner Ring: $43,060
Outer Ring: $47,474

It's not just a question of Brampton lowering the outer ring's incomes either, even without Brampton, it would only be $62,397 - still well below the core. And even if you swap out the upper-middle class Etobicoke Lakeshore for the working class Scarborough SW, the core would still be at $74,802. So basically no matter how you slice it, the core is substantially wealthier.

Only the suburb manages to surpass Toronto's core - Oakville at $81,800 (although Toronto's core still has 4 electoral districts that are wealthier than Oakville, home to 450,000 people). Even Burlington only comes in at $68,900. Mono, which is a small township of horse farms and exurban McMansion subdivisions comes in at $70,900.

The electoral district of Mississauga Lakeshore comes in at $73,900 and helps buoy the inner ring's incomes. Scarborough averages out at $43,512.

The five lowest income electoral districts in the GTA are Humber River-Black Creek ($37,240), Scarborough North ($38,560), Etobicoke North ($39,760), Scarborough Center ($41,560) and Scarborough-Agincourt ($41,560).

The five wealthiest electoral districts are Don Valley West ($113,600), University-Rosedale ($103,900), Toronto-St Paul's ($96,000), Eglinton-Lawrence ($88,500) and Oakville ($86,600).

[Docere]

The central corridor running north from downtown is Toronto's favored quarter (University-Rosedale, St. Paul's, Don Valley West and Eglinton-Lawrence).

[dimondpark]

Originally Posted by Docere

NYC area

Manhattan $78,771
Morris $58,981
Fairfield $58,851
Hunterdon $58,795
Somerset $58,021
Westchester $57,953
Monmouth $53,886
Nassau $53,363
Bergen $52,800
Putnam $47,533
Suffolk $46,466
Sussex $46,124
Hudson $42,822
Union $42,606
Dutchess $42,309
Middlesex $40,933
Rockland $39,923
Essex $39,695
Staten Island $38,096
Ocean $37,041
Brooklyn $36,295
Orange $35,616
Passaic $33,863
Queens $33,626
Bronx $22,749

Manhattan is wayyyyyy higher than that.

From bea.gov

Top 25 Counties by Per Capita Income, 2020:
Teton, WY $220,645
New York, NY $191,220
Summit, UT $156,537
Pitkin, CO $155,067
Bristol Bay, AK $152,678
Marin, CA $145,575
San Francisco, CA $144,818
San Mateo, CA $141,841
Midland, TX $126,631
Santa Clara, CA $123,661
Union, SD $123,000
Fairfield, CT $120,244
Blaine, ID $117,681
Westchester, NY $115,386
Nantucket, MA $114,832
Somerset, NJ $112,825
Monroe, FL $106,583
Goochland, VA $105,619
Collier, FL $103,865
Morris, NJ $102,227
Arlington, VA $100,823
Sully, SD $100,301
Norfolk, MA $98,019
King, WA $96,647
Nassau, NY $96,253

by MSA...

Top 25 Metro Areas by Per Capita Income, 2020:
Midland $124,667
San Jose $121,619
Bridgeport $120,244
San Francisco $111,050
Naples $103,865
Boston $85,724
Sebastian $84,607
Napa $82,408
New York $82,322
Barnstable Town $80,420
Seattle $80,420
Boulder $79,649
Washington DC $76,771
Santa Cruz $75,957
Trenton $74,218
Santa Rosa $71,386
Fayetteville(AR) $70,085
Charlottesville $69,853
Denver $69,822
Los Angeles $69,805
Philadelphia $69,705
Casper $68,447
Santa Barbara $67,879
Ocean City(NJ) $67,836
Chicago $67,671

[dimondpark]

Anyhow, whenever this topic comes up, 4 cities immediately come to mind for me:

Median Income, Married-couple families w/Children under 18 years:
City----Metro Area
Washington DC $210,983----$153,242
San Francisco $198,200----$170,861
Atlanta $195,414----$108,922
Seattle $160,167----$134,220

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by softee

Show me a sunbelt city besides maybe Los Angeles that has a prewar core of 50 square miles with 1000,000 people and a population density of over 20,000 ppsm.

Some of those above listed cities cores are in part a hollowed out shadow of their former selves and large swaths of them could hardly be called "urban" anymore.

It's true that wealthy in-town neighborhoods which could be defined as "urban" are pretty lacking in the Sun belt. There are notable exceptions (South of Broad in Charleston, the historic area of Savannah, various sections of New Orleans) but these are the exception rather than the rule. In most cases, the wealthy "in-town" areas are what we'd define as functionally suburban (single-family detached homes on fairly generous lots).

That said, when you're looking at income distribution, it really doesn't matter how urban the core is. Wealthy neighborhoods near the urban core are desirable for other reasons, such as proximity to employment and various cultural amenities.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by dimondpark

Manhattan is wayyyyyy higher than that.

From bea.gov

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/newyorkcountynewyork

Just reporting this.

[dimondpark]

Originally Posted by Docere

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/newyorkcountynewyork

Just reporting this.

Yeah, I figured you were using that stat. The Census stat is not incorrect but it is per capita total household income, whereas BEA counts total personal income.

Neither of us are wrong, just different measures.

[austlar1]

Originally Posted by wwmiv

Increasingly, Austin.

This is definitely true, especially the inner core, a two or three mile radius in any direction from downtown. Twenty years ago or so, this would have been a laughable proposition.

[Docere]

"Per capita income in past 12 months (in 2020 dollars)"

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fa...e/US/INC910220

Why would per capita HH income be lower than per capita personal income?

[Bailey]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

Core is wealthier

Boston
New York
Seattle
Portland
Washington DC
San Francisco
Los Angeles
Maybe Dallas
Maybe Austin

Suburbs wealthier

Philadelphia
Baltimore
Detroit
Chicago
Miami
Houston

Not true about Houston..River Oaks and Upper Kirby is in the Inner Loop

[Crawford]

Is one measure salaried income, or taxable income? Those would be pretty big differences in some jurisdictions.

Manhattan and Fairfield County, and Silicon Valley probably have big differences between salaried income and overall compensation, and would have significant non-salaried (investment) income.

[Docere]

Census Bureau is everyone (i.e. aggregate income / population), not sure what BEA is measuring.

Canadian figures are everyone 15 years and over.

[Docere]

In Toronto, there are 8 wards that constitute the core: Parkdale-High Park, Davenport, Spadina-Fort York, Toronto Centre, University-Rosedale, St. Paul's, Danforth, Beaches-East York.

Of the favored quarter, University-Rosedale and St. Paul's are your classic Brahmin-liberal affluent intown districts. That's where you'll find law firm partners, U of T professors, journalists and prominent people in arts and culture etc., as well as a lot of old established families.

[Docere]

[double-post]