Chicago is the slowest-growing big city in the US (Naperville: low income, 2013)

[Lookout Kid]

A bigger issue than the $250 license fee is the ridiculous "head count tax" for business that operate offices out of Chicago, which has them charged per person in a desk. Talk about a detriment to hiring new employees!

I am not a Republican, but after years and years of unchecked Democratic machine organizations running the city, they have basically snuck so many little taxes and fees in to things that we don't even realize it most of the time. Our revenue streams need to be streamlined and less regressive (fees on things like phone bills hurt the poor more than the well off).

[Vlajos]

Originally Posted by Lookout Kid

A bigger issue than the $250 license fee is the ridiculous "head count tax" for business that operate offices out of Chicago, which has them charged per person in a desk. Talk about a detriment to hiring new employees!

I am not a Republican, but after years and years of unchecked Democratic machine organizations running the city, they have basically snuck so many little taxes and fees in to things that we don't even realize it most of the time. Our revenue streams need to be streamlined and less regressive (fees on things like phone bills hurt the poor more than the well off).

Rahm eliminated the head tax.

[Vlajos]

Originally Posted by Standard111

The Chicago region is growing very slowly, both in terms of population and economy.

Real GDP growth for the top three metro areas by population

Chicago
2010 - 2.1%
2011 - 2.0%
2012 - 2.4%

LA
2010 - -1.1% (negative)
2011 - 1.2%
2012 - 3.1%

NY
2010 - 3.6%
2011 - 1.1%
2012 - 1.4%

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by Standard111

I don't get your point.

It's about as simple as it can get. Bigger isn't better. That's all. Houston could keep annexing land till it takes up half of Texas, and Chicago would still offer a better urban experience.

I don't disagree with the assertion that density can be good (as in Paris). But it can also be bad in the form of crowded slums (as in Rio or Mumbai). But you are looking too deeply in to a simple comment.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by Vlajos

Rahm eliminated the head tax.

Hey, nice!

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by Ace Rothstein

This whole argument is stupid but I just wanted to point out that Paris is one of the densest big cities in the world.

I used the word "crowded" instead of density. A favela may have a similar density to a New York neighborhood, but the favela doesn't have the infrastructure to support the population it has.

[Standard111]

Mod cut: Orphaned (quoted post has been deleted).

Chicago is near the bottom in both unemployment rate and in job growth.

The claim on this thread was basically "yeah the Chicago area is near the bottom in population growth, but it's the economy that matters". We're just pointing out that the economy is near the bottom too. It's obviously a bigger problem than just slow job growth.

[Vlajos]

Originally Posted by Standard111

Chicago is near the bottom in both unemployment rate and in job growth.

The claim on this thread was basically "yeah the Chicago area is near the bottom in population growth, but it's the economy that matters". We're just pointing out that the economy is near the bottom too. It's obviously a bigger problem than just slow job growth.

But it's not, other than unemployment, Chicago is middle of the pack in terms economic growth.

[emathias]

There are a lot of reasons that Chicago grows (or doesn't grow, as the case sometimes is) the way it does. There are three factors at present that play a role, none of which has been addressed (at least not to any great extent) in this thread yet.

First, immigration. When the national economy was strong and immigration was, shall we say, "less fettered" in the 1990s, the Chicago area grew strongly. It didn't grow explosively, but it grew strongly mostly due to immigration. After 2001, immigration at the national level slowed immensely. New York and LA will always have draw for immigrants, but after that other cities have significantly lower draw, so most other cities experienced relative slower immigrant growth, including Chicago. While there may be things Chicago can do to attract more of the existing immigrant pool, the fact remains that the vast majority of immigration issues are the result of national politic and international politics and historical events that have nothing to do with local politics.

Second, economic transformation. Chicago's economy has been undergoing a transformation for the past 50 years, and that transformation waxes and wanes in speed and type at various times for reasons that often have little or nothing to do with local politics. The stock yards collapsed as an industry, which had a lot more to do with improved national transportation allowing for the moving of slaughterhouses closer to where the animals live than anything else - you can't just move Chicago to Texas or Nebraska. Manufacturing collapsed as an employer, which was a result of automation and, after that, offshoring, which was a result of national politics and, again, improved international transportation capabilities. Steel collapsed, which was a result of environmental concerns here, international politics, and dramatic changes to how steel is made that meant the "old guard" in steel didn't have the capability to both run their existing plants and invest in new ones in the same places. None of those changes had ANYTHING to do with local politics, local taxes, or aspects of Chicago other than it's geographic location - which, last I checked, was neither a Democratic or Republican platform issue.

Third and finally, demographics, particularly regional levels of urbanization and birth rates. Between 1950 and 2010, the Northeast has increased urbanization 15.5 percentile points. The urbanization in the West expanded by 20.3 percentile points. In the South, urbanization exploded by 27.2 percentile points. The Midwest, on the other hand, increased urbanization by only 11.2 percentile points. This, again, has a lot to do with when places start to urbanize. The South, which included many of the recently high-growth cities, was the only region below 50% urbanization in 1950, so it had a LOT of catching up to do and is still the least-urbanized region of the U.S. This, again, also has a lot to do with geography. A large part of why the West is now statistically so urbanized is due to enormous tracts of Federal land where people can't legally live, and enormous tracts of non-Federal wilderness where it may be legal to live but has no infrastructure and can't be populated. The Midwest, by comparison, has virtually no Federal lands and virtually no areas with insufficient infrastructure for living. The South was slow to urbanize because it was always primarily agrarian. But technical advances mean it simply can't be be primarily agrarian anymore - wage prices go so low that jobs move there now for the same reason jobs moved overseas. And when investments like that happen, they are in the major cities because those are the only areas with sufficient infrastructure to support them. Starting from a low population and economic base, any investments are going to cause statistically higher growth. As average wages start to stabilize across the nation, growth in those areas will also stabilize. When comparing low-income, low-urbanization cities to high-income, high-urbanization cities, the low ones will always grow faster unless there is some really, really, strong reason for them not to. Given Texas lack of investment in education, it will be interesting to see if it can maintain its advantage as its rate of urbanization and average wages reach comparable levels to the Midwest. It will also be interesting to see what happens if the national minimum wage is increased above $10/hr, which will reduce some of the advantage the South current has over the Midwest. Both of those are major trends that may benefit Illinois and Chicago and yet are completely outside of local control. Birth rates are interesting, because they are higher-than-national average in much of the West and South, but lower in much of the Midwest, including Illinois. Birth rates are usually lower when people are educated and prosperous - you have to get really poor before it negatively impacts birthrates, usually the poor have high birth rates, which drop as prosperity and health increases. This is why Bill Gates switched from supporting birth control to supporting health and economics in poor areas, because he was shown that at wide demographic levels, improving health and economics lowers birth rates better than birth control. Currently birth rates are higher in the South, and child mortality is also higher. As the South improves, birth rates will fall toward national levels, which will slow their growth in places like Houston.

So, yeah, there are certainly things at the local level which can improve Chicago's growth. But current trends, especially as compared to other American cities in other regions of the U.S., are far bigger than some head tax or local business policies. As the U.S. becomes more integrated and less dominated by regions, I would expect growth to equalize. Only then will local policies start to really demonstrate whether low-tax, low-service is better than high-tax, high-service when it comes to growth and citizen preference.

[Avondalist]

Originally Posted by emathias

There are a lot of reasons that Chicago grows (or doesn't grow, as the case sometimes is) the way it does. There are three factors at present that play a role, none of which has been addressed (at least not to any great extent) in this thread yet.

...

This is a great post, but I think there's a fourth factor you're not mentioning, WEATHER. Chicago has cold, continental winters and overcast skies half of the year. All things being equal, and I agree that over time national integration will make policies and economies equal, I would prefer to live in Los Angeles for the weather.

Cold weather and fresh water supplies used to be an advantage for office work and manufacturing, respectively. But the former does not matter anymore because of air conditioning and manufacturing has moved elsewhere for different reasons. The latter still is a great advantage for Chicago, as well as its central location for transportation of goods.

Unfortunately for Chicago, it will have a major weather disadvantage into the future.