Philadelphia vs San Francisco vs Boston Which has a more urban big city feel? (salaries, living)
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Great, but the premise that this was a scheme to appease federal workers is FALSE. Patently False.
The only thing that matters is the number of workers. 3x more Mercer County people work in New York than Philadelphia.
Dont be daft.
Census designation has profound influence on every single federal agency , funding for medicare,welfare,fema,homeland security etc etc.. It behooves you to be associated in a metro with the higher wage index, greater cost of living index. It wasnt an accident that Mercer got moved from Phila to NYC and it wasnt commuter patterns inexplicably and suddenly changing in 2000.
Take central Jersey and Mercer itself out of equation. Based on your numbers.
Mercer commuters working in Counties directly connected to Philadelphia - 10,600
Mercer commuters working in Counties directly connected to NYC- 8,100 .
90% of Mercer workers commute to Mercer & Central Jersey.
Trentons urbanized area population(275,000) is in Philadlephias zone . Mercers total population is only 365,000.
There are a dozen Delaware River bridges connecting Mercer with Bucks(Philadelphia). How many bridges connect Mercer with NYC?
Great, but the premise that this was a scheme to appease federal workers is FALSE. Patently False.
The only thing that matters is the number of workers. 3x more Mercer County people work in New York than Philadelphia.
Stockton is also part of the Sacramento TV market but they commute to the Bay Area 4-5 times more than to Sacramento.
actually in 2000 it met the criteria for both - at the time there was a pay increase for federal employees to move into the NY CSA and the decision was made to do so and get the pay increase
a few things have transpired since then leading to more commuters flowing the NYC way
in 1998 the Fairles Steel Works in Bucks PA closed reducing the inflow of Mercer employees by over 9K inless than ten years, job markets just north of Mercer grew substantially in Hightstown (actually many Philly MSA residents make the 25-30 minute drive there as well). Merrill decided last minute to build 3 miles North along 95 in Mercer as opposed to Bucks moving 12K employees there
Mercer is grey area really smack in the middle and the connection of these two large metros
while GDP goes to the csa connection (actually now meets MSA but the census decided to keep it as CSA and with technically the Philly MSA and NYC MSA now meet the CSA connection technically between Burlington NJ and Mercer NJ but the Census put a position statement saying they wont combine them)
Burlington will be interesting to watch as its getting close to meeting MSA connection to both the Philly and NYC MSAs - it would be crazy for the county to be moved historically very integrated and connected to Philly (you can see the skyline from the county) but new job centers just miles away have commuters flowing both directions - Even if moved there would be no doubt these are solid Phillies and Eagles fans and very limited Giants and Yanks fans
so end of the day Mercer is in NYC - in the real world its seamlessly connected to both including the jobs it offers and income generated by employees many of whom are from Philly
Both Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton (Lehigh and Northampton counties, PA) and Trenton (Mercer County, NJ) send enough residents to work in counties in the Philadelphia and New York CSAs to be included in either.
Not true. Both these areas send many times more workers to the NYC metro area, which is why they're part of the NY metro area. They have about 6 times as many commuters going to the NY area.
It would be like saying "Bucks County could be in either metro area" since there exists a similar 6:1 ratio of commuters to either metro area. That's obviously absurd.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MarketStEl
Mercer County was moved from the Philadelphia MSA to the New York MSA in order to give Federal employees working in the county a pay raise.
This is possibly the silliest thing I have heard on C-D in quite a while. No, the Census does not fabricate numbers order to give random federal workers in Trenton a pay raise.
And even crazier, a bunch of Philly homers then actually agreed with your conspiracy theory, and then added additional conspiracies!
Gee, I hear Camden County was moved to the Philly MSA so that that the Federal employees would be paid less, thus saving the feds money. It's true, I tell ya! I heard it on C-D!
And LOL at the poster who claimed that the Census should designate metro areas by "bridge count".
Mercer County did NOT meet the criteria to merge with Philadelphia in 2000 under the 15% threshold, meanwhile 3x more workers commute to jobs in the New York MSA, well past 15%
And those New Jersey jobs are in the NY Metro Area, Not Philadelphia.
Hence this:
Tally of Destination Counties with more than 100+ workers:
Mercer Co. Residents who worked in New York in 2000: 36,649
Mercer Co. Residents who worked in Philadephia in 2000: 10,989
Ok, now maybe counties are too big a unit. Perhaps MSA definitions should be set at the smaller municipality or CDP level. That seems like a valid critism. But, this is an issue with lots of MSA. Parts of the Baltimore MSA could arguably be in the DC MSA, etc.
At the end of the day, I'm not really sure how MSA pop is all that relevant to this thread, which concerns the vibrancy of the central city. Atlanta, Dallas and Houston all have comparable MSA pops and nobody would think they are good contenders for this thread.
Philadelphian here and the bitching about why Mercer is not a part of the Philadelphia MSA from some posters is getting old. Deal with it. It's not that serious.
Mercer County did NOT meet the criteria to merge with Philadelphia in 2000 under the 15% threshold, meanwhile 3x more workers commute to jobs in the New York MSA, well past 15%
And those New Jersey jobs are in the NY Metro Area, Not Philadelphia.
Hence this:
Tally of Destination Counties with more than 100+ workers:
Mercer Co. Residents who worked in New York in 2000: 36,649
Mercer Co. Residents who worked in Philadephia in 2000: 10,989
This has gone on waaaay too long. I'm sure the other Philly posters have grown tired of this as well. 18Montclair, how many times are you going to run in circles with the whole Philadelphia-Trenton debate? This is the last time I'm addressing this. It has already been acknowledged that Mercer County residents send more workers to the NYC MSA than the Philly MSA but what you continually fail to mention is that more people commute from the Philly MSA to Mercer County for work than people commute from the NYC MSA to Mercer County for work. It's a bigger employment hub for the Philly area. That as a result has put Burlington County, NJ above the 15% CSA threshold. Your own stats that you once provided backs up my argument.
So technically Philly and NYC already meet the CSA threshold regardless of the politics that keep them separated. In the big picture, it really doesn't matter what the census or OMB does or says because Mercer County has always been culturally and historically tied to the Philly area. A minor census redesignation doesn't change 300+ years of history. 18Montclair, you need to accept it for what it is and move on.
Philadelphian here and the bitching about why Mercer is not a part of the Philadelphia MSA from some posters is getting old. Deal with it. It's not that serious.
I'm late to the party. What does Mercer County have to do with the question of whether Philly, SF or Boston has more of an urban, big city feel?
Not true. Both these areas send many times more workers to the NYC metro area, which is why they're part of the NY metro area. They have about 6 times as many commuters going to the NY area.
You're confused.
Allentown + Trenton workers arent going to NYC they are working in Central Jersey which has been an independent region for the past 300 years.
Of Trenton/Mercers work force 5% are commuting to NYC and NJ counties directly connected to NYC. 8% work in Philly or counties directly connected to Phila. 87% work in Mercer and Central Jersey.
Allentown is going to be skewed much more than that in regards to Philly/NYC.
I could care less that they are not part of metro Philly, its really no big deal. I have no issues with both of those metros being independent but its a sham that they are a part of NYC.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NOLA101
Gee, I hear Camden County was moved to the Philly MSA so that that the Federal employees would be paid less, thus saving the feds money. It's true, I tell ya! I heard it on C-D!
And LOL at the poster who claimed that the Census should designate metro areas by "bridge count".
Camden + Philly are intertwined and grew in unison
Trentons/Mercers growth and Allentown/Lehigh Valley growth has ZERO to do with NYC.
I think Mercer County should be part of metro Boston!!!
(*silly attempt to get this thread back on topic*)
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