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New York just seems to have an unlimited amount of resources and has a blank check to do anything it wants. Trump will also likely be wonderful for NYC.
Los Angeles on the other hand the writing is on the wall for that city. Trump and Republicans want little to do with it.
NYC is one of the wealthiest cities in the entire world. It is also the economic and financial capital of the US + the world, among many other things. Compared to any other city it's going to be way wealthier.
And it's also just way bigger than every other city.
Even just between NY and LA, the #2 city, there is a significant gap. NYC has more than double the population. In the MSA and CSA levels there are also a huge gap between them as well.
City population: (4.6 Million gap)
NYC: 8.5 Million
LA: 3.9 Million
MSA: (7.3 Million gap)
NYC: 20.1 Million
LA: 12.8 Million
CSA: (5.1 Million gap)
NYC: 23.7 Million
LA: 18.6 Million
It's not that LA isn't wealthy, but NYC is just very very rich and in its own league
USA average is $28,930. And then NYC has a higher business tax base which is reflective of the GDP statistics but not the personal per capita stats. The suburbs of NYC overall are also wealthier than Los Angeles. Los Angeles isn't a particularly rich metro for large metros though has some very wealthy pockets.
Budget comparison isn't quite fair, a lot of Los Angeles services are provided by the county; NYC is a merger of five counties and the city replaces the county government; you'd have to add in the Los Angeles County budget somehow for a fair comparison.
Budget comparison isn't quite fair, a lot of Los Angeles services are provided by the county; NYC is a merger of five counties and the city replaces the county government; you'd have to add in the Los Angeles County budget somehow for a fair comparison.
New York City has about 330,000 municipal employees. The State of New York in contrast has only about 150,000.
Add San Francisco and San Diego to Los Angeles (along with subtracting the Inland Empire from the CSA) and suddenly we have a much more valid comparison. That said, the wealthiest neighborhoods in NYC (Much of Midtown, UES, parts of the UWS) still outsell Beverly Hills and Bel-Air, mostly due to the higher density of NYC and even greater variety of businesses. Los Angeles still has considerably more middle-to lower income neighborhoods compared to NYC, where most of Manhattan south of 96th St, downtown Brooklyn and the Brownstone Belt, and even parts of the Bronx (Riverdale) and Queens (Astoria) show how a considerable portion of the city is filled with wealth, and that's around a third of the city, whereas in Los Angeles, it's only around a tenth of the city, with much of the southern half of the city, east LA, and a good portion of the San Fernando Valley middle class or lower. However, add SF (including the Silicon Valley) and SD in, and the wealthy proportion suddenly becomes closer.
IMO Los Angeles biggest threat to eclipsing NYC was in the 60s-80s back when the Big Apple was experiencing flight and decay along with the sunbelt boom. While LA is still a great city for what it offers, its best way to become a key challenger for No. 1 again IMO is to "Manhattanize" (or at least Vancouverize) the central portion of its basin via a vast subway network (we'll see if SpaceX does the job), tunnels, higher density in the form of mid-and high-rises with more mixed-use projects, and having competitive economic advantages to attract corporations.
As an East Coaster, I still get that feeling that NYC just takes too much wealth away from other fine cities like Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Providence, and other cities since they aren't that far apart like the major CA cities, and all offer a similar lifestyle on a smaller and generally more affordable scale. It just strives though by being a world city as opposed to being a nationally important city since most big corporations these days are global, and a city that isn't quite dominant will be picked over, even though I see many advantages for LA by being across the Pacific from the big Asian markets.
So to conclude, NYC is wealthier and is so both by absolute peak in concentration, but Los Angeles/California isn't too far behind. Santa Barbara, La Jolla, and even up to Carmel/Monterey make a good west coast comparison to The Hamptons.
USA average is $28,930. And then NYC has a higher business tax base which is reflective of the GDP statistics but not the personal per capita stats. The suburbs of NYC overall are also wealthier than Los Angeles. Los Angeles isn't a particularly rich metro for large metros though has some very wealthy pockets.
Budget comparison isn't quite fair, a lot of Los Angeles services are provided by the county; NYC is a merger of five counties and the city replaces the county government; you'd have to add in the Los Angeles County budget somehow for a fair comparison.
I could never live in New York City on that budget!
Most of the truly low-income population in NYC is either in public housing/rent controlled apartments or immigrants crammed into very tight quarters.
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