New Rice U. study: Houston grew faster than any other U.S. metro area in last decade (Dallas: credit, how much)

[DanielWayne]

The article is just an observation. People who like population stats (like me) will find this article interesting. Obviously Houston and Dallas and SA are still doing better than most of the country. Most 12-year-olds are not interested in statistics, however.

[wallstreetmafia]

What you Texans need to realize is that huge growth isn't synonymous with "good".

As we all know, Houston can grow all it wants but it will never be comparable to more mature metropolitan areas like New York City, San Francisco and maybe Chicago metropolitan area as the author of this dubious study attempts to do. These areas are all old, mature and beyond excessive population growth. I've lived in Houston and I currently live in Fairfield County, CT which is part of the NYC metro area and there really is no comparison.

What does Houston have to show for this huge boost in population (a huge chunk of it coming from Houston's high birth rates thanks to Hispanics and illegal immigration)? Increased traffic? For all Houston's growth, it's still rather poor, uneducated and lacking in amenities.

[blkgiraffe]

Originally Posted by wallstreetmafia

What you Texans need to realize that huge growth isn't synonymous with "good".

As we all know, Houston can grow all it wants but it will never be comparable to more mature metropolitan areas like New York City, San Francisco and maybe Chicago metropolitan area as the author of this dubious study attempts to do. These areas are all old, mature and beyond excessive population growth. I've lived in Houston and I currently live in Fairfield County, CT which is part of the NYC metro area and there really is no comparison.

What does Houston have to show for this huge boost in population (a huge chunk of it coming from Houston's high birth rates thanks to Hispanics and illegal immigration)? Increased traffic? For all Houston's growth, it's still rather poor, uneducated and lacking in amenities.

Who are you???

[TimBomb]

Originally Posted by wallstreetmafia

What you Texans need to realize is that huge growth isn't synonymous with "good".

As we all know, Houston can grow all it wants but it will never be comparable to more mature metropolitan areas like New York City, San Francisco and maybe Chicago metropolitan area as the author of this dubious study attempts to do. These areas are all old, mature and beyond excessive population growth. I've lived in Houston and I currently live in Fairfield County, CT which is part of the NYC metro area and there really is no comparison.

What does Houston have to show for this huge boost in population (a huge chunk of it coming from Houston's high birth rates thanks to Hispanics and illegal immigration)? Increased traffic? For all Houston's growth, it's still rather poor, uneducated and lacking in amenities.

Excuse me, but I'm the resident northeastern tasked to pop houston's balloons

[Spade]

Originally Posted by wallstreetmafia

What you Texans need to realize is that huge growth isn't synonymous with "good".

As we all know, Houston can grow all it wants but it will never be comparable to more mature metropolitan areas like New York City, San Francisco and maybe Chicago metropolitan area as the author of this dubious study attempts to do. These areas are all old, mature and beyond excessive population growth. I've lived in Houston and I currently live in Fairfield County, CT which is part of the NYC metro area and there really is no comparison.

What does Houston have to show for this huge boost in population (a huge chunk of it coming from Houston's high birth rates thanks to Hispanics and illegal immigration)? Increased traffic? For all Houston's growth, it's still rather poor, uneducated and lacking in amenities.

How about we give Houston a chance to mature instead of coming in amd bashing the place.

[DanielWayne]

Originally Posted by wallstreetmafia

What you Texans need to realize is that huge growth isn't synonymous with "good".

As we all know, Houston can grow all it wants but it will never be comparable to more mature metropolitan areas like New York City, San Francisco and maybe Chicago metropolitan area as the author of this dubious study attempts to do. These areas are all old, mature and beyond excessive population growth. I've lived in Houston and I currently live in Fairfield County, CT which is part of the NYC metro area and there really is no comparison.

What does Houston have to show for this huge boost in population (a huge chunk of it coming from Houston's high birth rates thanks to Hispanics and illegal immigration)? Increased traffic? For all Houston's growth, it's still rather poor, uneducated and lacking in amenities.

[sw4life]

Originally Posted by wallstreetmafia

What you Texans need to realize is that huge growth isn't synonymous with "good".

As we all know, Houston can grow all it wants but it will never be comparable to more mature metropolitan areas like New York City, San Francisco and maybe Chicago metropolitan area as the author of this dubious study attempts to do. These areas are all old, mature and beyond excessive population growth. I've lived in Houston and I currently live in Fairfield County, CT which is part of the NYC metro area and there really is no comparison.

What does Houston have to show for this huge boost in population (a huge chunk of it coming from Houston's high birth rates thanks to Hispanics and illegal immigration)? Increased traffic? For all Houston's growth, it's still rather poor, uneducated and lacking in amenities.

You are quite correct and quite wrong at the same time. Remember that our country itself utilized poor uneducated african slaves and european immigrants extensively during the 19th and 20th century to become the power house it is today. In order to continue this sort of growth, our population must have a working class subsection to provide the cheap labor needed for the 21st century in order to stay competitive with developing nations like China and India.

I also disagree that Houston is lacking in amenities. The missing link is mass transportation, but other than that we have every kind of shopping anyone could need, world class restaurants, a vast array of colleges and unis including Rice which is one of the best in the nation, and a high standard of life.

Besides the only people who worry about traffic are suburbanites, us inner city folk could care less.

[Glucorious]

Originally Posted by sw4life

You are quite correct and quite wrong at the same time. Remember that our country itself utilized poor uneducated african slaves and european immigrants extensively during the 19th and 20th century to become the power house it is today. In order to continue this sort of growth, our population must have a working class subsection to provide the cheap labor needed for the 21st century in order to stay competitive with developing nations like China and India.

I also disagree that Houston is lacking in amenities. The missing link is mass transportation, but other than that we have every kind of shopping anyone could need, world class restaurants, a vast array of colleges and unis including Rice which is one of the best in the nation, and a high standard of life.

Besides the only people who worry about traffic are suburbanites, us inner city folk could care less.

You can not compare 1811 to 2011. There was pretty much no education and everybody was at the same level. It's much different today. You are wrong if you think cheap labor creates or helps creating a "power house". China has 1.3 billion people. We have much, much less. We still are way ahead of China. Their GDP is much lower than ours. It's still a developing country. That's what you get when you have too much cheap labor. Africa is another example of too much cheap and uneducated labor. Also, Texas' income is projected to go down in the future, not up. Maybe I can still find the article, but they said it's because of the growing Hispanic population and the stuff that comes with it ( drop out rates, less education, poverty etc.). So I do not know why you would say we need cheap labor ( or what you call immigrants), because that is not correct. We do need less of them.

BTW. You imply we need them to compete with China? We can't, unless we pay them 1 Dollar a day, which is not possible due to our (much) higher SOL. If we wanted really to compete with them, we would have to become poorer.

Edit:

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/...n/7008236.html

[sw4life]

Originally Posted by StoryFriend

You can not compare 1811 to 2011. There was pretty much no education and everybody was at the same level. It's much different today. You are wrong if you think cheap labor creates or helps creating a "power house". China has 1.3 billion people. We have much, much less. We still are way ahead of China. Their GDP is much lower than ours. It's still a developing country. That's what you get when you have too much cheap labor. Africa is another example of too much cheap and uneducated labor. Also, Texas' income is projected to go down in the future, not up. Maybe I can still find the article, but they said it's because of the growing Hispanic population and the stuff that comes with it ( drop out rates, less education, poverty etc.). So I do not know why you would say we need cheap labor ( or what you call immigrants), because that is not correct. We do need less of them.

BTW. You imply we need them to compete with China? We can't, unless we pay them 1 Dollar a day, which is not possible due to our (much) higher SOL. If we wanted really to compete with them, we would have to become poorer.

Edit:

www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7008236.html

I didn't necessarily mean 1811, I meant the late 1800s, early 1900s when America began industrializing and there was a HUGE need for this type of labor.

Also don't forget the fact that China's GDP is set to overtake America's by 2016 according to the IMF.

Will the 'Age of America' end in 2016? - CNN.com

China will be the dominant force in the world whether we like it or not, and I honestly don't think it's a bad thing.

[Queen Palm]

Originally Posted by wallstreetmafia

What you Texans need to realize is that huge growth isn't synonymous with "good".

As we all know, Houston can grow all it wants but it will never be comparable to more mature metropolitan areas like New York City, San Francisco and maybe Chicago metropolitan area as the author of this dubious study attempts to do. These areas are all old, mature and beyond excessive population growth. I've lived in Houston and I currently live in Fairfield County, CT which is part of the NYC metro area and there really is no comparison.

What does Houston have to show for this huge boost in population (a huge chunk of it coming from Houston's high birth rates thanks to Hispanics and illegal immigration)? Increased traffic? For all Houston's growth, it's still rather poor, uneducated and lacking in amenities.

any of this could apply to any (large) city experiencing growth. I'm sure it applied to NYC many, many decades ago. Houston gets these kinds of responses all the time. The "Houston can't compare to X-city". It's just another revelation that while people from other larger cities claim that Houston can't compete, the reality is that it IS competeing. Otherwise folks in these larger metros wouldn't feel threatened.