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I'm American, and I even lived in San Francisco for awhile. BUT, even SF is far behind Asia in terms of internet, technology, infrastructure, shipping, etc. I mean, SF created a lot of the dot com stuff, but Asia seems to take broadband and everything else to whole other levels. I'm not sure about bio-technology, I thought that was controversial in the States for whatever reason, according to the last Obama-McCain election. Has that changed? I don't think it's controversial anywhere else though, and people have been moving ahead with it throughout the world.
Having lived in Asia for years, there is just a lot more money floating around over here. Almost ALL the cargo goes from Asia to everywhere in the world FULL...and come back EMPTY. So, shipping is definetely over here.
No doubt the money will continue to keep pouring into this part of the world. The cities are much more massive, much larger. New York City is a great city, but many Asian cities are close equivalents.
I mean, you have random cities in China, like Chongqing, that no one has every heard of, but has 10+ million people. Tons of Chinese cities like that.
Actually, CHINA will probably have the most important future in the world...although tons of very critical important cities over here - Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong, etc.
It hasn't risen yet to that level, but I think China is pushing Shanghai to be 'that' city...but I believe HK has a lot more wealth and influence and power. But I think China doesn't want a city known to be previously British to be 'the' place, so is doing everything in it's power to siphon as much as they can, and put the power/strength more on its other mainland cities.
im positive that china is just doing good now and will end up just like the soviet union... that much controll over people never works out.
im positive that china is just doing good now and will end up just like the soviet union... that much controll over people never works out.
Yeah, but China is capitalism in overdrive. The government has a different structure, but the economy is pure capitalism.
The moment you step into the streets of China...it oozes capitalism to the extreme...like in a way that you feel things might have been back in the heyday of U.S. first rising to economic strength.
Shanghai, Hong Kong and London will share the spoils of the world between them in the future, London because it is the most globally connected city in the world (and will remain so for a number of important reasons), HK/Shanghai the seat of China's financial might. Between then and now, though, there might be one or two financial crises and a hard landing for the Chinese economy along the way which may cause transient upsets in the balance.
As the world globalises, enriches itself and competes on a grander scale I predict a new age of empires - China, US, India, SE Asia (read: ASEAN), EU, Russia (read: ex USSR), Latin America, Islamic block of the ME + North Africa, and Africa. There will be megacities for each region, not just competing on a global scale but within the region too, eg
Shanghai vs Guangzhou vs Beijing vs Chongqing vs Seoul vs Tokyo,
Jakarta vs Singapore vs Manila vs Bangkok,
London vs Paris vs Berlin
NYC vs LA,
Rio vs Sao Paulo vs Buenos Aires vs Mexico City
Lagos vs Kinshasa vs Johannesburg
Tehran vs Riyadh vs Dubai vs Cairo vs Baghdad
Delhi vs Kolkata vs Mumbai vs Karachi vs Dhaka
Also the future is definitely looking East these days. The largest cities in the world at the mo, there's only one Western city, NYC, barely in the top 15. In ten years it won't even be in the Top 20:
1. Guangzhou-Shenzhen 37 million contiguous, 44-60 million metro
2. Tokyo - 33 million contiguous, 39 million metro
3. Shanghai-Suzhou 30 million contiguous, 38 -48 million metro
4. Karachi - 23 million contiguous, 24 million metro
5. Seoul - 21 million contiguous, 26 million metro
6. Mexico City 20 million contiguous, metro 22.5 million
7. Jakarta - 19 million contiguous, at least 28 million metro (mega suburbs stretching beyond)
8. Delhi - 19 million contiguous, 25 million metro
9. Mumbai - 19 million contiguous, 21 million metro
10. Sao Paulo 18.8 million contiguous, metro 21 million
11. Cairo 18.2 million contiguous, metro 20.5 million
12. NYC 18.1 million contiguous, metro 20 million *
13. Osaka 18 million contiguous, metro 20 million
14. Lagos 17 million contiguous, metro 21 million
15. Beijing 16 million contiguous, metro 21 million
Smaller cities but with large metros:
Manila 12 million, metro 20.5 million
London 13 million, metro 18 million
Los Angeles 13 million, metro 18 million
Moscow 11.5 million, metro 18 million
*the NYC 'MSA' has 23 million but is way too loose a count compared to the other cities, considering it doubles the size of the CSA even, and relies on less than 5 percent commuting into the centre city. If other cities counted the same we would be seeing in populations of 60 million or more in Europe, Bangladesh, Egypt, China and India.
1. Guangzhou-Shenzhen 37 million contiguous, 44-60 million metro
12. NYC 18.1 million contiguous, metro 20 million *
Shenzhen is 150 kilometers from Guangzhou--that's a huge area. You'd have to compare it to the NYC-Philadelphia metro area or something to compare an area of equal size, which would give you a population of 35-40 million or so.
Nope - NYC and Philadelphia are separated, whereas the Shenzhen-Guangzhou aren't, theyre now one contiguous city (as in you can walk on streets, with housing and buildings on either side from one city into the next).
In fact it's not two cities that have merged, but four.
Foshan 3.6 million (marked on the map with an F) and Guangzhou (G) 12 million merged a long time ago, as did Dongguan (D) 8 million and Shenzhen (S) 10 million via a large coastal strip. However recently these two monstrosities have merged again (X). There are actually other cities being tacked on south of Foshan-Guanzhou also but I'll keep those out for now to make it simple.
This is why the authorities are now building the worlds largest metro and transport system that links up all these places, though they deny it is making it one city that was widely reported across the world in 2012 - even despite Google Maps showing otherwise.
In short, if NYC physically joins up with Philadelphia, you've got something similar, but even then the combined total of the urban, contiguous population 22 million.
Stockholm
....Joke, we've only just started to get more metropolitan.
My vote goes for Shanghai or Beijing
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