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/\ I agree, in name and recognition, Austin overshadows SATX. In importance overall though I still feel it’s splitting hairs. It’s pretty close between the two in terms of economic importance.
The rising stars of the future will be whatever cities embrace the coming trends. Thing is at the current time we have no idea yet what they will be.
I thought bro culture essentially replaced hipster culture as the dominant 'marketable' urban trend about a decade ago when we started climbing out of the recession.
One thing I think we can agree on is that future rising stars will be those that grow and prosper economically at an above-average rate.
San Diego is better. I like that the city is more urban and has more things to do for different age groups. I enjoyed my time there the last visit. Unemployment numbers are looking better but the city was really hit hard.
San Diego is better. I like that the city is more urban and has more things to do for different age groups. I enjoyed my time there the last visit. Unemployment numbers are looking better but the city was really hit hard.
Do you think that San Diego is also the 'superior' third city in its state compared to Austin? This is less of a head-to-head matchup and more about how well each city rounds out the top three within its state.
Haven't been to either but to me, Austin stands out more as the third city in its state (and it really is third in just about every way except population IMO) than San Diego. San Diego is overshadowed geographically by LA to an extent as well as economically by the Bay Area somewhat in one of its key industries, biopharma. Even educationally it does well as UCSD is clearly a top public university and USD ranks well also, but UCLA and USC in LA and Berkeley and Stanford pack more powerful punches as highly-recognized public/private power couples as far as universities go. I think it clearly dominates only one important area within its state, that being the military--which is no doubt important, but it doesn't really significantly raise the city's profile on a national level which tends to be the case for just about all military-heavy cities.
Austin on the other hand has the benefit of not being in the same geographical region as Houston and DFW and, from where I stand, it seems to be associated with the Hill Country more than San Antonio, which is also within the region. It also dominates high-profile, high-growth corners of the tech sector within Texas (manufacturing, computer systems, semiconductors), is the state capital, and home to the state's flagship and highest-ranked public university. Culturally, it also managed to carve out a distinct niche within its state with live music and its hippy/counterculture scene and even managed to create nationally renowned festivals that embody elements of that culture (SXSW and ACL).
I'm not saying Austin is the "superiror" third city in its state over San Diego, but there's no doubt that in terms of notoriety and name recognition, it has managed to essentially get on Houston's and Dallas's level within the past two decades or so even though I'd put it in the same tier of cities in Texas with San Antonio and Fort Worth (but it ranks first within said tier). I wouldn't say the same of San Diego even though it has no others within its tier in California.
San Antonio gets its share of national recognition if not more especially when it comes to televised national and international sporting events. San Antonio also has a well developed city branding that makes it a top U.S. destination.
San Antonio has three industries that are larger than Austin's biggest which is it's Tech sector. San Antonio also has more F500, larger corporate base and bigger private companies that are F500 in size. San Antonio also has a more diversified economy than Austin.
What inflates Austin's GDP is the price of Real estate and COL. You are comparing cities that have totally different COL/ Real estate prices which effects GDP figures and in my opinion doesn't give an accurate size of economic strength.
This is why I don't think GDP totals can give an accurate comparison at least for what city has more industry and larger economy.
Austin's COL and sky high Real estate prices give it an advantage and inflated profile but it doesn't equate to a bigger economy than San Antonio.
Based on San Antonio's conservative GDP total for a metro it's size I wonder how much of the U.S. dept of defense GDP is actually tallied towards S.A.'s total GDP figure, considering $50 billion annually is a huge chunk of $129 billion which is S.A.'s total GMP/GDP.
(Billions towards GDP annually for key industries) I compiled this data from local economic websites for S.A. and Austin.
Yeah, that is just not true... Austin's has significantly more GDP output because it has much higher levels of education, and as a result, much higher incomes per-capita. Austin also has an average of 2 people per household compared to 2.7 in San Antonio. Basically, the majority of San Antonio's population advantage is made up of larger families and more young children. The workforce in each city are pretty similarly sized, while Austin has notably higher incomes. Hence a higher GDP.
Austin is more educated than Dallas and Houston but that doesn't mean it has more industry and commerce.
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