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I realize this is City-Data and reality vs CD often are miles apart from each other, but Phoenix is killing it with +23k. Which, unless I’m missing something, is the most. Phoenix is a far better place to live than what CD forums give it credit for. Sure it has issues (and growth issues) and everyone likes to make themselves feel better about its crazy growth by saying it has water issues and it won’t be sustainable. I’d venture to say in a decade it will still be experiencing growth and people will still be saying the same thing they have for the past 30yrs.
As someone that works in tech, there are PLENTY of tech jobs available there along with the explosive growth in semiconductor manufacturing. I’d venture to say it may end up the top dog in the US for semiconductor manufacturing. Many billions are being invested by TSMC and Intel. Phoenix is changing and growing fast. It’s not the same retiree haven you commented on from your decades old perception.
I can't buy the "Phoenix is changing and growing fast" thing, as a good thing, as water really is an issue. I kind of harp on this, as I read a lot, and kind of think there's a fair amount of hiding one's head in the sand going on. If one searches for articles that explain the very foreseeable problems that might possibly be encountered, they might not be so flip about this. We are retired and thought about a home for the winter months in Arizona...after reading and researching, we were scared off. We wouldn't live to see this happen, but unless something changes, it's inevitable, IMO. SO, that's my take on Phoenix growing. Sure, there are positive articles, but there are also articles (based on realities), that explain the very real problems that might be down the road. I don't believe millions should keep moving to a desert.
Phoenix, Austin, Houston, Tampa, Nashville, and Dallas are doing very well in this regard. CD vs Reality is a real thing for sure and those cities are constantly torn down here yet they’re great places to live and have many attractive qualities.
Houston, Nashville and Dallas are three of the most touted cities on CD. And for good reason.
I'm getting the sense that some folks are really misinterpreting this data, although the NYTimes also presented it in a misleading way, so I can understand the reason.
The fact of the matter is college graduates are FAR more likely to be mobile, so it really should come as literally no surprise that you'd see large sums of college grads coming and going in major metro areas. That's how it has always been. It's all about seeking new opportunity and upward mobility, which, if we're honest, is far easier for someone with a college degree generally speaking.
What this data DOES NOT tell us is the how the population of college graduates has changed overall in these cities/regions. Folks seem to be forgetting that most major metro areas have large concentrations of universities that produce thousands upon thousands of college graduates each year. Obviously, a good portion of these students will leave to seek opportunities in other cities, or closer to their home regions.
But even if only half of those students stay in a large city where they went to school, it's still a net gain of college graduates, because none of those students were counted as college grads 4 years earlier, or even 1 year earlier, for that matter.
In other words, net migration data is only one piece of the demographic puzzle. My inclination is that the NYTimes is trying to jump on the bandwagon of news stories feeding into the "doom loop" narrative for big cities, but it's a very incomplete narrative if you read between the lines.
It's interesting that Pittsburgh and Columbus have pretty anemic growth among college grads, by the way. The hype especially around Pittsburgh is legendary--as though this massive replacement of blue collar retirees by smart, young tech and health workers was turning Pittsburgh into a kind of Appalachian Austin. For sure there have been tangible changes there--but Pittsburgh's renaissance is extremely overrated.
This is exactly the misinterpretation I was referring to in my last post. Again, this only refers to migration data alone, not total population.
Let's look at the American Community Survey, the exact same data source that the NYTimes is using for this article.
I'm getting the sense that some folks are really misinterpreting this data, although the NYTimes also presented it in a misleading way, so I can understand the reason.
The fact of the matter is college graduates are FAR more likely to be mobile, so it really should come as literally no surprise that you'd see large sums of college grads coming and going in major metro areas. That's how it has always been. It's all about seeking new opportunity and upward mobility, which, if we're honest, is far easier for someone with a college degree generally speaking.
What this data DOES NOT tell us is the how the population of college graduates has changed overall in these cities/regions. Folks seem to be forgetting that most major metro areas have large concentrations of universities that produce thousands upon thousands of college graduates each year. Obviously, a good portion of these students will leave to seek opportunities in other cities, or closer to their home regions.
But even if only half of those students stay in a large city where they went to school, it's still a net gain of college graduates, because none of those students were counted as college grads 4 years earlier, or even 1 year earlier, for that matter.
In other words, net migration data is only one piece of the demographic puzzle. My inclination is that the NYTimes is trying to jump on the bandwagon of news stories feeding into the "doom loop" narrative for big cities, but it's a very incomplete narrative if you read between the lines.
Yeah, that is true.
The Bostons, LAs, DCs, etc. will always attract new grads because the jobs, money and opportunities are there - the biggest thing the cities in the first column (the super expensive) need to worry about is it's not 2010 or 2012 anymore... they need to look at the writing on the wall, the Raleighs, Richmonds, Pittsburgs, Austins are way more competitive and if they don't get serious about rectifying the lack of affordable housing in their regions they will continue to lose residents to lower CoL cities and while they may not care right now long term it creates real issues.
Also, 2020-2021 is kind of one-off data. Cities with more WFH jobs available during the pandemic will see fewer college grad in-migration during that period. Anecdotally I have 3 friends with older kids who graduated from college right into the pandemic and took a WFH position and moved back in with their parents instead of original plans of moving to NYC, LA, Boston where the jobs were. The thing is all three of them have now moved to one of those cities. 2022-2023 will be more enlightening.
WFH has proven to be much less lasting than anticipated, even in tech. Young employees without a lot of connections and experience are particularly harmed in the long run by WFH.
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