Columbus may soon replace Cleveland as the 'Most Diverse City in the State' (Cincinnati: apartment, vs)

[jbcmh81]

Originally Posted by bjimmy24

I'm pretty sure your Asian population figures for Cleveland are incorrect.

I would also say qualifying people as "white" and "hispanic" and "asian" is a horrible way to measure diversity and doesn't actually say much. Can be very misleading. Our "white" people are made up of a huge number of ethnicities. By the same token, our "hispanic" population is really just Puerto Rican and pretty much nobody else, not even very many Mexicans. This is not a good way to look at diversity of a city. Sometimes census information can be surprisingly useless.

1.8% is what the census has for the Asian population in Cleveland. American FactFinder - Results *

Race isn't the only way to measure diversity, of course. I included foreign-born as a way to address ethnicity/culture that doesn't have to do with race, but it is also not the only way. Is there a particular way you think is more valid?

[bjimmy24]

Originally Posted by jbcmh81

1.8% is what the census has for the Asian population in Cleveland. American FactFinder - Results *

Race isn't the only way to measure diversity, of course. I included foreign-born as a way to address ethnicity/culture that doesn't have to do with race, but it is also not the only way. Is there a particular way you think is more valid?

Foreign born doesn't necessarily tell you anything either. Maybe a place has 1 dominant immigrant group. Perhaps language spoken at home would be a better measure, but I'm not sure there is any way that does it too well. But I'm also not sure how important it is at the end of the day either, once you get to a certain level of diversity.

I'm not disputing the number of Asians, but the percent change seems pretty off to me. I think the Asian population in Cleveland has been growing pretty well recently.

[jbcmh81]

Originally Posted by bjimmy24

Foreign born doesn't necessarily tell you anything either. Maybe a place has 1 dominant immigrant group. Perhaps language spoken at home would be a better measure, but I'm not sure there is any way that does it too well. But I'm also not sure how important it is at the end of the day either, once you get to a certain level of diversity.

I'm not disputing the number of Asians, but the percent change seems pretty off to me. I think the Asian population in Cleveland has been growing pretty well recently.

For the sake of the debate, we have to look at tangible measurements. There may not be one all-encompassing way to measure diversity, but you can get an idea of what the diversity is by race, ethnicity, country of origin, etc. The census does also measure language spoken at home. In any case, if the idea is that diversity can't really be measured in any real way, then I'm not sure how anyone from any city can make any claims about it.

Maybe it has in recent years, I don't know, but during the 2000-2010 period, Cleveland's Asian population fell by 1/5th.

[bjimmy24]

Originally Posted by jbcmh81

For the sake of the debate, we have to look at tangible measurements. There may not be one all-encompassing way to measure diversity, but you can get an idea of what the diversity is by race, ethnicity, country of origin, etc. The census does also measure language spoken at home. In any case, if the idea is that diversity can't really be measured in any real way, then I'm not sure how anyone from any city can make any claims about it.

Maybe it has in recent years, I don't know, but during the 2000-2010 period, Cleveland's Asian population fell by 1/5th.

I think it's definitely picked up, but might not be reflected in census, I also might be thinking of the metro (Asians, Hispanics populate latest wave of Northeast Ohio's newcomers | cleveland.com). But with metro population exploding so much and Asiatown doing well, I find it hard to believe that the city population of Asians went down at all. But Cleveland really wasn't in very good shape until after the recession/housing crisis stuff. Since then though, I think things have been much better.

Asians, Hispanics populate latest wave of Northeast Ohio's newcomers | cleveland.com

But you didn't post the percentage of foreign language speakers at home and what those languages are. I really don't think you can measure it too well, unless the results are either extremely mixed or extremely homogenous. In the middle, it's somewhat meaningless to claim "more diverse" in my opinion.

[jbcmh81]

Originally Posted by bjimmy24

I think it's definitely picked up, but might not be reflected in census, I also might be thinking of the metro (Asians, Hispanics populate latest wave of Northeast Ohio's newcomers | cleveland.com). But with metro population exploding so much and Asiatown doing well, I find it hard to believe that the city population of Asians went down at all. But Cleveland really wasn't in very good shape until after the recession/housing crisis stuff. Since then though, I think things have been much better.

Asians, Hispanics populate latest wave of Northeast Ohio's newcomers | cleveland.com

But you didn't post the percentage of foreign language speakers at home and what those languages are. I really don't think you can measure it too well, unless the results are either extremely mixed or extremely homogenous. In the middle, it's somewhat meaningless to claim "more diverse" in my opinion.

It was up about 32% in the metro. It's possible that the Asian population in Cleveland was just moving out of the city and into the suburbs the past decade, combined with new immigrants moving into the metro. They weren't the only demographic that declined during the 2000s, so it shouldn't be that unbelievable, really. That demographic could've been in recovery by 2010, but we won't really know for sure for awhile.

No, I didn't post the language stuff, because that's a lot of info and usually that doesn't go over very well here. As far as the numbers I gave, you could say it's a good representation of racial diversity, but not necessarily other kinds.

[cali3448893]

Originally Posted by jbcmh81

Those aren't city numbers, those are metro numbers, which *would* be the most similar because the majority-white suburbs and rural areas of the metros would dilute the much more diverse cities.

Here are the 2010 city percentage of total population for Ohio's 6 largest cities, going from most to least diverse for each group, and also their 2000-2010 % changes.

Non-Hispanic White
Cleveland: 33.4% (-26%)
Cincinnati: 48.1% (-17.5%)
Dayton: 50.5% (-17%)
Columbus: 59.3% (-1.1%)
Akron: 61.2% (-16.7%)
Toledo: 61.4% (-16.6%)

Non-Hispanic Black
Cleveland: 52.5% (-13.2%)
Cincinnati: 44.6% (-6.6%)
Dayton: 42.6% (-14.3%)
Akron: 31.2% (-0.7%)
Columbus: 27.7% (+27%)
Toledo: 26.7% (+3.4%)

Non-Hispanic Asian
Columbus: 4.1% (+43.9%)
Akron: 2.1% (+45.1%)
Cincinnati: 1.8% (+20.8%)
Cleveland: 1.8% (-20.3%)
Toledo: 1.1% (+6.6%)
Dayton: 0.8% (+20.6%)

Hispanic
Cleveland: 10.0% (+4.4%)
Toledo: 7.4% (+23.8%)
Columbus: 5.6% (+149.2%)
Dayton: 3.0% (+53.0)
Cincinnati: 2.8% (+113.0%)
Akron: 2.1% (+68.6%)

Foreign-Born
Columbus: 11.0% (+81.6%)
Cincinnati: 5.6% (+32.7%)
Cleveland: 4.5% (-17.0%)
Akron: 4.3% (+23.3%)
Toledo: 4.0% (+22.0%)
Dayton: 3.6% (+57.2%)

So as far as the 3-Cs go in 2010, Cleveland has the highest Black and Hispanic populations while Columbus had the highest Asian and White populations. Columbus had the highest foreign-born population as well, which could be any race or ethnicity. Cleveland is doing the worst long-term as far as how diversity within the city is changing, Columbus the best, Cincinnati in the middle.

ummm nobody goes by the city anymore, everyone goes by the metro...also if you look at it cincinnati is the second fastest growing after columbus in ethnics.

[natininja]

I like how Cbus gets credit for lots of Germans, but Cincinnati whites are "non-ethnic".

This has to be one of the stupidest threads I've seen on C-D. Have at it, Cleveland and Columbus. Prove how very diverse you are. I'll be munching on this here popcorn.

[motorman]

^ (lol) Thinking the same thing, natininja. I'm luvin' how Cincinnati's population gets fluffed off as being merely "white/black, along with a handfull of Mexicans," while those other "2-C Ellis Islands" tabulate each and every one of their little percentage-points and declare themselves Exemplars of Diversity. Somehow, Columbus and Cleveland believe that Cincinnati's Caucasians and Negroids came from nowhere, but if a boatload of Slovaks or Somalis arrives in either of their towns, they host a parade and give 'em the keys to the city! (Pass me some of that popcorn, willya?)

[jbcmh81]

Originally Posted by natininja

I like how Cbus gets credit for lots of Germans, but Cincinnati whites are "non-ethnic".

This has to be one of the stupidest threads I've seen on C-D. Have at it, Cleveland and Columbus. Prove how very diverse you are. I'll be munching on this here popcorn.

Does Columbus get credit for having a lot of Germans? I don't actually think there are that many who live there and haven't ever seen people talk about there being many there. Cleveland and Cincinnati definitely get a lot more credit for their European immigrant populations.

Not sure why you're so annoyed by the thread, honestly.

[jbcmh81]

Originally Posted by cali3448893

ummm nobody goes by the city anymore, everyone goes by the metro...also if you look at it cincinnati is the second fastest growing after columbus in ethnics.

Cities are always going to be more diverse than the metro areas, that's why I don't like to use metros to talk about diversity. They're majority white in most cases.

I think I mentioned how Cincinnati was in the middle, meaning 2nd.