Is St. Louis more cliquish than other cities its size? (Charleston: transfer, live)

[xenokc]

Originally Posted by Matthew Hall

True the total net growth was 4.6% percent, but where did the new downtown residents come from? St. louis is not detroit, cleveland, or pittsburgh which all had net MSA loses of more than 3%. That is a big difference.

And 4-5% is about the birth/death rate. STL is clearly attracting people from the outside, including downtown. The net difference for the metro is partly due to people born in STL leaving and apparently most people who do move there don't stay more than 5 years. STL had a big domestic lost actually, offset with international gains.

But downtown growth is great.. coming from elsewhere in the metro in addition to some outsiders. Hopefully with downtown improvements a higher % from the outside will stay and STL can keep more young educated from leaving. Seems to be happening recently. The next migration report should come out next year.

[Matthew Hall]

2% is replacement where everyone is replaced by someone else so 4.6% isn't horrible. Just to put it in perspective if detroit had had the same population percentages as st. louis in the last 20 years it would have almost 500,000 more people in its metro than it does today. 500,000!

[Chicago76]

Originally Posted by xenokc

See page 7...
http://www.metrooutlook.org/assets/migration2007.pdf

KC and STL have more international in-migration than Indy. KC's are mostly Mexicans and STL had a big Bosnian migration and some Mexican... and both getting more Asian.... but both more Intl than Indy overall. A big chunk of Indy growth is from Chicago (page 25). Indy had more domestic in-migration than international unlike KC/STL.

STL was actually having international gains and domestic loss and they offset each other. (page 7) This may have changed recently. Will be interesting to see the next migration report from 2005-2010, which should come out next year.

I would agree that jobs are a bigger factor. But the migration numbers show that many people who do come in don't stay for more than 5 years. Jobs would be one reason but given that many people mention city personality when they leave, it may have something to do with it as well. The fact this thread exists is an indication. And if it does and STL ignores it... well you can't solve a problem if you don't acknowledge the core causes.

KC's recent problem is that people are now moving here w/out a job (via a friend works for MO State job employment service, who feeds BLS data). I'm surprised that KC's unemployment is still below national avg given this recent influx.

After digging through the study you posted, I see your point about the international vs. domestic net migration, although my larger point still stands: you're looking at gross numbers 2000 vs. 2010 without any granularity and trying to raw very specific conclusions that can't be supported.

-Apart from intl vs. domestic, STL is generally an older city with older residents, which leads to a lot of snowbird sunbelt migration.

-I would love to know where you the data points are that support the notion that "most people who go to STL don't stay for more than 5 years." All I've seen is net inbound/outbound migration and the source/destination. Hopefully you're not conflating net migration figures with this assumption. The outbounds could be a bunch of 70 year olds who have lived here for 50 years while the inbounds might by 20 or 30 somethings who stay for decades.

-Most importantly, you're trying to draw some comparison between net migration from 5 year old data and cliquishness, disregarding the other possibilities for outbound migration, which range from job creation/economics to heat and humidity in the summer, to a dislike of a sports town that is dominated by baseball, to a dislike of provel, to a dislike of state government in MO, to fear of earthquakes, to temporary job rotations into a Fortune 500 HQ and back out to satellite offices (as STL has many Fortune 500 HQ), etc. There is a whole universe of possibilities out there, and you're honing in on one that is pretty far down the list, IMHO.

-the only evidence you seem to present that is directly linked to STL and cliquishness is a friend of yours who didn't stay in the area post-grad. I could just as easily cite the fact that I went to school there as well and me and my classmates didn't stick around due to career-building opportunities in our early/mid 20s. We went to places like NYC, Boston, San Francisco, DC, and Chicago for those opportunities. I could also just as easily cite the fact that my wife has lived at least 4 years in STL, Pittsburgh, Chicago, and LA and she would rate STL as less cliquish than 2 of the other 3 (behind Chicago). Or I could also cite the fact we were looking at places as part of a relo and met 4 different couples we exchanged numbers with in STL last weekend in 4 different settings...their request, not ours...and we aren't that fascinating of a couple. This would never happen in Chicago (according to her the least cliquish of the cities my wife has lived in).

Any assumption based upon the numbers you've provided would require a huge logical leap to pin a major root cause down to provincialism.

[xenokc]

I'll agree with you there. There is no hard data that shows city personality is related to flat migration, actually fairly significant outward domestic migration - KC has many retirees heading S too yet has positive domestic and intln migration. If MO were the issue then MO outside STL should show similar stagnant migration too but isn't. Even Cape Girardeau grew by 10%.

I'm only proposing city personality could be one of the reasons, granted partly based on anecdotal experience. The existence of this thread is also a tad bit of evidence. Seems cliquiness of STL is brought up in many forums. It's brought up often when I visit STL - still have family there. Is not something to completely ignore. If it is indeed an issue and impacts people staying in STL, would not be wise for STL ignore it. Can't solve problems if you don't acknowledge the causes.

Given the 2010 census shows <5% growth, it's the same as the 2000-2005 data, so it will be surprising if things have changed that much in last 5 years. There was also a Census stat that showed % of people born in the metro. STL was much higher than avg. I'll see if I can find it, was several years ago when I saw it.

[xenokc]

[aragx6]

Oh my god a local city magazine used a well known joke cliche as their cover story. That definitely settles it.

[kshe95girl]

Originally Posted by aragx6

Oh my god a local city magazine used a well known joke cliche as their cover story. That definitely settles it.

I thought the same thing.

[xenokc]

i thought it was cute. but i'll get out of youse guys hair... i'm not solving any problems here and realize i'm just now stirring things up, which i'm sure is annoying. toodaloo.

[aragx6]

Originally Posted by xenokc

i thought it was cute. but i'll get out of youse guys hair... i'm not solving any problems here and realize i'm just now stirring things up, which i'm sure is annoying. toodaloo.

Don't be offended, I'm a smart aleck to everyone. You're a great poster on the KC forum and I like having you around.

[Old Trafford]

Originally Posted by xenokc

Here's more recent data straight from the Feds... STL has second lowest Per Cap GMP in the Midwest (3rd post in thread). Manufacturing does have better GMP than the Service industry and a lot who had manufacturing jobs in STL probably went to the service industry.

//www.city-data.com/forum/kansa...y-kc-does.html

The original source from Feds is here...
BEA : Gross Domestic Product by Metropolitan Area

Acutally that data is from 2009 - the stuff I posted was from last year