Tag Archives: kotkin

Cities, The Middle Class, and Children

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by Michael Lewyn

In a recent article, Joel Kotkin critiques the work of Jane Jacobs; he points out that Jacobs idealized middle-class city neighborhoods, and suggests that because cities have become dominated by childless rich people, middle-class urbanity “has passed into myth, and… it is never going to come back.” He suggests that Americans are “moving out to the suburbs as they enter their 30s and start families” because central cities are only appropriate for “the talented, the young, and childless affluent adults.” This claim rests on a couple of assumptions: 1) that cities have little appeal to families and 2) that the only Americans whose preferences are typical are those middle-class families.

The first claim has an element of truth: families do tend to prefer more suburban living environments. But what Kotkin overlooks is that the tide is turning (at least a little). Although American suburbs clearly have more children than cities, the most desirable city neighborhoods are more appealing to parents than was the case a decade ago.

For example, Kotkin writes that Greenwich Village (where Jacobs lived) “today now largely consists of students, wealthy people and pensioners.” But according to the Furman Center’s neighborhoood-by-neighborhood surveys of New York housing, the percentage of households with children actually increased in New York’s more desirable urban neighborhoods. For example, in Jacobs’s own Greenwich Village, 15.1 percent of all 2013 households had children under 18—lower than in most places to be sure, but higher than in 2000, when only 11.4 percent had children. Similarly, the “households with children” percentage increased from 11.4 percent to 15.1 percent in New York’s financial district, from 14.6 percent to 17.8 percent in the Upper West Side, and from 13.3 percent to 16.6 percent in the Upper East Side. Continue reading →

Not A “War on Suburbia” Election

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(cross-posted from cnu.org)

According to Joel Kotkin, this month’s elections were really about the “progressives’ war on suburbia.” According to Kotkin, the Democrats lost because they are “aggressively anti-suburban.” Since I didn’t vote for President Obama, I leave it to his supporters to defend him.

However, I do think it is worth pointing out that cities and suburbs moved in the same direction this year. The Republicans gained several governorships this year (Arkansas, Illinois, Maryland, and Massachusetts). I couldn’t find city election statistics for Arkansas, but I was able to find city board of elections statistics for the other three states. In each, the Republican candidates for governor improved on their 2010 showing. In Massachusetts, Republican Charlie Baker gained 30 percent of the Boston city vote, up from 23 percent in 2010. This 7 point gain was equal to his 6.5 point statewide gain (from 42 to 48.5 percent) and exceeded his 4 point gain in suburban Middlesex County.

In Illinois, the Republican vote share increased from 17 to 20 percent. Kotkin asserts that this is a “laughably pathetic” vote share, but in fact the Republicans gained almost as much in Chicago as they did statewide. They gained 3 percentage points in Chicago, and almost 5 points statewide (from 46% to 50.8%). (To be fair, the Republican gained a little more in the Chicago suburbs, but that may reflect the fact that he is from suburban Chicago while 2010 nominee Bill Brady is from downstate).

In Maryland, the Republican vote share in Baltimore city increased from 16 percent to 22 percent, a 6 point shift, more than the vote shift in Prince George’s County near Washington (4 points) and almost as much as the 7-point vote shift in Montgomery County. (However, the Republican gained more votes in the Baltimore suburbs, which by Kotkin’s logic means that they must have revolted against a “progressive war on Baltimore.”)

In sum, Republican candidates gained votes in suburbia- but they gained votes in cities as well, often in roughly equal proportions.

Joel Kotkin on “What People Really Want”

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(cross-posted at cnu.org)

Joel Kotkin recently wrote in the Washington Post that unspecified urban planners want “to create an ideal locate for hipsters and older, sophisticated urban dwellers” rather than focusing on the needs of “most middle-class residents of the metropolis.” He claims that these people want “home ownership, rapid access to employment throughout the metropolitan area, good schools, and ‘human scale’ neighborhoods” as well as “decent-pay [job] opportunities.” He doesn’t really explain how these goals can be achieved, other than noting that Sun Belt cities continue to grow more rapidly than high-cost northern cities, and thus must have somehow achieved these goals. Kotkin’s claims miss three realities.

First, smart growth-oriented planners seek to achieve some of these goals. By improving public transit and substituting street grids (which allow traffic to flow through a broad range of streets rather than being confined to a few major streets) for cul-de-sacs, they seek to expand “rapid access to employment throughout the metropolitan area.” Smart growth-oriented planners also seek to make cities more “human scale” by making them more friendly to pedestrians as well as automobiles. By contrast, much of America is “car scale” rather than “human scale.” And by expanding the urban housing supply, smart-growth oriented planners seek to make more homes available to more people. (Having said that, I agree with Kotkin that planners in “luxury” cities have failed to meet the latter goal- partially because density-phobia has limited development and thus artificially constricted housing supply).

Second, some of Kotkin’s worthy goals are beyond the reach of urban planning. Nearly all Americans are for “good schools” but urban planners don’t have any special expertise in how to create them. Other central-city policymakers have struggled with this problem for decades, usually without much success. Similarly, urban planners have no special expertise in how to create jobs, especially in the teeth of the post-2008 worldwide economic downturn. Even before the 2008 recession, Rust Belt metros like Buffalo struggled with job creation.

Third, to the extent a city can’t solve the “school problem”, it might as well try to attract the people who don’t need schools: singles and empty-nesters. Although Kotkin may sneer at these groups as “hipsters”, the fact of the matters is that the number of nonfamily households has exploded over time. In 1940, 47 percent of households were either married couples with children or single parents with children; today, only 30 percent do. Kotkin may bemoan the growth of nonfamily and empty-nester households, but they exist and need places to live too.