Sunbelt battle for #2?

[Will O' Wisp]

Originally Posted by Crawford

I don't see what's shocking. The number of college students is basically a function of the overall population. LA is larger than Houston, Dallas and Austin combined, so, not surprisingly, has more college students. Something like 70% of high school grads attend college these days.

Again, I don't understand what's so important about where people attend college. In most cases it has limited impact on a metro's economic prospects. The best "Wall Street" business school isn't in NYC, the best "innovation" university is nowhere near Silicon Valley, etc. People just move to jobs after college.

The biggest concentration of Harvard grads isn't in Boston. If Harvard moved to rural Maine, it probably wouldn't change things too much, both for the metro and the institution.

LA metro pop in 2018: 13,291,486
Dallas, Houston, Austin combined metro pop in 2018: 16,705,411

College students in LA: 974,013
College students in Houston and Dallas combined: 572, 922
Austin doesn't even rate to be included in the list, but if we assume it has 270,000 students (same as Huston at #10) LA still has over 100,000 more than all three combined.

Or put another way, Dallas is 4th in total population yet 7th in students. Houston is 5th in population and 10th in students. On a per capita basis, Texan cities are really losing out on the college game.

And that does effect the overall composition of the metro area. The majority of both LA and Texas' college students stay in their city after graduation. Interestingly Houston and Dallas are both slight better at retaining their graduates (66.1%/63.7% vs 62.9% for LA), but even then the vastly larger number of students in LA means it generates a far larger base of skilled workers. Just on these numbers we'd find that Dallas is adding 192,738 graduates to its workforce every year, and Houston 180,323 for a total of 373,061. But then LA is adding nearly double that at 612,654, and in a single metro area.

Now the real number is almost assuredly lower, that figure assumes every student graduates and every student gets a 4 year degree, but it wouldn't be unreasonable to say a company in LA can pull from a pool of college educated workers 3-4x larger than it could anywhere in Texas.

edit: Houston

[JAYNYC]

Originally Posted by Will O' Wisp

LA metro pop in 2018: 13,291,486
Dallas, Huston, Austin combined metro pop in 2018: 16,705,411

College students in LA: 974,013
College students in Huston and Dallas combined: 572, 922
Austin doesn't even rate to be included in the list, but if we assume it has 270,000 students (same as Huston at #10) LA still has over 100,000 more than all three combined.

Or put another way, Dallas is 4th in total population yet 7th in students. Huston is 5th in population and 10th in students. On a per capita basis, Texan cities are really losing out on the college game.

And that does effect the overall composition of the metro area. The majority of both LA and Texas' college students stay in their city after graduation. Interestingly Huston and Dallas are both slight better at retaining their graduates (66.1%/63.7% vs 62.9% for LA), but even then the vastly larger number of students in LA means it generates a far larger base of skilled workers. Just on these numbers we'd find that Dallas is adding 192,738 graduates to its workforce every year, and Huston 180,323 for a total of 373,061. But then LA is adding nearly double that at 612,654, and in a single metro area.

Now the real number is almost assuredly lower, that figure assumes every student graduates and every student gets a 4 year degree, but it wouldn't be unreasonable to say a company in LA can pull from a pool of college educated workers 3-4x larger than it could anywhere in Texas.

Where on God's green Earth is Huston???

Inquiring minds want to know.

[Boisebro]

Originally Posted by JAYNYC

Where on God's green Earth is Huston???

Inquiring minds want to know.

Idaho. Though I think his numbers are off:

Huston Vineyards

[JAYNYC]

Originally Posted by Boisebro

Idaho. Though I think his numbers are off:

Huston Vineyards

I mean that sh*t don't even look right. It's like the equivalent of Shicago, Atlantuh or Feenix.

[Will O' Wisp]

Originally Posted by JAYNYC

Where on God's green Earth is Huston???

Inquiring minds want to know.

I'll have you know John Huston was a screenwriter and director who defined classic noir with The Maltese Falcon and The Asphalt Jungle, and he would not appreciate being talked about like this.

You know you've reached peak LA when your spellcheck defaults to golden age film directors over major US cities.

[JAYNYC]

Originally Posted by Will O' Wisp

Austin doesn't even rate to be included in the list, but if we assume it has 270,000 students (same as Huston at #10) LA still has over 100,000 more than all three combined.

edit: Houston

[aufbau]

Originally Posted by Boisebro

Idaho. Though I think his numbers are off:

Huston Vineyards

The number of times I drove past Chicken Dinner Rd without realizing there was wine on it!

[JManc]

Originally Posted by Will O' Wisp

LA metro pop in 2018: 13,291,486
Dallas, Houston, Austin combined metro pop in 2018: 16,705,411

College students in LA: 974,013
College students in Houston and Dallas combined: 572, 922
Austin doesn't even rate to be included in the list, but if we assume it has 270,000 students (same as Huston at #10) LA still has over 100,000 more than all three combined.

Or put another way, Dallas is 4th in total population yet 7th in students. Houston is 5th in population and 10th in students. On a per capita basis, Texan cities are really losing out on the college game.

And that does effect the overall composition of the metro area. The majority of both LA and Texas' college students stay in their city after graduation. Interestingly Houston and Dallas are both slight better at retaining their graduates (66.1%/63.7% vs 62.9% for LA), but even then the vastly larger number of students in LA means it generates a far larger base of skilled workers. Just on these numbers we'd find that Dallas is adding 192,738 graduates to its workforce every year, and Houston 180,323 for a total of 373,061. But then LA is adding nearly double that at 612,654, and in a single metro area.

Now the real number is almost assuredly lower, that figure assumes every student graduates and every student gets a 4 year degree, but it wouldn't be unreasonable to say a company in LA can pull from a pool of college educated workers 3-4x larger than it could anywhere in Texas.

edit: Houston

Texas historically been a destination for transplants. Most people I know here in Houston who are college educated are not from Houston or Texas but other states and countries where they already received most if not all their higher education. It's their kids who are likely to attend TX based universities and the schools are expanding. The undergrad and grad schools I went to here quadrupled in student size since my time there. California has not been a major destination for transplants on the scale of the rest of the sunbelt in decades. They long since addressed their higher education needs.

[Austin55]

Originally Posted by JManc

As austlar1 mentioned, the two cities are too intertwined and there is a lot of people and economic activity in between them that tie the entire metro together. Even if you did peel off Fort Worth, Dallas still would be on the same level as Houston and Atlanta.

The Fort Worth "Metro" would be sizable on it's own too. Tarrant+Wise+Parker+Johnson+Hood is about 2.2 million, Vegas/Cincinnati metro territory.

[Sun Belt]

Originally Posted by JAYNYC

Where on God's green Earth is Huston???

Inquiring minds want to know.

Of all the things to discuss, you're zero'd in on a typo? A typo that is missing one letter? That typo is most likely associated to the user actually spelling it correctly, while the hardware/software not registering it as a full on punch - or typing too fast for the keyboard to actually place it.

This happens to me all the time [and certainly you!].

[JAYNYC]

Originally Posted by Sun Belt

Of all the things to discuss, you're zero'd in on a typo? A typo that is missing one letter? That typo is most likely associated to the user actually spelling it correctly, while the hardware/software not registering it as a full on punch - or typing too fast for the keyboard to actually place it.

This happens to me all the time [and certainly you!].

Yeah. Sure did.

A "typo" is generally considered a one-off misspelling caused by a slip of a finger, typing too fast or carelessness.

Spelling "Houston", "Huston" six times in ~five paragraphs isn't a "typo", it's someone who clearly doesn't know how to spell the word.

Mmmmkayy??

[Sun Belt]

Originally Posted by JAYNYC

Yeah. Sure did.

A "typo" is generally considered a one-off misspelling caused by a slip of a finger, typing too fast or carelessness.

Spelling "Houston", "Huston" six times in ~five paragraphs isn't a "typo", it's someone who clearly doesn't know how to spell the word.

Mmmmkayy??

Just a head up, nobody respects a typo nerd -- true story -- that's all you got, is a typo.

[JAYNYC]

Originally Posted by Sun Belt

Just a head up, nobody respects a typo nerd -- true story -- that's all you got, is a typo.

You mean I haven't earned the respect of a complete stranger on an Internet forum who I'll never meet in real life, and whose opinion(s) I couldn't care less about?

How will I live to see another day?

[Sun Belt]

Originally Posted by JAYNYC

You mean I haven't earned the respect of a complete stranger on an Internet forum who I'll never meet in real life, and whose opinion(s) I couldn't care less about?

How will I live to see another day?

You're the one focused on a typo. Lol. You got nothing else in the discussion, you must be proud!

[Will O' Wisp]

Originally Posted by JManc

Texas historically been a destination for transplants. Most people I know here in Houston who are college educated are not from Houston or Texas but other states and countries where they already received most if not all their higher education. It's their kids who are likely to attend TX based universities and the schools are expanding. The undergrad and grad schools I went to here quadrupled in student size since my time there. California has not been a major destination for transplants on the scale of the rest of the sunbelt in decades. They long since addressed their higher education needs.

Managed to find some stats for total college grads by metro area:

LA: 3.5 million
Dallas: 1.77 million
Houston: 1.55 million

That that isn't counting the additional 1.01 million additional graduates in the Inland Empire and Ventura County, many of whom commute into LA, but since I don't know enough about the Texan cities to determine if they also have far outlaying suburbs that should be included I'll leave that out.

In any case your anecdotal experience is correct. LA only has 2-3x the college graduate population of either Dallas or Houston, which tracks fairly close to the ratio of LA's size compared to each city. Dallas and LA have nearly identical degree attainment rates (39.8% vs 39.7%), with Houston falling slightly behind (37.8%). The only reasonable explanation for where these additional skilled workers are coming from is outside the metro.

Which, if we could finally bring this thread back to its original topic, is the central issue with the future of most major non-Cali metros in the sunbelt. Demographically and thus economically, their growth is extremely dependent on domestic migration. And that has historically been tied to their low cost of living, which itself is largely due to the low cost of land. But even in Texas land isn't an infinite resource. Or at least land within an acceptable commuting distance of the major job centers is limited. So the question becomes what does Texas and Florida's future look like after cheap new suburban residential development isn't feasible anymore in their current largest cities? Can Dallas, Houston, and Miami transition creating growth from within rather than taking growth from without? Or will we just build another set of western cities into metropolises?

[Shawn]

Originally Posted by JAYNYC

You mean I haven't earned the respect of a complete stranger on an Internet forum who I'll never meet in real life, and whose opinion(s) I couldn't care less about?

How will I live to see another day?

I’m making this public on purpose: stop making antagonist posts. You read like an angry teenager whose attitude negatively affects every thread you post in. If you want to continue participating in this forum, you need to adjust your tone and you need to learn how to let things go. Just an Internet forum and you’ll never meet these people in real life? Then who cares if you score some internet argument points?

Some advice too: start showing us you can be an adult by not replying to my post here with some flippant rejoinder. Just let it go.

[bilbao58]

I just noticed the following: "City-versus-city activity is flat-out banned from being posted here in all its forms."

Therefore I have deleted the post.

[ThePhun1]

Speaking of complexes, here goes that Houston inferiority complex. We don't need to pub ourselves, it's a great city that's grown a lot in ways other than population the last couple decades.

We could be New Orleans: celebrated cosmetically with lots of problems. So let's just enjoy Houston.

[bilbao58]

Originally Posted by ThePhun1

Speaking of complexes, here goes that Houston inferiority complex.

Hey, I also think it's ridiculous when San Antonio touts itself as being bigger than Dallas (which, of course, it technically is, but, I mean, get real!) and I dread the day Houston's population surpasses Chicago's because I fear Houston will just embarrass itself. I have a hard time imagining Houston ever surpassing Chicago in sheer grandness or grandeur.

[KB0679]

Originally Posted by bilbao58

Hey, I also think it's ridiculous when San Antonio touts itself as being bigger than Dallas (which, of course, it technically is, but, I mean, get real!) and I dread the day Houston's population surpasses Chicago's because I fear Houston will just embarrass itself. I have a hard time imagining Houston ever surpassing Chicago in sheer grandness or grandeur.

I wonder if folks once said that around the time LA began creeping up on Chicago.