
Which is the most ideologically diverse American city? - kristianc
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2018/04/ideologically-diverse-city.html
======
js8
First, article is talking more about ideological divide
(democratic/republican) than ideological diversity (which would presumably
mean many other viewpoints).

Not sure about ideological diversity, and how to even measure it, but
ideological divide to me seems as an inevitable result of two party system
(and majority voting system), as both parties struggle to get supporters. In
order to do that, they often abandon or shift in ideology. The result is that
the "ideological divide" is so very fluid that it is not really representative
of any particular ideology.

In short, I think measuring the "ideological diversity" in terms of
democrats/republicans is probably quite misleading.

~~~
kevmo
Yes.

Washington, DC is absolutely not an ideologically diverse place, by basically
any measure. 93% (!) of the city voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016.

Additionally, most people there, Democrats included, are extremely dedicated
to the status quo. I've live in cities all across America, including DC
2015-2018 -- I actually usually cite it as the least ideologically diverse
place I've ever lived.

I generally like Marginal Revolution, but this article is bunk.

~~~
rayiner
I work here and I agree. Everyone here thinks that the educated class should
run the country. I had to move out to Anne Arundel to get away from it.

~~~
moorhosj
Was there a time when people thought the uneducated class should run the
country? Were most of the founders part of the “educated class”?

~~~
mhuffman
I would go further and be curious if people think that the uneducated class
running the country is a good idea now?

~~~
rayiner
Yes. I think the DC mindset that highly educated wonks should tell everyone
what to do is intensely anti-Democratic.

~~~
moorhosj
Who in DC is "telling everyone what to do"? We vote for them, they write the
laws. That is how a representative democracy works. Under your vision of
uneducated leaders, would those people still be "telling everyone what to do"
when they write a law?

~~~
rayiner
There is a vast army of wonks (mostly in executive departments and agencies)
that are doing most of the “telling everyone what to do.”

~~~
moorhosj
Do you think MBAs should tell software engineers how to write code? Do you
consider people who specialize in software development "wonks" or just
experts?

------
czep
Wait, this is just someone's opinion? There's no data here! This should be an
empirical exercise, why should we trust these cities the author pulls from
random anecdote?

One idea would be to use voter registration records and census blocks to
measure the polarization of the population wrt political behavior. There's
also survey data on attitudes and beliefs that could be aggregated by city.
But there's no data at all, it's just the author's personal speculation.

~~~
psyc
Yikes, outside of Hacker News, people share their thoughts and opinions
without citations! Those morons!

------
chrisdevereux
Given that we tend to over-emphasise the differences between ideological
positions that we're more familiar with, and under-emphasise the difference
between positions that we aren't, it's hard to see how an exercise like this
tells us anything except the author's own political experience and
imagination. Even if there were empirical data here, how could we objectively
determine the distance between ideological perspectives? And what dimensions
of their many differences do we emphasise?

We see this most clearly when we look at ideologies that are dominant today.
For example, a fairly core ideology over the last 30 years is that more and
more aspects of society either should, or inevitably will, be governed by the
market. As a result, ideologies that don't subscribe to this this idea are
generally viewed as similar no matter how much they might otherwise be
unrelated. Which is kind of strange, since 'ideologies that don't subscribe to
this idea' amounts to most of the ideologies adopted over the course of human
history.

~~~
jernfrost
Exactly. Here in Norway e.g. the non-market oriented political ideologies
would be represented by at least 5 different parties: communists, socialists,
social-democrats, social-liberals, and liberal-Christians.

Although the social-liberals and liberal-Christians are not usually considered
pro market, although they don't seem to be the American sense of pro-market.
Like they are not actively pushing privatization as a major focus. Rather they
are more against state infringement on individual rights.

------
skywhopper
What I find interesting is that Tyler makes it all about his personal POV.
Everyone _he_ talks to in Washington is obsessed with hour-by-hour politics.
Everyone _he_ talks to in San Francisco and Seattle are obsessed with
blockchain. But only in other places he's apparently never actually visited,
he assumes, those people probably have "regular lives". The only thing this
post shows is how insulated Tyler's own life is from the vast majority of
Americans.

~~~
bryanlarsen
You can accuse Tyler Cowen of many things, but accusing him of not visiting
any particular place is probably going to back fire. He is quite well
travelled, especially to places that aren't generally travelled to.

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VLM
The server seems dead, can't handle the load.

I wonder if the author considered the collision of urban-philia being a
political distinction, and geographic boundaries are mostly a political or
geographic accident. So statistically the most diverse city will have 100%
non-diverse neighborhoods like any other city, but will have weirdly large
boundaries for legacy historical reasons such that the "diverse" city includes
distant rural farmland and suburbs whereas "non-diverse" city with identical
neighborhoods and demographics will have small city limits boundaries.

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kristopolous
How can this question be reasonably answered?

Maybe places with high numbers of academics and articulate people can be
measured but that's about it.

There's multiple dimensions when it comes to ideology and multiple approaches
to each dimension. There's even fundamentally different interpretations of the
categorical differences on how to subdivide the classifications of these
systems. And each of these facets have wide diversity at every nuanced level.

For instance, many San Francisco "lefties" are anarcho-capitalists who want to
do away with market oversight along with having drug legalization, amnesty for
all immigrants, gay rights, and unlimited gun rights for all. They want to
privatize all public services and call that process "progressivism".

Some of them call themselves libertarians, others "classical liberals" and yet
others will tell you long stories about how they aren't either of those...
It's really quite complicated and throwing them all in a "liberal" column with
people who believe entirely different things for entirely different reasons
(such as, for instance, those who believe "money"(another debated term) is a
fundamentally corrupting influence and the state needs to tame the market
through strict oversight), is pretty incorrect. In fact, some socialists I've
spoken with consider the entire libertarian project as a form of tyrannical
autocracy by the ruling class - so they view those lefties as actually far-
righties.

But let's pretend you can map all those out and ignore that perspective
matters. Do you need population size? Representation in governments? Places of
discussion?

I really can't see how to even approach this question.

~~~
nickik
> For instance, many San Francisco "lefties" are anarcho-capitalists

That seems a bit strange. I know quite a bit about anarcho-capitalism, but I
have never, never ever heard anybody claim they were 'left'. In fact generally
'leftism' is associated with socialism and the exact opposite of what AnCaps
want.

~~~
kristopolous
If you use a non-technical approximation of the term as the placeholder for
the true bearers of liberty and freedom, then sure.

As far as others considering them "lefties", to some people, a few checkboxes
put you in a generalized "leftist/liberal/fascist/democrat/communist"
category, which these people consider to all be the same thing. For instance:
pro-immigrant, gay rights, and weed-legalization would be the end of the
discussion for them. Their analysis is over and they don't care to discuss it
any further.

There's a lot of people like that. I meet them frequently.

------
briandear
Houston for sure. It’s close to a true melting pot. You have everything from
cowboys to Marxists, libertarians to La Raza activists. You have an old, tight
knit African American community mixed with limousine liberals, George H.W.
Bush style globalist conservatives along with large Latin American
communities, GLBT flag-wavers and evangelicals. There is even a small, but
extremely tight-knit Jewish community along with a large and welcoming Islamic
community. I could go on and on. Houston wins by far when it comes to
ideological diversity. The ciry itself does trend leftwards, however if you
add Harris Coubtry into the mix, it’s almost an even split with many people
straddling the left-right ideological divide (voting for liberal mayors but
conservative county commissioners.)

------
febeling
> The proper conclusion may be that intellectual bubbles are a useful means of
> moving forward.

Read the last sentence. Unless I misinterpret this grossly, the author is
making fun of demands for "ideological diversity", i.e. lack of
conservative/Republican mindshare, a la maybe Jonathan Haidt.

------
evrydayhustling
As long as we are defining this qualitatively, I nominate Charlottesville VA.
Yeah, it's much smaller, but the community feel means people are actually
interacting across ideaological lines, not just sharing municipal services.

~~~
LyndsySimon
Absolutely not. I moved from there in December, and it is the most hostile
place I've ever experienced. If you aren't an acceptable class of Progressive,
you're a "Nazi."

------
walshemj
To change an old joke we have all types of politics Democrat (centre right)
and republican ( originally centre right but now take over by far right
entryists).

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yellowapple
I'd imagine this would correlate with ethnic and/or economic diversity, which
makes it surprising that Sacramento (my hometown, and consistently in the top
15 of the variety of "most ethnically/economically diverse American cities"
lists, sometimes venturing into the top 5 or the #1 spot) seems to be absent
from the article.

------
nabla9
Cowen uses intellectual and ideological diversity interchangeably.

I would argue that intellectual and ideological bubbles are only partially
intersect and most of his readers are more interested in intellectual
diversity.

I also suspect that binary conservatives/liberals division is not bringing
enough diversity either ideologically or intellectually. The political
diversity is large cities with large universities with lots of students and
immigrants far outweighs the diversity in local politics. Smart Nepalese
student who is communist may cut trough the conservative/liberal axis in a
surprising way that is really new and interesting.

~~~
BaronSamedi
Good point. The Left/Right model of politics poorly reflects the complexity
and nuance of people's actual views. It is good for encouraging us-versus-them
conflict but terrible for real understanding.

------
superkuh
Well, it won't be any large or mega city. Statistically as they grow larger
they'll homogenize. It's far more likely to be some tiny hundreds of person,
barely incorporated place no one has heard of. In those the deviation won't be
smoothed out.

------
guelo
The question is complicated by the fact that a big part of the modern
Republican ideology is a hatred of cities and an anti intellectualism. Which,
by the way, is historically a very dangerous ideology and led to things like
the Khmer Rouge's genocide.

~~~
SlapHappy
You are aware that the Khmer Rouge was a leftist Marxist government, right?

Also, the “hatred” goes both ways.

~~~
guelo
I wasn't suggesting that the ideologies are identical, just that they share
those elements.

And no, the hatred does not go both ways, but you might think so because
another big part of modern Republican ideology is victimization and
resentment. Which are also powerful dangerous forces historically.

~~~
SlapHappy
_I wasn 't suggesting that the ideologies are identical, just that they share
those elements_

The way you worded your comment obviously made that implication - between
Republicans and the Khmer Rouge, when in fact the Khmer Rouge was a leftist,
communist, Marxist government, whose leaders were steeped in academic Marxist
"intellectualism" (they studied in Paris, no less).

Deciphering whether you intended it or not is not my motive, so I'll leave
that to the readers.

 _And no, the hatred does not go both ways,but you might think so_

I disagree, but I have no horse in this race - my personal politics are boring
centrist liberalism.

 _so because another big part of modern Republican ideology is victimization_

Is it opposite day or something?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersectionality](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersectionality)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identity_politics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identity_politics)

~~~
guelo
All that I'm saying is that Khmer Rouge hated cities and Republicans hate
cities. The reason it is dangerous is because it creates a hated "other"
(urban elites) that can ultimately lead to atrocities.

On victimization and resentment, it's basically the whole appeal of Trump. See
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/07/21/...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/07/21/white-
people-think-racism-is-getting-worse-against-white-
people/?utm_term=.86552602f574)

The whole point of the anti-urban elites propaganda is to make people feel
like they're victims of the hated others.

------
bradleyjg
Republicans and Democrats aren’t that far apart globally speaking. So probably
the answer is the same as what it would be without the word ideological—i.e.
NYC and specifically Queens.

------
jernfrost
As a foreigner I must say Americans are rather blinded in their thinking about
ideology from having a political system which doesn't allow for more than two
parties.

Yes sure legally speaking there can be more parties, but due to the winner-
takes all form of voting, there is no practical way for a third party to ever
enter politics.

The existence of the republican and democratic party in the US for such an
exceedingly long time has created a very ingrained sense of what politics and
ideology is in the US.

People naturally have a much wider spectrum of ideologies than those
represented by democrats and republicans. Yet there is no way to express that
at the voting booth. Hence whatever people vote wouldn't really reflect the
ideological divide.

Seen from my Norwegian perspective, if Norway was a city in the US, then
Hillary Clinton would likely have gotten 90% of the vote. However that doesn't
mean there is a lack of ideological diversity in Norway. There are 9 major
parties in Norway and several much smaller ones, representing quite a
diversity of opinion. The democratic party would have been quite an outlier
politically in Norway, yet Donald Trump and republicans are even more extreme
that people would naturally vote Hillary.

That a diverse set of people vote on some common lesser evil doesn't really
make them all that similar.

------
thedaniel
Well, I'd guess the most culturally diverse city (Los Angeles) is a likely
answer.

~~~
bryanlarsen
Toronto is far more culturally diverse than LA, and that's the city that
elected Rob Ford as mayor.

~~~
toasterlovin
How do you figure Toronto is more culturally diverse than LA? LA has large
communities of people from essentially every part of the world. Maybe they're
roughly on par?

~~~
bryanlarsen
Toronto is 50% immigrants, LA is 40% immigrants. LA's immigrants are 2/3rds
Latino, Toronto's immigrants are very broadly composed.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Toronto](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Toronto)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Los_Angeles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Los_Angeles)

~~~
gamblor956
LA is 40% immigrants because large immigrant populations are already
established in LA, whereas Toronto was basically white until a few decades
ago.

LA is roughly 48% Latino, 30% "white", 11% Asian, 10% Black, and 30% "other"
generally referring to smaller ethnic groups or to multi-ethnic individuals.
LA's minority population on an absolute basis is larger than the entire
population of the Toronto Metro Area. We have every type of Asian, European,
South and North American, African, and Pacific Islander there is. We have
ethnic populations in LA that are the only settled populations of those groups
outside of their home countries, such as Iranian Jews and Druze.

Toronto is 48% white, 9% Black, 1% Aboriginal, and the remainder is Asian. Not
diverse by US standards, unless you're comparing yourself to Cleveland or
Indianapolis, maybe.

~~~
bryanlarsen
"the only settled populations of those groups outside of their home countries,
such as Iranian Jews and Druze."

Rural Alberta has Druze communities, let alone Toronto.

"and the remainder is Asian"

Not true, a significant portion of the "other" category in Toronto is Arab and
African. Not to mention the fact that "Asian" itself is a highly diverse
category.

"Toronto was basically white until a few decades ago"

Exactly. Toronto's hugely diverse population is quite young, meaning it is
much less assimilated.

------
dajohnson89
>2\. Washington, D.C. and environs. The intellectual class in this city is
about half conservative/Republican/libertarian and always will be — just don’t
think too hard about who actually lives here!

Um....what? DC resident here. The only conservatives I see, anywhere, are
tourists from the South/Midwest. The "intellectual class" is not linearly
mapped to the Congress proportions. While conservative politicians (by the way
most politicians live in the suburbs, outside DC) have conservative staffers,
there's way more non-profits which are overwhelmingly liberal.

------
qntty
It's true that some cities are bubbles without conservatives, but you have to
keep in mind that America itself is a bubble without any real left wing to
speak of. If you care about getting the full range of ideology that exists in
most other western countries, you need to choose a city with a large
international population like NYC.

This just goes to show that the idea of 'diversity' is always a value
judgement about what the 'right' mix of people is.

------
coldtea
Well the "diverse" part is mostly choosing one or the other of the two
mainstream views.

------
scarmig
Kind of stupid without a definition of ideological diversity.

Cowen uses "ideological diversity" as a stand-in for Democratic/Republican
balance. Which is one kind of diversity, and you would likely find the most
balanced distribution of opinion on such questions as "is Mueller biased
against Trump?" and "is Paul Ryan's tax plan good?" in the cities mentioned.

But here's a couple other questions that are likely more balanced in e.g. San
Francisco than the cities mentioned: Are microstate monarchies the ideal form
of government? Did the Constitution establish white supremacy? Should Keystone
XL be blocked? Does trans ideology unnecessarily essentialize binary genders?
Should we establish a generous universal basic income? Will blockchains lead
to utopia on Earth? Should blockchain enthusiasts be sent to the gulag
already?

Cowen enjoys occasionally getting under his elite coastal readership's skin,
but this is pretty weak tea.

------
ghthor
I hypothesize NYC

~~~
busterarm
Sorry, the groupthink here is palpable.

------
blocked_again
I think Toronto.

------
lotsofpulp
What is the point diversity for the sake of diversity? What you want is a
community of people who can analyze data and have sufficient knowledge of
statistics to know how to distinguish valid information from garbage. There's
no point in being around anti vaccine people, or people who base their
arguments in assumptions (beliefs) from old stories.

~~~
reversecs
The point of diversity of opinion is that you have a challenge against the
ideas of yourself and of others. If everybody around you agrees with what you
say then you may never be thoughtful about your positions and can get away
with being wrong.

In academia a paper is written by a human who desperately wants to be right
and publish it (because they are self interested of course) and the peer
review process is there to challenge the methodology so that the truth can
emerge.

It's like if you had two sets of scientists who had opposing viewpoints but
could only use objective measure to justify their own side, when placed in
opposition to one another their biases will more likely produce a truth.

It's also important to note that being able to analyze data and have knowledge
of statistics is not enough. For a hypothetical example if you are a modern
American progressive you might have a set of opinions which you identify with
like a raised minimum wage, progressive tax, etc. You really want to be
consistent in your beliefs so you seek out data which CAN justify your
position. Like that minimum wage does not reduce employment or something. You
search for any evidence that justifies it naturally and maybe do some shallow
research on the opposition but deep down you know what side you are on. You
have used data and statistics to justify your positions, but that is not
enough to say whether you are actually right or not.

On the other hand, the anti vaxxer which try to figure out if they MUST reject
that vaccines cause autism and maybe they find one thing that says there is a
reason to doubt and that is sufficient.

In each case exposure to a formidable argument from the opposite side can
really challenge their opinion. (Not that minimum wage is as simple as
vaccines)

If you have hard evidence against something like anti vaxers then you can do
away with their argument scientifically, but if you characterize all
conservatives/liberals in that way, they you are lacking exposure to real,
formidable arguments against your own positions. Because there are certain
issues where both sides have objective measure which justify their own side.

~~~
lotsofpulp
If someone is searching for data to support their bias, then they are not
qualified to to analyze data and do not have sufficient knowledge of
statistics. It's important to know what you're not able to discern from the
information you have.

The labels "conservative/liberal" don't mean much to me either. I find that
many people are motivates by economics, or supporting their own tribes/ego.
Many of these "opinions" come from organizations funded by wealthy people who
benefit from the voters having those opinions, and I don't see any point in
ascribing them any value.

At least in academia, there is a process that can result in valid results
about our world, such as climate change. But there is no reason to consider
Jenny Mccarthy's opinion on vaccines, or some oil magnate in Texas's opinion
about climate change.

~~~
reversecs
Yea then nobody is qualified to analyze the data.

And there is reason to consider opposing opinions on vaccines, and then after
the best evidence from both sides are provided a real conclusion can be made
(it has already been made) and then it's no longer worth considering unless
new evidence arises.

------
Eurongreyjoy
> Washington DC: The intellectual class in this city is about half
> conservative/Republican/libertarian and always will be.

While I think the 50 percent figure is high, people tend to only think of DC
as a liberal city.

Of course it primarily is, but there is a large population of well-educated
conservatives and libertarians living here.

Most of my social circle leans left, but it was always good living in DC to
hear different perspectives, rather than shouting into an echo-chamber.

Also an extremely diverse population (51% Black) along with on-going
gentrification leads to DC being one of the more intellectually stimulating
cities to live in.

~~~
briandear
51% black doesn’t make it “extremely diverse.” That makes it “majority black.”
Hispanics are only 4% of the population, Asians less than 3%. Whites are
roughly 43%

I am not sure how diverse that is and certainly questionable to call that
“extremely diverse.”

~~~
lotsofpulp
In my experience, socioeconomic diversity results in different points of view
than the color of someone's skin. Many problems people face are economic or
financial, so I would expect people that have grown up in similar financial
environments to have similar political concerns.

------
whataretensors
"Mexicans fit along a political spectrum of their own."

Tell me more about this mexican political spectrum. I'm only half can I join?
Btw what do we believe in?

~~~
reversecs
Americans have a political spectrum, like a range of beliefs that the
conservatives have to the liberals. Probably most countries have different
political spectrums, Europe in general has done away with gun rights debates
and so their political spectrum is different than those in the u.s.

It's definitely not a race thing, it's a nationality. It's just a fact that
every nation has their own type of polarization, aka spectrum.

~~~
LyndsySimon
> Europe in general has done away with gun rights debates

One side has won, but it's hardly been "done away with". Even in the UK there
is support for relaxing gun control. There are some countries in Europe with
fairly strong laws protecting gun ownership as well, like the Czech Republic.

