ABSTRACT
Economist Edward Glaeser's social philosophy of cities and the promise of urban life is rooted in the evidence and methodologies of economics. In the world's poorer places, cities are expanding enormously because urban density provides the clearest path from poverty to prosperity. Urban poverty should be judged relative to rural poverty. The income gap between urban and rural areas is just as large in other rich countries, and even stronger in poorer nations. Cities thrive when they have many small firms and skilled citizens. The job of urban government is to care for the city's citizens. During the middle years of the twentieth century, many cities, like New York, declined as improvements in transportation reduced the advantages of locating factories in dense urban areas. Transportation technologies have always determined urban form. Today successful cities, old or young, attract smart entrepreneurial people, in part, by being urban theme parks.
