This statistic shows the top 25 cities in the United States with the highest resident population as of July 1, 2022. There were about 8.34 million people living in New York City as of July 2022.

A dataset listing Georgia cities by population for 2024.

A dataset listing New Mexico cities by population for 2024.

A dataset listing Indiana cities by population for 2024.

A dataset listing Maine cities by population for 2024.

In 2023, the metropolitan area of New York-Newark-Jersey City had the biggest population in the United States. Based on annual estimates from the census, the metropolitan area had around 19.5 million inhabitants, which was a slight decrease from the previous year. The Los Angeles and Chicago metro areas rounded out the top three. What is a metropolitan statistical area? In general, a metropolitan statistical area (MSA) is a core urbanized area with a population of at least 50,000 inhabitants – the smallest MSA is Carson City, with an estimated population of nearly 56,000. The urban area is made bigger by adjacent communities that are socially and economically linked to the center. MSAs are particularly helpful in tracking demographic change over time in large communities and allow officials to see where the largest pockets of inhabitants are in the country. How many MSAs are in the United States? There were 421 metropolitan statistical areas across the U.S. as of July 2021. The largest city in each MSA is designated the principal city and will be the first name in the title. An additional two cities can be added to the title, and these will be listed in population order based on the most recent census. So, in the example of New York-Newark-Jersey City, New York has the highest population, while Jersey City has the lowest. The U.S. Census Bureau conducts an official population count every ten years, and the new count is expected to be announced by the end of 2030.

A dataset listing Colorado cities by population for 2024.

A dataset listing Iowa cities by population for 2024.

Motivation

In the United States, city governments provide many services: they run public school districts, administer certain welfare and health programs, build roads and manage airports, provide police and fire protection, inspect buildings, and often run water and utility systems. Cities also get revenues through certain local taxes, various fees and permit costs, sale of property, and through the fees they charge for the utilities they run.

It would be interesting to compare all these expenses and revenues across cities and over time, but also quite difficult. Cities share many of these service responsibilities with other government agencies: in one particular city, some roads may be maintained by the state government, some law enforcement provided by the county sheriff, some schools run by independent school districts with their own tax revenue, and some utilities run by special independent utility districts. These governmental structures vary greatly by state and by individual city. It would be hard to make a fair comparison without taking into account all these differences.

This dataset takes into account all those differences. The Lincoln Institute of Land Policy produces what they call “Fiscally Standardized Cities” (FiSCs), aggregating all services provided to city residents regardless of how they may be divided up by different government agencies and jurisdictions. Using this, we can study city expenses and revenues, and how the proportions of different costs vary over time.

Data

The dataset tracks over 200 American cities between 1977 and 2020. Each row represents one city for one year. Revenue and expenditures are broken down into more than 120 categories.

Values are available for FiSCs and also for the entities that make it up: the city, the county, independent school districts, and any special districts, such as utility districts. There are hence five versions of each variable, with suffixes indicating the entity. For example, taxes gives the FiSC’s tax revenue, while taxes_city, taxes_cnty, taxes_schl, and taxes_spec break it down for the city, county, school districts, and special districts.

The values are organized hierarchically. For example, taxes is the sum of tax_property (property taxes), tax_sales_general (sales taxes), tax_income (income tax), and tax_other (other taxes). And tax_income is itself the sum of tax_income_indiv (individual income tax) and tax_income_corp (corporate income tax) subcategories.

Variable Description

• year Year for these values
• city_name Name of the city, such as “AK: Anchorage”, where “AK” is the standard two-letter abbreviation for Alaska
• city_population Estimated city population, based on Census data
• county_name Name of the county the city is in
• county_population Estimated county population, based on Census data
• cpi Consumer Price Index for this year, scaled so that 2020 is 1.
• relationship_city_school Type of school district. 1: City-wide independent school district that serves the entire city. 2: County-wide independent school district that serves the entire county. 3: One or more independent school districts whose boundaries extend beyond the city. 4: School district run by or dependent on the city. 5: School district run by or dependent on the county.
• enrollment Estimated number of public school students living in the city.
• districts_in_city Estimated number of school districts in the city.
• consolidated_govt Whether the city has a consolidated city-county government (1 = yes, 0 = no). For example, Philadelphia’s city and county government are the same entity; they are not separate governments.
• id2_city 12-digit city identifier, from the Annual Survey of State and Local Government Finances
• id2_county 12-digit county identifier
• city_types Two types: core and legacy. There are 150 core cities, “including the two largest cities in each state, plus all cities with populations of 150,000+ in 1980 and 200,000+ in 2010”. Legacy cities include “95 cities with population declines of at least 20 percent from their peak, poverty rates exceeding the national average, and a peak population of at least 50,000”. Some cities are both (denoted “core

The revenue and expenses variables are described in this detailed table. Further documentation is available on the FiSC Database website, linked in References below.

All monetary data is already adjusted for inflation, and is given in terms of 2020 US dollars per capita. The Consumer Price Index is provided for each year if you prefer to use numbers not adjusted for inflation, scaled so that 2020 is 1; simply divide each value by the CPI to get the value in that year’s nominal dollars. The total population is also provided if you want total values instead of per-capita values.

Questions

• Do some exploratory data analysis. Are there any outlying cities? Any interesting trends and rela...

Of the most populous cities in the U.S., San Jose, California had the highest annual income requirement at ******* U.S. dollars annually for homeowners to have an affordable and comfortable life in 2024. This can be compared to Houston, Texas, where homeowners needed an annual income of ****** U.S. dollars in 2024.

A dataset listing Wisconsin cities by population for 2024.

A dataset listing New York cities by population for 2024.

A dataset listing Washington cities by population for 2024.

A dataset listing Louisiana cities by population for 2024.

This statistic shows the 25 largest counties in the United States in 2022, by population. In 2022, about 9.72 million people were estimated to be living in Los Angeles County, California.

Additional information on urbanization in the United States

Urbanization is defined as the process by which cities grow or by which societies become more urban. Rural to urban migration in the United States, and around the world, is often undertaken in the search for employment or to enjoy greater access to services such as healthcare. The largest cities in the United States are steadily growing. Given their size, incremental increases yield considerable numerical gains as seen by New York increasing by 69,777 people in 2011, the most of any city. However in terms of percentage growth, smaller cities outside the main centers are growing the fastest, such as Georgetown city and Leander city in Texas.

Urbanization has increased slowly in the United States, rising from 80.77 percent of the population living in urban areas in 2010 to 82.66 percent in 2020. In 2018, the United States ranked 14th in a ranking of countries based on their degree of urbanization. Unlike fully urbanized countries such as Singapore and Hong Kong, the United States maintains a sizeable agricultural industry. Although technological developments have reduced demands for rural labor, labor in the industry and supporting services are still required.

A dataset listing Oregon cities by population for 2024.

A dataset listing Mississippi cities by population for 2024.

In 2025, approximately 23 million people lived in the São Paulo metropolitan area, making it the biggest in Latin America and the Caribbean and the sixth most populated in the world. The homonymous state of São Paulo was also the most populous federal entity in the country. The second place for the region was Mexico City with 22.75 million inhabitants. Brazil's cities Brazil is home to two large metropolises, only counting the population within the city limits, São Paulo had approximately 11.45 million inhabitants, and Rio de Janeiro around 6.21 million inhabitants. It also contains a number of smaller, but well known cities such as Brasília, Salvador, Belo Horizonte and many others, which report between 2 and 3 million inhabitants each. As a result, the country's population is primarily urban, with nearly 88 percent of inhabitants living in cities. Mexico City Mexico City's metropolitan area ranks sevenths in the ranking of most populated cities in the world. Founded over the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan in 1521 after the Spanish conquest as the capital of the Viceroyalty of New Spain, the city still stands as one of the most important in Latin America. Nevertheless, the preeminent economic, political, and cultural position of Mexico City has not prevented the metropolis from suffering the problems affecting the rest of the country, namely, inequality and violence. Only in 2023, the city registered a crime incidence of 52,723 reported cases for every 100,000 inhabitants and around 24 percent of the population lived under the poverty line.

A dataset listing Montana cities by population for 2024.

A dataset listing West Virginia cities by population for 2024.