Over the past decade, New York has managed to usurp Los Angeles’s claim as the most ethnically diverse big city in the country. Census figures show that while L.A. took the top ranking in 2000, New York is now more the most diverse of all metro areas with a population higher than 500,000. A Brookings Institutions study released yesterday found that the trend toward urban diversification is nationwide, with more than 50 percent of U.S. cities now composed of nonwhite majorities. Uh-oh, white people, 2050 might come sooner than you think!
In New York City, Bloomberg reports that that change is perhaps best exemplified by a single Census tract in Brooklyn that covers a section of Dyker Heights in southwest Brooklyn. The longtime Italian-American enclave had one of the biggest increases in diversity thanks to an uptick of Asian residents. But Nick Venezia, manager of Ben Bay Realty Co., says locals were too preoccupied to recognize the shifting demographics.
Brooklyn Enclave Helps New York Top L.A. as Diversity Capital [Bloomberg]
