The objective in this presentation is to compare Honolulu with large cities on the US mainland, to get notion of how the city fits into the scheme of things. The source of the data for these comparisons is the Statistical Abstract of the United States 1998.
Honolulu ranked 11th in population among US cities in 1994. That puts us well behind NYC, LA, Chicago, and Houston, but just behind Detroit and just ahead of San Jose in rank.
We can use census data to compare ethnic diversity of the populations. Consider the excerpts below from Table No. 48 in US Statistical Abstract, which lists some figures for the 219 US cites with populations greater than 100,000. The excerpted cities have a range of populations nor the land areas around our own. The census bureau commonly has used four categories for crudely characterizing populations. White, Black, American Indian/Eskimo/Aleut, and Aisan/Pacific Islander; together the four should sum to 100%. In the excerpt, we stand out as being among the cities with low percentages of African Americans, and even more so in the Asian and Pacific Islander column. It looks like Honolulu is unique among these cities.
| City | 1990Pop | 1996Pop | Area(sqMi) | %Black | %AmInd_Esk_Aleut | %AsPacIsl | %Hisp | |
| Honolulu,HI | 377000 | 423000 | 85.7 | 1.3 | 0.3 | 70.5 | 4.6 | |
| Houston,TX | 1638000 | 1744000 | 539.9 | 28.1 | 0.3 | 4.1 | 27.6 | |
| Las_Vegas,NV | 258000 | 377000 | 83.3 | 11.4 | 0.9 | 3.6 | 12.5 | |
| Little_Rock,AR | 176000 | 176000 | 102.9 | 34.0 | 0.3 | 0.9 | 0.8 | |
| Pittsburgh,PA | 370000 | 350000 | 55.6 | 25.8 | 0.2 | 1.6 | 0.9 | |
| Boston,MA | 574000 | 558000 | 48.4 | 25.6 | 0.3 | 5.3 | 10.8 | |
| Detroit,MI | 1028000 | 1000000 | 138.7 | 75.7 | 0.4 | 0.8 | 2.8 | |
| Eugene,OR | 113000 | 124000 | 38.0 | 1.3 | 0.9 | 3.5 | 2.7 | |
| Fresno,CA | 354000 | 396000 | 99.1 | 8.3 | 1.1 | 12.5 | 29.9 | |
| NYC,NY | 7323000 | 7381000 | 308.9 | 28.7 | 0.4 | 7.0 | 24.4 | |
| Scottsdale,AZ | 130000 | 179000 | 184.4 | 0.8 | 0.6 | 1.2 | 4.8 | |
| Seattle,WA | 516000 | 525000 | 83.9 | 10.1 | 1.4 | 11.8 | 3.6 |
Honolulu, in 1995, had about 10,000 government employees. That may seem like a lot, but it ranks 24th in absolute size of city governemnt and 53rd in size per 10,000 population. Our 112 employees per 10,000 population is lower than top ranked NYC's 545, San Francisco's 341, or Baltimore's 381. It is about the same as Fort Worth, TX, Charlotte, NC, Oklahoma City, OK and Tulsa, OK.
The average full time employee in Honolulu earned $3,083 per month in October 1995. In NYC that was $3,454, in San Jose CA $4,700 (highest), and in Anchorage $4,683. On the other hand, Atlanta GA, Baton Rouge LA, and Akron OH are all around $2,500. The lowest was $2,159 in Lexington, KY.
Table 524 reports figures for city finance for 1995, which was an economically lagging year in Honolulu, but a booming year on the mainland. City revenues for 1995 were about $1,114,000,000 (21st ranked) or about $2,189 (22nd) per capita. Our per capita taxes of about $605 ranked 13th, well below NYC at $2,413 and Washington DC at $4,397, almost tied with Detroit's $609, and yes, higher than the $261 in Austin, TX. In terms of expenditure per capita, Honolulu ranks 17th ($1,177), well behind Washington DC ($8,086) or NYC ($5,241), and more like LA's $1,252 or Milwaukee's $1,168. When we look at outstanding city debt per capita, Honolulu ranks 21st with only $1,819. This about ties us with Baltimore, MD, and leaves us well behind NYC's $5,834 or Washington DC's $7,297 per capita outstanding debt.
The picture that this seems to paint is one of fairly conservative fiscal policies.
Table 338, using 1996 data, indicates that our "total crime index" of 6,840 per 100,000 population ranks about 51st among the 76 largest cities in the US. That is lower than Atlanta, GA's 17,070, St. Louis MO's 15,128, Tampa FL's 14,549. But it is higher than New York City's 5,212, Los Vegas' 4,129, and Santa Ana, CA's 4,479.
When you break it out by kinds of crime, Honolulu ranks 76th in "total violent crime" (313 per 100,000) and also for "murder" (3.1 per 100,000). Washington, DC has 73.1 murders per 100,000, and NYC has 13.4. We make up for it with a rank of about 35th in "total property crime".
Statistical Abstract of the United States 1998.
(Tables 338, 414, 415, 416, 417, 418, 419, 420, 421, 520, 524,
and 536 are included in the class reader)