Commercial Sub-markets in Suburban Cuyahoga County,Ohio

Abstract

In this study, auditor appraisal real property tax data are aggregated and used to identify high and low intensities of commercial activities in census tracts. Then, the tracts are cross-classified by standard occupation classification (SOCs) categories. A discriminant analysis is performed to test whether differences actually exist in tract intensities based on the SOCs. The discriminant function correctly classified 80.0 per cent of the low- and 68.2 per cent of the high-intensity cases. An analysis of SOC percentage distributions in Cleveland, the suburban commercial sub-markets and the balance of the county reveals that jobs are more highly concentrated in the county than in the city. An index of specialisation shows that sub-markets are highly specialised in 10 of 21 SOCs, while an index of entropy shows that the sub-markets are relatively identical in occupational structure. Lastly, a multivariate analysis of variance is performed comparing the sub-markets, firm and housing characteristics, and the SOC categories. The sub-markets are largely undifferentiated on the basis of firm characteristics, but the E/R ratios, the number of housing units and the total square footage of housing space indicate that the sub-markets are somewhat different in housing characteristics. Nonetheless, all of the sub-markets have job-housing imbalances. Continuing decentralisation of population and jobs ensures that speculators and developers will expand and infill suburban sub-market clusters to the detriment of Cleveland's CBD and the chagrin of its political leaders.