DOMESTIC
VANDERBILT POLITICAL REVIEW
Millenials and Music City
College graduates are determining the future of urban spaces
R
egardless of whether you are
hopeful or dubious about where
you will end up after graduation,
chances are that you will be more adventurous as you choose your area of relocation than graduates fifteen years ago.
More than ever before, recent graduates
in the United States are seeking to spend
the next stage of their life in a city. According to a City Observatory report, the
rate of young college graduates living in
major cities today has increased by 25%
since 2000. However, not just any city is
the apple of our eye. While the great tourist attractions of New York City, Boston,
and Los Angeles have remained steadily
occupied by the “young and restless,” it
is cities like Austin, Denver, Minneapolis, San Francisco and Nashville that have
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by SYLVIA PRECHT-RODRIGUEZ ‘15
experienced the greatest surge in the new,
potential work pool. Denver, in particular,
has seen its population of 25-34 aged educated persons with four year degrees double since the turn of the century. The less
traditional cities for the young, such as
Denver and our very own Nashville, are
metamorphosizing and experiencing flourishing municipal, economic development.
Bill Purcell, who served as the city’s
mayor from 1999-2007, comments in an
interview, “In modern America, this is
the moment in time when Nashville has
most dramatically moved to the