Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Richest cities in the world


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.  

The result was 'No consensus, defaults to Keep. Note that the article has been moved to the (better) title List of cities by Per Capita economic output (PPP). NawlinWiki 03:47, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Richest cities in the world

 * – (View AfD) (View log)

Unsourced, incomprehensible list. By what bizarre measure is Mexico City richer than Boston? Clarityfiend 00:07, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * By comparing Purchasing Power Parity. I agree it's bizarre, but it is a standard economic measure.  I believe the phrase per capita in the article is in error -- the raw numbers are obviously not per capita, and the ranking is not per capita. Capmango 03:49, 3 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Delete - unsourced, and inherently POV without sourcing. With sourcing, it still depends on criteria, and there's no way to get an objective list. MSJapan 00:38, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete - unsourced. I believe the list purports to show cities ranked by their economic output (how the hell that's done is another thing given that no governmental multinational agency produces such statistics); fo it to be "richest" the article should, at least normalize this number by the number of inhabitants. Bigdaddy1981 00:40, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep and rewrite text Its completely sourced. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 01:15, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Merge into larger item city; this is a fine list and would contribute to a larger entry --Drtillberg 01:28, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep not sure what folks are complaining about; this is the sort of information you look to an encyclopedia for. Personally, I'm not a big fan of Purchasing Power Parity, but it is as objective as any other means of comparing GDP in two different places. Capmango 02:10, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment. You should have seen what it looked like before Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) improved it. Still doesn't explain what "GDP in $US BN" is, though. Clarityfiend 03:17, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment gross domestic product in billions of US dollars. I'm not sure how one purports measure the GDP on a city given that GDP explicitly is a measure of a nation's output. Bigdaddy1981 03:47, 3 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep per Capmango. Probably needs a better title, e.g. List of cities by per-capita economic output (PPP). Also, why doesn't the table show the actual per-capita GDP? cab 02:40, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment Its not per capita. Dividing the number for a specific city by that city's population would give you that statistic Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) cleaned it up but has added an error in purporting that these statistics are per capita. Bigdaddy1981 03:47, 3 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep, so the problem of this article is the writing and lack of sources for the statistics or the title. "Richest" make it a little bit original research.  A  W  04:05, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep there seem to be objective sources, but the title does not make that clear. DGG 04:42, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete along with : Richest cities by 2020, both has no references of the statistic studies. Ammar  (Talk - Don't Talk) 07:35, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep - Seems reasonable, we have articles on countries by GDP, what is wrong with cities? I know something else exists isn't a reason, but in this case I think this is something people are interested in. Anyway cities are fast becoming the new countries anyway with their own laws and the like so information like this is actually interesting and encyclopaedic. Ben W Bell   talk  07:56, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment: according to countries GDP you can not compute cities wealth, not every country takes care of their cities statistics. would you like to read fake information ? Ammar  (Talk - Don't Talk) 16:38, 3 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Delete A list that, absent a specific, credible source can make no claims to encyclopedic verifiability or accuracy. Ad that is the issue. As it is, the list is a reprint of the PWC report, which itself is fairly arbitrary, and so this amounts to a reprint of someone else's OR, which risks CV issues among other things. If this is exapnded beyond the PWC report, then it becomes a hopeless muddle of competing metrics and statistics and descends into a morass of unverifiability. That's not on. If you want to find out who PWC thinks are the richest cities in the world, go to them directly. For an article on Wikipedia, we need multiple, independent sources that can be verified. That is not the case here. Eusebeus 08:33, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - Eusebeus is right, this is merely a presentation of PWC's workproduct. There exist in no country that I know of's national statistics any calculation of something that purports to be the "gdp" of a city. Moreover, if you wish to go to the link you will find that the reports suthors admit that the population data they use is not comparable between cities. This is terrible research and will only harm the wikipedia. Bigdaddy1981 17:04, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * whoa now, it may be a copyright violation to simply reprint the list (however, lists of facts are usually not copyrightable) but it is definitely not original research. Original research refers to research conducted by Wikipedia editors, not to reports issued by one of the largest companies in the world. &mdash; brighterorange  (talk) 18:21, 3 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep This is a rather well-defined list of the GDP equivalent of cities around the world. GDP per capita is calculated on a purchasing power parity basis, which adjusts the actual GDP per capita based on the costs of living in that country or city. The PPP-adjusted per capita value is multiplied by the population to come up with a total number. This list comes from a rather credible and verifiable source. This list does not show PPP-adjusted income per capita; its shows each city's GDP adjusted on a PPP basis. Alansohn 16:09, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Question - is reprinting the Pricewaterhouse list like that kosher? I'm not a copyright lawyer so I'm not sure if it counts as a copyvio as stands, but it does seem to be substantially a copy-paste of the list.  Otherwise, keep per the arguments given above.  Ark yan  &#149; (talk) 17:32, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * In addition to the fact that it is properly attributed to the source, a list of facts and information is generally not copyrightable. Alansohn 17:44, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Question - this list isnt just a presentation of publically available data (as would a list of officially published GDP or population be), it is instead a presentation of the outcome of a research project conducted by PWC. I plead ignorance as to whether this makes a difference or not - just thought it worth mentioning. Bigdaddy1981 20:16, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * We can use information from any reliable source, and this would seem to be one. There doesn't seem to be any reason not to use the data simply because the raw data used to calculate the numbers are not available. I would have preferred to see additional data for unadjusted GDP, GDP per capita on a PPP basis and population, but their absence doesn't seem to undermine the end result. No Wikipedian gathered and calculated the data, so it's not original research on our part. These results wouldn't seem to be any different from the results of any other economic, statistical or medical research done by any other reliable source. Alansohn 20:24, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Question - I agree its not OR, I was just wondering if there are any copyright issues with using workproduct from a private firm that may or may not have rleased it under free license. Bigdaddy1981 22:22, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Sounds good to me then.  Ark yan  &#149; (talk) 18:00, 3 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep because we have List of cities by population - economic standing is no less important than population. Shalom Hello 17:48, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree, but I doubt the accuracy of these "GDP" data. Bigdaddy1981 18:39, 3 July 2007 (UTC)


 * keep and cleanup We probably don't need the whole list, and it could use some breadth (including different metrics) or renaming, but this is sourced and encyclpedic. &mdash; brighterorange  (talk) 18:21, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete as per above comment from Eusebeus. The information itself is as worthy as other, similar lists that have been mentioned, but that's neither here nor there. The greater issue is one of copyright: at best this is a derivative work of information whose copyright is owned by PricewaterhouseCoopers. Unless they have released it under an acceptable free license, or into the Public Domain, the article should be deleted ASAP. There's a good reason why the Foundation and the community are very concerned about copyright issues: one high profile infringement suit could potentially close down the entire site. -- Hux 19:50, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Weak Keepif it can be tied to the report in question. PwC is one of the most respected companies in the world---and a research report by them would have instant credibility in this regard.  I do, however, have to vote to delete the 2020 because that one is still speculation.Balloonman 00:56, 4 July 2007 (UTC) Changing to Delete Eusebeus is correct in his reasoning belowBalloonman 05:16, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete This list only applies to one point in time, and it has nothing to do with wealth, it is about size of the economy so at the very least it needs to be renamed. But that just brings us to the issue of the inconsistency of city boundaries. Osomec 13:37, 4 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment It seems odd to me that so many editors are voting to keep this article despite the clear problems that have been noted. This is a straight reprint of this commissioned study, so copyright issues certainly apply. More importantly, however, the study uses a set of specific metrics to allow for a city-by-city comparison, such as using PPP (as oppose to e.g. trade-weighted terms), defining cities by their "surrounding urban area", etc... That's all fine, but how then can this list expand to reflect multiple, independent sources? As soon as information is introduced from another source, the comparison becomes worthless: the integrity of a single analytical method is necessary for the information to make sense. Another study could base findings on a separate set of metrics, making a data merge impossible. What we end up with is an article that should be called the PricewaterhouseCoopers Richest cities in the world, like the List_of_most_expensive_cities, which should be called Mercer Human Resource Consulting List_of_most_expensive_cities. Is Wikipedia really supposed to be a repository for single-sourced studies? That last example is informative, btw. The Economist publishes its own version of the most expensive cities in the world. Because it uses a different set of parameters, however, the information it derives cannot be included. Surely this is textbook WP:NOT. Eusebeus 07:31, 5 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Reply: Wikipedia has thousands of articles that come from a single source. List of most three-point field goals made in National Basketball Association history comes straight from the National Basketball Association; Highest-income places in the United States comes straight from the United States Census Bureau, to name just a few in addition to your examples, and none of them list the source in the title. Morgan Quitno publishes lists of the most dangerous and safest cities in the United States which are widely referenced, despite the single source. Clear consensus on Wikipedia is that such lists from a single reliable source are reliable in themselves and based on these precedents Wikipedia is an abundant repository for such lists. To add a second or third source to this article, just add a second or third column of values, in addition to the PwC calculations, adding an explanation for each set of metrics and allowing readers to sort on their metric of choice. Calling the task a no-brainer exaggerates the difficulty of the effort to merge a second, alternative source. Lists of facts cannot be copyrighted, and you yourself have provided examples of Wikipedia articles that use such sources with full acceptance by the Wikipedia community. A rather clear precedent exists to keep this article as is. Alansohn 11:53, 5 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, those points are well-made and well-taken. I am unsure I agree with your initial logic. Unlike the examples you cite above, the PWC study is their own original research and relies on the parameters that their research department has selected (presumably not the case with 3-point FGs or even urban pci stats from the USCB). The use of additional columns as a means for overcoming the single-source problem of the data as presented now is a more judicious point. A list of facts may not be copyrighted, but this is the product of their research department. I think you will find that many such "lists" remain, in fact, under copyright of the Group that produced them (The EIU, for example, makes it data available, but does not release them into public domain). That may not be the case here, but specific evidence to that effect would be salutary. Eusebeus
 * Weak keep pending a serious copyedit and rename to Richest cities in the world in 2005 - the lead explains nothing and fails WP:JARGON, but that's not a reason to delete per se. More serious is the issue with WP:ATT: the single source is "The 150 richest cities in the world by GDP in 2005", but the article uses "List of the 100th Richest Cities in the World from 2006". Either the section header is wrong, or there is some OR going on here. EyeSereneTALK 12:00, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

I think this is a good reasonable article, it shows the wealth of cities which can be very important. we have countries by gdp and gdp per capita, what the hell is wrong with cities, also the title of this article has changed into a more significant title. i say keep this article, and it is sourced. well done to the user of this article.20:14, 8 July 2007 (UTC) Eusebeus
 * Comment, I note that the above comment, which purports to be from Eusebeus was apparently added by anon. isp: 86.143.187.31. Bigdaddy1981 04:00, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.