A report based on newly released Census figures suggests that Midwestern metro regions such as Cincinnati and Detroit were the big winners of the roaring 1990s.

        Even though tech cities and Sunbelt states in the West and South garnered attention for explosive growth, Midwestern cities enjoyed the most balanced economic gains, John Logan, director of the Mumford Center at the State University of New York at Albany, said Tuesday.

PROSPEROUS PLACE

Here's how some of the 50 largest metro areas ranked in prosperity in 2000, according to a new study of 2000 Census data by the State University of New York at Albany's Lewis Mumford Center for Comparative Urban and Regional Research. Some of the areas, such as Cincinnati, include parts of more than one state. The areas' rank in 1990 is listed in parenthesis.    1. San Jose, Calif. (3)    2. Nassau and Suffolk counties,  New York (1)    3. Washington, D.C. (2)    4. San Francisco (6)    5. Minneapolis/St. Paul (10)    22. Columbus (25)    23. Indianapolis (23)    28. Cincinnati (29)    33. Cleveland (35)    46. Los Angeles (43)    47. New Orleans (50)    48. New York, including  Westchester and other northern  New York counties (48)    49. Riverside/San Bernadino, Calif.  (45)    50. Miami (48)

        The Midwest had the greatest jumps in median and per capita income and biggest drop in poverty. And even though tech cities such as San Jose, Calif.; Seattle; and Boston ranked high in the survey, all experienced rising poverty in the 1990s.

        “Income was really skyrocketing while people toward the bottom were untouched by that prosperity,” Mr. Logan said of San Jose and Seattle.

        “The high-tech prosperity may not be as good as the sort of growth that occurs in the Midwest.”

        The report was based on a “prosperity index” developed by Mumford researchers scoring the nation's 50 largest metro regions in eight categories including income, poverty, education, unemployment and housing.

        The study ranked Greater Cincinnati as the 28th most-prosperous metro area in the nation, up from No. 29 in 1990.

        The study showed that the 13-county region's median household income was $43,561, a 10.5 percent increase over 1990 when adjusted for inflation. The region's poverty rate dropped 1.9 percentage points to 9.7 percent.

        Those figures made Greater Cincinnati one of the top 16 performers during the 1990s for income growth and whittling poverty.

        The survey ranked Silicon Valley's San Jose as the nation's wealthiest region, with a median household income of $74,335; Miami was last out of 50 metro areas with a median household income of $35,966.

        Ohio's strong gains belied earlier predictions of more modest income growth. The Buckeye State's median household income jumped 9.9 percent to $40,956. Kentucky's wage increases were even greater, up 15.1 percent to $33,672.

        Ohio creates fewer but more lucrative jobs than fast-growing areas such as Phoenix or Atlanta.

        The state's jobs “aren't in the sexy high-growth sectors,” said Edward Malecki, director of Ohio State University's Center for Urban and Regional Analysis.

        “The jobs that are skill-based, you can't send those offshore very easily,” Mr. Malecki said. “Those are what Ohio needs to keep more of.”

        Mr. Logan cautioned that the figures don't account for the economic recession and dot-com meltdown that hit tech cities hard.

        Other Census figures show that U.S. women earned 73 cents for every dollar men were paid in 1999, though the gap narrowed during the 1990s, according to Census figures released Tuesday. Women gained roughly 7 cents on the dollar over the 10-year period, according to the Census.

        The figure does not necessarily mean that women are being paid less than men for doing the same job. Instead, the Census looked at earnings in 1999 for full-time workers in all industries and found that the national median income for men was $35,922 and $26,292 for women.

        Experts said the main reasons for the wage gap are that women often take time off to have children and lose experience and pay because of it; that women often choose lower-paying professions, such as teaching and social work; and that women are discriminated against when it comes to promotions and raises.

        The Associated Press contributed to this story.
       

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