Rank-size distribution

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Rank-size distribution or the rank-size rule or law describes the remarkable regularity in the distribution of city sizes around the world. This phenomon is governed by Zipf's Law. If one ranks the size of each in a given country or in the world and calculates the natural logarithm of the rank and of the city size (measured in terms of the number of people), the resulting graph will show a remarkable log-linear pattern. This is the Rank-Size Distribution.^[1]

The resulting distribution of city sizes in a country, region or the world will be characterized by a largest city, the primate city, with cities decreasing in size respective to it, initially at a rapid rate and then more slowly. This results in a few large cities, and a much larger number of cities orders of magnitude smaller.

A 2002 study found that, Zipf’s Law worked for 44 of 73 countries tested.^[2] The study also found that variations of the Pareto exponent are better explained by political variables than by economic geography variables like proxies for economies of scale or transportation costs.^[3]

[edit] References

1. ^ Zipf's Law, or the Rank-Size Distribution Steven Brakman, Harry Garretsen, and Charles van Marrewijk
2. ^ Kwok Tong Soo (2002)
3. ^ Zipf's Law, or the Rank-Size Distribution

[edit] See also

• Pareto distribution
• Pareto principle
• The Long Tail