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This paper examines taxable sales in the Los Angeles and Miami metropolitan areas to find evidence of the short- and long-run effects of the Rodney King riots and Hurricane Andrew on their respective economies. The comparison of these two events shows that the King riots had a long-term negative effect on Los Angeles' economy while Hurricane Andrew had a short-term positive effect on the Miami economy. The paper also applies the contrasting experiences of Los Angeles and Miami to New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina. In some ways, Katrina is a hybrid of these two events since it combines elements of both a natural disaster and a social disaster. The paper examines how Katrina is similar to each of the previous incidents and how these similarities might affect the recovery of New Orleans following the storm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

New York, Los Angeles, and Miami are primate immigrant centers within the U.S. metropolitan system, attracting new immigrant arrivals as well as serving as focal points for internal migrants. Using the segmented assimilation framework as a foundation, this paper emphasizes the role of geography and migration within the assimilation process. Focusing upon selected origin groups, migrant selectivity and the determinants of migration are evaluated and compared, highlighting the differential role of primate centers. While the New York and Miami metropolitan centers clearly dominate Dominican and Cuban migration systems respectively, the role of primate centers is less clear among other national origin groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]