Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier, and Happier

Translated from English by I. Kushnareva. – M.: Gaidar Institute Press, 2014. – (Moscow Urban Forum. Urbanist Library). – 432 p.

ISBN 978-5-93255-404-3

Harvard economist Edward Glaeser shows in his book that, contrary to established ideas about cities (dirty, poor, unhealthy, full of crime, expensive to live in and polluting the environment), they are in fact the healthiest, most environmentally friendly and richest (culturally and economically) places to live. New Yorkers, for example, live longer than other Americans, and the number of cardiovascular diseases and cancer cases in this city is lower than the national average. More than half of the developed world's income is earned in its largest cities, and city dwellers consume, on average, 40% less energy than suburbanites.

Glaeser uses historical accounts and his own observations to show the hidden mechanisms of how cities work. People who settle in even the worst cities – Kinshasa, Calcutta, Lagos – have better jobs and are healthier than those who live in the surrounding villages. Glaeser shows that Bangalore and Silicon Valley have remarkably similar histories, that education plays a vital role in the success of cities, and that new technologies actually help people live closer together.

The book was prepared with the support of the Moscow Urban Forum, the Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO and ZAO Inteko.