One Chart That Proves New York Is - And Always Has Been - The Greatest City In The US

Despite what some might say to try to take it down, New York City is -- and always has been -- the greatest city in America.

Or at the very least, the largest.

Using data from the Census Bureau, this chart shows the ranking of the top five cities in the United States every decade since 1790.

We were inspired by a similar chart showing the top 20 cities generated by user thessnake03 on the DataIsBeautiful subreddit. We just zoomed in a bit.

It's pretty remarkable. You can see a whole bunch of awesome trends over time, like the dawn of the West Coast, the rise and fall of Detroit, and even the decline of southern cities following the Civil War.

One thing, though, is abundantly clear. One city in America has remained top dog for over 220 years.