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The richest cities in the U.S. are glittering metropolises where super-wealthy people gather and even relatively modest homes costs millions of dollars.

Or so one might think.

Los Angeles, home to a long list of rich neighborhoods (think Beverly Hills, Bel-Air and Holmby Hills), would seem an obvious candidate for any rich list. So would New York, where a penthouse is currently on the market for $70 million, and where property prices are so high it seems at times as though only moguls and celebrities can afford to live there.

But by at least one measure of wealth, neither city makes the list. To figure out the richest places, have a look at the American cities with the highest median household incomes (the level at which half of the households make more and half less), as measured for 2004 by the U.S. Census Bureau. And prepare to be taken aback.

Yes, San Francisco (with a median household income of over $60,000) makes the list, as does Washington, D.C., where half the households make more than about $46,500. But New York, Boston and Miami are nowhere to be seen in the top ten. California cities make up 40% of the rankings, and the rest is made up by some surprising locales, including Anchorage, Raleigh, N.C., and Virginia Beach, Va. While pleasant places, they aren't generally thought of as homes for the rich and famous.

What gives? A combination of local economic strength, geographical quirks and the limitations of the analysis, which measures the middle of the income distribution, rather than the extremes.

"Places like Los Angeles and New York have very skewed distributions of income," says Gilbert Yochum, professor of economics at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Va. "There are lots of rich people, but lots of poor people. Most of the cities in this metropolitan area--Norfolk, Newport News, Virginia Beach--have a much less skewed distribution of income. There's not as much poverty, but there aren't as many rich. We have a very high center."

Newer cities also have higher median incomes than more established places, like Boston or Chicago, because they are growing and have people moving in rather than out. Look just outside the city of Philadelphia (which also did not make the top ten), for example, and you will see an abundance of wealthy suburbs.

According to Yochum, Virginia Beach is also helped by its strong military economic base. Military areas tend to have less-extreme income distributions (a reason San Diego makes the list as well), and retirees in the area have comfortable military pensions, he says.