Less efficient by far:
For all its sprawl and global impact, the greater London area is astonishingly efficient: A mere 34 government entities look after all the public safety, services, transportation, zoning and schools. Greater Toronto has only 28.
Paris, by contrast, ranks among the most fragmented and duplicative of the worlds metro areas, presiding over 1,400 units of government in its city and suburbs.
But when it comes to overlap, unnecessary taxpayer spending and political fragmentation, the Chicago-Milwaukee metroplex is in a league of its own. The two adjoining metro regions are conjoined by common industries, highways and shoreline but splintered into a profusion of 2,155 separate entities of government.