* Individual Results May Vary
It seems that some folks have become disillusioned with Richard Florida. I am not among them . I never accepted his "theory" as gospel in the first place. However, some cities put all their resources behind Mr. Florida’s ideas and in the January, 2010 issue of "The American Prospect", Alec MacGillis speaks with a mayor that is very unhappy with the results of his city’s efforts, especially in light of comments made by Florida in Atlantic Monthly last March (2009).
In the Atlantic Monthly article Mr. Florida surmised;
"Finally, we need to be clear that ultimately, we can’t stop the decline of some places, and that we would be foolish to try. Places like Pittsburgh have shown that a city can stay vibrant as it shrinks, by redeveloping its core to attract young professionals and creative types, and by cultivating high-growth services and industries. And in limited ways, we can help faltering cities to manage their decline better, and to sustain better lives for the people who stay in them".
The man toured the world telling everyone that would listen that the future belonged to the "creative class" and if cities/regions wanted to be part of that future they should heed his words. What he’s saying in this piece, and apparently he has more to say about it in his new book, is that not every city/region will be able to be a "creative city". That is, despite any amount of money and resources a city may commit to become one of Florida’s "Smart Cities" some will just not benefit.
My criticism of Richard Florida from the get go has been that this whole "creative class" thing is an illusion. An economy cannot sustain itself on ideas and creativity. Ideas and creativity are fuel for thriving economies the engines of which are the production of tangible goods. When we look at the world today the economies that are growing are the very ones that are producing the goods.
On his own blog (May 2009) Florida wrote;
"We can confer subsidies on places to improve their infrastructure, universities, and core institutions, or quality of life. But this still is unlikely to stem the tide of the talented and the mobile, at least in the short-run. We can take a longer-term approach and help them gradually shift away from declining industries and build around their remaining assets organically and over time.
At the end of the day, people – not industries or even places – should be our biggest concern. We can best help those who are hardest-hit by the crisis, by providing a generous social safety, investing in their skills, and when necessary helping them become mobile and move to where the opportunities are."
In an ironic twist, Mr. Florida is encouraging mobility, not to attract the creatives to a place but, instead to escape places that he admits cannot become one of his Smart Cities.
Mr. Florida often cites Jane Jacobs. Where he has it backward, in my lowly opinion, it that Jacobs’ cities’ growth is based on the replacement of imports. She asserts that successful cities grew because they developed technologies and processes to produce their own goods for trade. Without a balance of raw materials production, manufacturing and processing and service industries all working together an economy is doomed. An economy based on computer programmers, designers and bankers without an equally strong goods producing sector and raw materials is ultimately unsustainable.
To be fair Richard Florida was hired by cities and chambers of commerce et al, to present his theories (and schlep his books). That the same cities and chambers of commerce jumped on his wagon and committed their resources to become a Smart City without seeking other opinions and exploring other options and schools of thought is a demonstration of their imprudence. Their disappointment with their results is merely buyer’s remorse on a large and very public scale.
Tags: Creative Class, creative economy, Economics, Jane Jacobs, Richard Florida
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Great article today James. I agree with you.
If a peoples cannot sell a tangible good then they will be over taken by another economy. It truly is that simple. An economy cannot survive on services alone. This has ben demonstrated time and again.
I will give it to Florida though, he has sold himself well. I do not think anyone should abandon his ideas as they have merit in any economy. It is just that it cannot be the “whole” economy and it is not the saviour of cities as he once touted (and is now back peddling in my opinion).
One of your best James! I agree whole heartedly!
It seems that the term “tangible good” is somewhat intangible. Some clarification would be helpful. How many places really do create tangible goods. For instance, what tangible goods does Chicago produce? or T.O.?
My main issue with Mr. Florida’s assertions is the belief that people will move to a place just because its “cool” or creative. I still believe people move for jobs. It’s just that the jobs, lately, have been in the service or creative sectors. Any “one size fits all” approach to city revitalization is doomed to failure. It’s all about asset identification and exploitation.
A tangible good is something that is built/assembled to be used. Think of all that money that was made on Wall Stret that really doesn’t (or didn’t) exist. It all existed on paper but in actuality it truly never existed.
BTW: Chicago builds a heck of a lot. Their manufacturing base is quite large.
You are right that people do move because of jobs but people will also move to cities that offer them more than where they currently reside.
My issue is that we all can’t be painters buying paintings.
The “creative” class involves much more than artists.
Toronto does have some manufacturing but it is probably fair to say that in a relatively lightly populated country, a place like TO can exist on “creative class” employment because it has a virtual monopoly on the support services for the “tangible goods class” of the entire country. Wherever we make tangible goods, we still need bankers, lawyers, and government. TO just has all or most of them / it.
Part of the trouble with Windsor, in my view, is that we have allowed TO to monopolize the “creative class” work by hiring Toronto lawyers, bankers, consultants, designers, engineers etc. instead of local talent. Thus, anybody really good either struggles here or leaves town.
But I agree wholeheartedly with James’ article. Florida’s model is unsustainable without being coupled with the manufacture of tangilble goods. And possibly (dare I say) with the payment of real wages to the goods manufacturers so they can partner with the “creative class” at spending money locallly on amenities.
I also agree with the correction that Florida’s “creative class” was not limited to artists but extended to most professions on the basis that the widgets produced required “creativity”.
I am glad that Margaret dared to raise the issue of payment of real wages. In a time of stimulus spending, something this city has jumped into with both feet, it made no sense to remove 1600 wages from being spent in the community for 15 weeks. Adding insult to injury by contracting out well paying jobs in favour of low end wages exposes the contradiction at the heart of the mayor’s agenda.
The “starving artist” creative class in Windsor will have fewer patrons resulting in a migration of the artists to more lucrative locales.
I know of one local artist, Christian Aldo, that has packed up and moved to T.O. It’s a shame because he was one of those responsible for creating “gallery” space in the vacant storefronts along Pelissier.
As “Richard” pointed out, the Creative Class includes many professions and technical jobs like engineer, architect, web design, and many others. By and large these are service jobs that exchange knowledge and skill for pay.
Because these “creative jobs” can be done remotely there is no assurance that there is any income security in those type of jobs. H.R., I.T., prototyping and engineering is done for North American companies every day by others half-a-world away (for half the cost).
Richard, I understand that but it sure isn’t going to make the world go around. When everyone is being “creative” who is going to do the building? Who is manufacturing who is making something?
The only truly “service” based economies are third world for the most part. How do you think we got our wealth?
LOS, Margaret and James have excellent posts that cannot be refuted.