Who's Your City? | Richard Florida | Talks at Google

Summary

In this talk, Richard Florida, a professor at the University of Toronto, discusses the significance of place in the creative economy. He challenges the notion that technology has made the world flat, arguing instead that geographic location remains crucial. Florida explores how economic activity and innovation are concentrated in 'spiky' urban areas, emphasizing the importance of cities as drivers of productivity and innovation. He also delves into the impact of place on personal happiness and well-being, highlighting the role of social connections and job satisfaction.

Takeaways

• 📚 Richard Florida's work emphasizes the importance of the 'creative class' in the economy, suggesting that creative people are at the forefront of the 21st-century economy.
• 🌏 The script discusses the concept of place and location as crucial factors in personal and economic life, contradicting the idea that technology makes the world 'flat' and irrelevant.
• 🏙️ Cities and urban areas are identified as significant economic powerhouses, despite the belief that technological advancements would decentralize economic activity.
• 📈 The world is described as 'spiky' rather than flat, with economic activity, innovation, and population concentrated in specific urban areas or 'mega-regions'.
• 🤝 Social connections and the diversity of thought in cities are highlighted as drivers of creativity and economic growth, rather than just physical infrastructure.
• 🏡 Housing investment is presented as a significant life decision, with location influencing not only affordability but also potential appreciation and return on investment.
• 🧑‍🎨 The script touches on the idea that certain personality types, particularly 'open to experience' individuals, are highly concentrated in specific cities and are key to innovation.
• 🌟 The importance of 'quality of place' is underscored, suggesting that the physical and cultural attributes of a location significantly impact residents' happiness and well-being.
• 🌱 The potential for 'domain-specific' networks to form in certain areas is discussed, where the concentration of people with similar professional interests can drive innovation and economic development.
• 🌐 The global nature of cities like New York is highlighted, with real estate markets influenced by global wealth rather than just local economic conditions.
• 🤔 The script concludes with a call for further research into the dynamics of urban development, the factors influencing the concentration of creative talent, and the implications for economic and social policy.

Q & A

What is the main thesis of Richard Florida's talk on 'Who's Your City'?

Richard Florida's talk emphasizes the importance of geographic location in today's economy. He argues that despite technological advancements suggesting a 'flat' world, where to live is a crucial decision that can significantly impact one's life, especially for the creative class.

What does Richard Florida suggest about the relationship between technology and the significance of place?

Contrary to the belief that technology makes place less important, Florida suggests that the world is both flat and spiky, with economic activity and innovation clustering in specific, concentrated areas rather than being evenly distributed.

What does Florida identify as the three major decisions in one's life according to Daniel Gilbert's 'Stumbling on Happiness'?

According to Daniel Gilbert, the three major decisions in one's life are what we do for a living, who we take as a life partner, and where we choose to live.

How does Richard Florida describe the economic activity distribution in the United States compared to other countries like China and India?

Florida points out that the United States has a more even distribution of economic activity across various cities, whereas countries like China and India are more 'spiky,' with economic activity highly concentrated in specific areas such as Shanghai, Beijing, Bangalore, Mumbai, and Delhi.

What does Florida mean by 'mega-regions' and how do they relate to global economic activity?

Mega-regions, as described by Florida, are large-scale regional clusters that produce more than 100 billion dollars in economic activity. These regions, of which there are about 40 worldwide, house less than 20% of the world's population but account for two-thirds of the world's economic output and a significant majority of global innovation.

What is the concept of 'urban metabolism' mentioned by Florida, and how does it relate to cities' growth and survival?

Urban metabolism refers to the rate at which cities use resources and generate waste. Florida cites research from the Santa Fe Institute, suggesting that as cities grow, they need to super-scale to survive, meaning their metabolic rates increase, and they become more efficient and productive.

How does Richard Florida's research indicate that personality types are distributed across different geographical locations?

Florida's research, in collaboration with Jason Rentfrow, shows that certain personality types, particularly those open to experience, tend to cluster in specific cities known for innovation and creativity, such as New York, San Francisco, and Austin.

What does Florida suggest about the relationship between job markets and geographical location?

Florida suggests that job markets are becoming increasingly specialized and geographically concentrated. For certain professions or industries, being in a specific city or region can be essential for career opportunities and success.

How does Richard Florida define 'economic and social opportunity' as a factor in people's happiness with their community?

Florida identifies economic and social opportunity as one of the key factors contributing to people's happiness with their community. This includes the availability of jobs, the potential for career growth, and a supportive social environment.

What does Florida's research with the Gallup Organization reveal about the factors that affect people's subjective well-being in relation to their place of residence?

The research with Gallup reveals that factors such as the quality of the physical environment, the openness of the community to various groups, and the presence of economic and social opportunities significantly affect people's subjective well-being and happiness with their place of residence.

How does Richard Florida respond to critics who question the validity of his work on the creative class and economic growth?

Florida responds by emphasizing that his work is empirically based and that he does not have a values agenda. He suggests that creativity is not limited to certain professions or educational backgrounds and that it is essential to unleash the creativity of all individuals for a more prosperous society.

Outlines

00:00

📚 Introduction to Richard Florida's Urban Studies

Richard Florida, a professor at the University of Toronto, is introduced as a key figure in urban studies, known for his book 'The Rise of the Creative Class.' The speaker highlights the significance of location in today's technology-driven world and invites Florida to discuss why certain areas, like Google's location, have become hubs of innovation despite the apparent 'flatness' of the global landscape. Florida emphasizes the importance of dialogue and welcomes questions, reflecting on his academic journey and the influence of his students and experiences in shaping his understanding of urban environments.

05:00

🌐 The Myth of a Flat World and Urban Agglomerations

The speaker debunks the myth of a flat world, arguing that despite technological advances, geography still plays a crucial role in economic and social structures. He discusses the UN's data on urban population growth, revealing that over half of the world's population now lives in urban areas. The speaker also addresses the concentration of economic activity in cities, using satellite imagery to demonstrate that economic output is not evenly distributed but rather clustered in specific regions, challenging the notion that technology diminishes the importance of place.

10:01

🌟 Identifying Global Economic Centers Through Innovation Data

The speaker delves into the analysis of innovation data, including patents and scientific publications, to identify global economic centers. He discusses the concept of 'mega-regions'—clusters of economic activity that, while housing a small fraction of the world's population, account for the majority of global economic output and innovation. The speaker emphasizes the 'spiky' nature of the world, where economic activity is concentrated in specific areas rather than being evenly distributed.

15:01

🌆 Spatial Unevenness and Economic Activity in the US, China, and India

The speaker contrasts the spatial distribution of economic activity in the United States, China, and India, highlighting the 'spikiness' of economic concentration in these countries. He points out that while the US has a more even distribution of cities, China and India exhibit extreme concentration of economic activity in specific regions like Shanghai, Beijing, Bangalore, Mumbai, and Delhi. The speaker underscores the importance of understanding this unevenness in economic development.

20:01

🏙️ The Economic Growth Puzzle and Jane Jacobs' Theories

The speaker introduces Jane Jacobs' theories on economic growth, which emphasize the importance of people and their interactions in cities as the primary drivers of innovation and productivity. Jacobs challenges traditional economic theories that focus on capital investment and specialization, arguing instead that the exchange of ideas and collaboration in urban environments are the true engines of economic growth.

25:01

🤝 The Impact of Urbanization on Social and Economic Mobility

The speaker discusses the impact of urbanization on social and economic mobility, noting the increasing divide between the mobile, rooted, and stuck populations. He highlights the correlation between geographic mobility and economic advantage, the specialization of job markets in certain cities, and the implications for career choices and housing investments. The speaker encourages a thoughtful approach to location choices, considering factors such as housing appreciation and career opportunities.

30:03

🎨 The Intersection of Personality and Place

The speaker explores the relationship between personality types and the places they inhabit, using data from a large-scale personality mapping project. He discusses the distribution of different personality types across the United States, noting the concentration of 'open to experience' individuals in certain cities known for innovation and creativity. The speaker suggests that these personality types may play a significant role in the economic and cultural dynamics of urban areas.

35:04

🎼 The Role of Bohemian Clusters in Innovation

The speaker examines the role of bohemian clusters—concentrations of artistic and open-minded individuals—in fostering innovation. He discusses the historical and ongoing significance of these clusters in attracting and nurturing creative talent, suggesting that the presence of such communities can serve as an indicator of a region's potential for technological and cultural advancement.

40:05

🏡 Happiness and the Importance of Place

The speaker presents findings from a Gallup survey on happiness, highlighting the importance of place alongside work and social connections. He discusses the factors that contribute to life happiness, including job satisfaction, social connections, and the quality of the living environment. The speaker emphasizes the role of 'quality of place' in enhancing well-being and suggests that the physical and cultural characteristics of a location significantly impact residents' happiness.

45:07

🌐 Cultural Generalizability and the Future of Urban Studies

The speaker acknowledges the cultural bias in current urban studies and expresses a desire to make future research more culturally generalizable. He discusses the need for deeper samples from various cultures to better understand global phenomena and the importance of broadening the perspective beyond Western-centric views. The speaker also addresses the complexity of creating new hubs of innovation and the potential for places like Waterloo to become new centers of creative and technological advancement.

50:09

🤔 Domain-Specific Networks and the Geography of Innovation

The speaker explores the concept of domain-specific networks, which are geographically concentrated areas of expertise in various fields such as technology in Silicon Valley or music in Nashville. He discusses the idea that these networks are not overlapping and are essential for the growth and success of specific industries, suggesting that being part of such a network can be a requirement for success in certain domains.

55:11

🏘️ Neighborhood Effects and the Creative Class

The speaker discusses the importance of neighborhood effects on the creative class, suggesting that people's choices of where to live are influenced by the specific characteristics and opportunities of neighborhoods. He highlights the need for more research into these neighborhood effects and the potential for creating new hubs of creativity and innovation by understanding the dynamics of such areas.

💰 The Role of Financial Centers and Creative Occupations in Urban Development

The speaker addresses the misconception that New York is primarily a financial center, pointing out that the city has a high concentration of creative occupations across various fields. He discusses the global market for property in cities like New York and suggests that the city's real estate market is influenced by the presence of a diverse and creative workforce.

🌈 Creativity in All Socioeconomic Classes

The speaker emphasizes the idea that creativity is not limited to a certain class or profession but is a universal human trait. He discusses the importance of recognizing and nurturing creativity across all socioeconomic backgrounds and the potential for innovation to come from various sectors of society, including traditionally non-creative industries.

Keywords

💡Creative Economy

The creative economy refers to an economic system driven by innovation, where creativity is the primary source of economic growth. It is central to the video's theme, as Richard Florida discusses how the rise of the creative class is reshaping cities and economies. The script mentions that economic growth doesn't come from physical investments but from people with ideas, highlighting the importance of the creative economy in today's world.

💡Urban Agglomerations

Urban agglomerations are densely populated urban areas that may include multiple cities, towns, and other settlements closely networked together. The script notes that for the first time in human history, more than fifty percent of the world's population lives in urban agglomerations, indicating a significant shift towards urban living that has implications for economic activity and innovation.

💡Economic Output

Economic output refers to the total value of goods and services produced by an economy. In the context of the video, the concept is used to discuss how economic activity is concentrated in certain cities, as measured by satellite imagery and other data. The script reveals that a small number of mega-regions account for a disproportionate amount of the world's economic output.

💡Innovation

Innovation is the process of translating an idea or invention into a good or service that creates value or for which customers will pay. The script emphasizes the concentration of innovation in certain urban areas, as indicated by patent data, and how it contributes to the 'spiky' nature of the world's economic landscape.

💡Spatial Unevenness

Spatial unevenness describes the unequal distribution of economic activity, population, or other phenomena across geographic space. The video discusses how economic activity is not spread evenly across the globe but is instead concentrated in specific areas, leading to a 'spiky' world where some regions are hubs of activity while others are less developed.

💡Geographic Mobility

Geographic mobility refers to the ability and tendency of people to move across different geographical locations. The script suggests that economic advantage increasingly comes to those who are mobile, as job markets become more specialized and opportunities are concentrated in certain cities, requiring individuals to relocate to where the jobs are.

💡Domain-Specific Networks

Domain-specific networks are specialized clusters of individuals and organizations within a particular field or industry. The video discusses how these networks are geographically concentrated, with examples such as Silicon Valley for technology and Nashville for music, and how being part of such a network can be crucial for career advancement and innovation.

💡Quality of Place

Quality of place refers to the physical and aesthetic characteristics of a location that contribute to the well-being and happiness of its inhabitants. The script identifies quality of place as a significant factor in people's overall life happiness, with features such as parks, open spaces, and architecture playing a role in how people perceive and enjoy their environment.

💡Cognitive Diversity

Cognitive diversity refers to the variety of ways people think, solve problems, and approach tasks. The video mentions that cognitive diversity is associated with better group problem-solving and is linked to ethnic, racial, age, gender, and sexual orientation diversity, suggesting that a diverse population can drive innovation and economic growth.

💡Open to Experience

Open to experience is a personality trait characterized by a willingness to try new things, think creatively, and be receptive to new ideas and experiences. The script discusses how this trait is associated with creativity and entrepreneurship, and how people with this trait tend to cluster in certain cities, contributing to the innovation and vibrancy of those places.

💡Subjective Well-Being

Subjective well-being refers to an individual's perception of their own life satisfaction and happiness. The video includes a discussion of a Gallup survey that explored factors affecting well-being, such as job satisfaction, social connections, and the physical characteristics of the place one lives in, revealing that where people live has a significant impact on their happiness.

Highlights

Richard Florida's talk emphasizes the importance of location in the creative economy and how it impacts life decisions.

Florida introduces the concept that technology does not make the world flat; rather, where we live is crucial despite technological advances.

The talk discusses the unexpected concentration of Google in certain areas, challenging traditional expectations of geographical distribution.

Florida highlights the significance of asking hard questions and embracing dialogue and criticism for the evolution of ideas.

The speaker's background in urban planning and geography shapes his perspective on the importance of place in economic and social life.

Florida references Jane Jacobs' work, emphasizing the role of cities in fostering innovation and productivity through the clustering of people.

The talk unveils the 'spiky' nature of the world, contrary to the popular notion of a 'flat' world, with economic activities concentrated in specific regions.

The concept of 'mega-regions' is introduced, identifying 40 global economic powerhouses that drive the majority of world economic output and innovation.

Florida points out the uneven distribution of economic activity, with some areas like the U.S. being more evenly spread than 'spiky' regions like China and India.

The talk explores the idea that economic growth stems from people and their interactions within cities, not merely from physical investments or capital.

Florida discusses the importance of cognitive diversity in driving innovation, linking it to ethnic, racial, age, and sexual orientation diversity.

The talk addresses the divide between the mobile, rooted, and stuck populations, and how geographic mobility correlates with economic advantage.

Florida examines the specialization of job markets, where certain professions are concentrated in specific cities, affecting career choices and opportunities.

The discussion on housing as a significant investment is highlighted, with the rate of return on housing being a key factor in location decisions.

The talk introduces the psychological impact of place, with research showing that certain personality types are more likely to cluster in specific urban areas.

Florida's research with Gallup reveals factors contributing to life happiness, including job satisfaction, social connections, and the quality of the living environment.

The closing thoughts of the talk stress the need for further research into the dynamics of domain-specific networks and their influence on geographical concentrations of talent.

Transcripts

so welcome to Richard Florida's talk on

who's your city how the creative economy

is making where to live the most

important decision of your life Richard

is a professor at the University of

Toronto and he first exploded onto the

scene in 2002 with his book the roof the

rise of the creative class which

according to his press release isn't IDK

social new social class of creative

people was emerging at the forefront of

the 21st century economy and provided a

refreshing new way to think about how we

live today Richard's new book who's your

city is a book that I think will

resonate with all of us many of us who

made a conscious decision not to be

living in a certain suburb of San Fran's

IM to stole my opening line it's a book

about how while technology maybe makes

the world seem boundless and flat it

really isn't that flat and where we live

does matter and I'm so I'm going to

leave you in Richard to thank you that

thank you well thank you for that kind

introduction so yeah that was the

question I wanted to start with and I

thought about it a lot this morning you

know why here why not that suburb

outside of San Francisco where we're

really excited to go next week but why

here why here for you guys so I want I

want you to think about it why here for

you guys and why here for Google because

it wouldn't be what most people who

study what I study would have expected

they would expected everything to be in

this cluster out on the west coast so I

want you to think about it the other

thing is you know I'll talk for 40

minutes or so you know maybe 45 leave

plenty of times for questions I've been

a professor at Carnegie Mellon been a

visiting professor at thank you MIT I

teach at the University of Toronto I

like questions and I like really hard

questions so you don't have to feel I

know you don't could you work here and I

know where you went to school so but you

don't have to feel shy and you know none

of us has the last word and that's

something I want to say and I think you

know that because you work most of you

in technology if anyone thinks they have

the last word they don't and all of this

is evolving so and all of my ideas are

constantly evolving and I've always been

my best ideas or whatever i've added at

the margin to ideas have come out of

dialogue and from great criticism so

please you should feel free and i look

at this and the other thing is if you

have any cool ideas of what to do with

this stuff like in your own work and how

to make it come alive visually or with

maps you know i'm easy to find I'm

Florida at creative class calm I am

completely addicted you know I live

online if anyone ever has ideas about

that stuff feel free we have a pretty

cool Institute at the U of T and we're

building it out and and and we're in

this for the long haul and then the

other thing by way of starting I want to

say is kind of when you mention the

press release and the biomaterial really

the book that I wrote two books before

this rise of the creative class was

really about the kind of lives that you

guys are leading and have been leading

so in some ways I learned a lot about

this from just interacting with folks in

particular my students and graduate

students at Carnegie Mellon and other

universities and now at the U of T

anyway I've been I went to Rutgers in

the mid-70s and I took a degree in

political science and urban studies I

went to Columbia and I got a PhD in

urban planning in 1986 so that's between

two and three decades of studying kind

of place in geography and location and

after writing like lots of academic

papers and running a research center and

and I can talk about how my wife Rhonda

has traveled with me today who kelp runs

our little company we moved to

Washington DC and we liked it there and

then we got the offer to come to Toronto

and we moved again like two times in the

past five years and also we talked to a

lot of people family members friends who

are moving and I kind of realized and

then and then and then I read dan

gilbert's book stumbling on happiness

and he said you know we make three big

decisions in our life what we do for a

living who we take is a life partner and

where we live and I know there's like a

lot of economics and business and

guidance counseling and advice columns

and biz

this week kind of magazines on what kind

of job in career and how you would do

that and how to navigate it and

certainly my dad growing up in New

Jersey and I I talk about my dad in the

beginning of the book my dad worked in a

factory he had an eighth grade education

he like you have to study really hard

you have to go to college you have to

get a good career and first they wanted

me to be a dentist then they want me to

be a lawyer and I just didn't want to do

that so but then my mom elite and then

other people you know if you think about

this who questioned people say well you

know who you marry is really important

that's imply watch the Today show this

morning and they talked about like

happiness in your life and how your

family and the person you spend your

life with is so important and people who

are married and have happy marriages are

happy and more satisfied in their life

and I thought my mom always said rich

you know even though your dad only had

an eighth grade education I guess I

could have you know gone out with

someone more successful but it was the

best decision I made because I really

was madly in love with your dad and then

I thought about our own moves and no one

ever told me and and even in my field

now 20 years into this field people

write about why locations important and

how place affects things and at why

companies locate in certain areas they

don't really write so much about why we

locate but i thought you know no one has

ever really put down on paper how this

who questioned they talked about the

what they talked about the who the how

this where question how this where kept

question how our location affects our

lives and then I met with my research

group and we toss the idea around and

this young guy who worked for me he's

now he just got back his band just got

back from South by Southwest they're

called these United States they're

really really interesting he left kind

of writing and researching the plate to

have this man he's a good songwriter he

said why don't you call it who's your

city and we all laughed and then we took

it around to publishers like basic books

and they said you can't title with that

you have to title it like the location

factor or the wealth of place or why

place matters and we and I don't have a

big you know at creative class calm our

website we have people who come and

communicate with us and it's not a huge

thing but it's big enough and we had a

little vote

and people like no absolutely who's your

city is a better title because it

resonates with people so once we got

that far I decided to write it up and

and in the few minutes we have you know

and really it's the result it tries to

be easy to read but it's the result of

20 or more years of kind of research in

this field but the first thing that that

we found that's really really

interesting is that what you're talking

about this technology the Internet

computing transportation advances

everybody immediately hears of that

stuff and they think oh that's going to

make place less important that all of

this advance in technology and

communication transportation is going to

make the place you live less important

because you can live anywhere and and

you know that's not just a new story

that's an old story hey guys there are

chairs up here if you want them you

don't have to take them I mean I'm not

trying to make you sit up here this

isn't a bad class it makes you sit up

front um okay and and and so and so yeah

and this is an old story like i was

saying if you go back and read the

history like the telegraph was going to

do this and then the telephone was going

to do it and then the streetcar was

going to do it and then the automobile

was going to do and then certainly the

airplane was going to do it then the fax

machine was going to do it and to what

we did cuz we're pretty empirically

minded oh there's one chair left but you

can stay back there if you want um

because we're pretty empirically minded

we said well let's take a look at this

so the first thing we did is just look

at data and what's really interesting is

there's very little data which is cool

for you guys at Google to most data

that's collected is collected at the

national level now a country may have

data like the United States or Canada or

Australia or your Europe eurostat may

have data on like cities and provinces

and state but nobody collects actual

information on cities so the first thing

we did there is a program at the United

Nations which collects data on

population of cities so we looked at

that data and the first thing that

struck us is that in this past year for

the first time in human history more

than fifty percent of all people live in

what they call urban agglomerations so

more than half of the world's population

is urban and if anything that's been

growing over the past you know all their

human history but certainly over the

past 50 to 100 years that percentage has

been growing and that's when it got

interesting the next thing we had to do

is try to estimate because population is

a crude measure of concentration right

there can be concentrations of people

like New York or San Francisco that are

relatively wealthy or produce a lot of

economic output there could be

concentrations of people in the emerging

economies where people are living and

essentially slum or kind of global slum

situations so we said let's try to

figure out how much economic activity

goes on in these cities so I'm not a

computer scientist but lots of people I

work with are including two or three of

my best research collaborators who are

computer science undergraduates and then

took economics of PhDs and one guy said

who was at the University of Maryland he

said well Richie know their satellite

maps of the world and I said yeah

they're really cool he said you know we

could use them to distill economic

energy so he did this I don't know the

methodology but he basically built some

algorithms that would allow him to

distill from these energy Maps economic

output there's another group bill

nordhaus he's a famous famous economist

at Yale he's done something similar not

with light maps but he did this some

something similar he called it his g

econ program we calibrated against his

work we also went to every country that

has sub-national data so if the United

States had information on the gross

regional product of its 300 regions we

looked at that or if Europe had the same

thing we got the best calibration we

could and then we estimated this for

every kind of you know kilometer of

light across the globe and then we got

innovation data now we would have liked

to had better innovation data or we'd

like to have entrepreneurship startup

data but that doesn't exist but data on

patents do exist so we took the US data

we got them to do a special run break it

down by zip code but they do the zip

code of every inventor in the world

so not just inventors in the United

States but every inventor that files a

US pat in the world they have his or her

location and then we combine that with

data on international patenting from the

world international patent office and

then finally finally we got data on

scientific discovery this guy Mike badi

he's a professor and in London he had

been looking at bibliometric data but

you have better bibliometric data but

nonetheless he had bibliometric data and

we looked at scientific discovery and

publication well what happened is you

know you all know Tom Friedman's work

about the world being flat and how he

says the world is going to be flat it's

going to be a level playing field there

are six billion people competing for

work he talks in that book if you want

to innovate you no longer have to

emigrate the world wasn't flat at all

you know whether we looked a population

or economic activity innovation or

discovery it was actually it was like

this population had a line like this

economic activity had a line like this

innovation had a line like this each of

those lines got steeper and steeper so

what we talked about in the book and you

can see the maps in there is that the

world is really really spiky and and I

know you guys can understand this but

lots of people have trouble with it it's

not like it's actually one or the other

it's both flat and spiky decentralising

and centralizing at the same time so as

the world gets bigger and as more

countries come into play and as economic

activity expands and firms to centralize

their economic activity they don't do

that in a ubiquitous way they do it in a

very concentrated way so there's kind of

a dialectic as the world expands and

grows more global the vehicle of

globalization are these very spiky

places and then we went one step further

we decided that using this data series

we could actually capture we're really

important clusters of economic activity

are we could not only capture a city

like New York but we had the satellite

images we could identify the world

economies real economic centers which

aren't necessarily cities and are

necessary states and provinces and

certainly are

nations but by using that satellite

imagery we could see where there is a

actually observable empirical

concentration of economic activity well

we did exercise we gave all of them kind

of funny names you know we tried to give

them interesting things a fellow named

John Gottman in the 50s he's an economic

geographer described the emergence of

what he called megalopolis right it's a

word we all know but him him megalopolis

was Boz wash he called it the Boston New

York Washington car well that one popped

up right away and then there was another

when he called shy pits that ran from

Chicago to Detroit to Cleveland to

pittsburgh but he didn't do much more

and a few other people had tried to look

at us meg what we called mega regions we

actually identified every single

regional cluster in the world setting a

threshold of a place that produces more

than 100 billion dollars in economic

activity we actually identified that

there about 40 of these things worldwide

so there's 191 nations but actually

there's 40 mega regions which are the

real centers of the economic action in

the world economy they house less than

twenty percent of the world's population

they account for two-thirds of all the

world's economic output and almost more

I was going to say almost ninety percent

about eighty to eighty-five percent of

the world's innovation the world is a

very concentrated place and and the

other thing that struck us and I see

that you guys are a very global group if

you look at the United States you

actually get a very biased picture of

the geographic distribution of economic

activity because the United States is

the most evenly distributed place on the

planet like it has the most number of

kind of interesting cities yeah New York

and Boston and Washington and Chicago in

austin and ann arbor in Pittsburgh a lot

San Francisco in LA Seattle Portland has

lots and lots of cities not that they're

all the same they're diverging

increasingly over time but they're more

or less similar we looked at India and

China and you know people say the United

States is involved in this computation

with India and China I could talk ad

nauseam about that and how silly silly

those arguments sometimes are

you know but the United States isn't

competing with India and China there are

two of the most spiky places on the

planet in China almost all of the

economic activity is clustered around

Shanghai and Beijing and a few other

places that radiates from out from there

and in India it's bangalore to kind of

Mumbai and then Delhi they are much

spikier and I remember meeting with one

of my students we sent since written to

kind of interesting papers on China

using these data but my Chinese student

said to be rich he said he actually

called me professor Florida like no no

no please call me rich and he called me

professor Florida he said you know I

don't want to be insulting I don't want

to be too aggressive he said in Shanghai

I live better than you but the people at

the outskirts of Shanghai live his words

and I quote in the book in pre civilized

conditions so what we got a sense of is

that the world is not only economically

uneven it is incredibly spatially uneven

and that economic activity as it spreads

itself is actually doing so in a way

that concentrates this activity which

leads me to kind of the first academic

point or kind of intellectual point why

would this be so why would why would

this happen right so we have an

empirical observation but then you have

to sit back and go whoa hold on I

thought costs were supposed to matter I

thought companies were supposed to

migrate where there was lower costs I

thought you guys were supposed to all

look for places where you could optimize

your utility and find that dream home

you know that was affordable not living

in a place where you spend two three

four five thousand bucks a month for

rent and live in 500 600 700 square feet

right it makes no sense it makes no

sense so then there is a woman who

actually got to know before she passed

away and I'd encourage all of you if you

haven't to read about her but she was

truly remarkable um she didn't she went

to the University of Scranton she didn't

get a PhD her name was Jane Jacobs she

wrote a fabulous book on this

neighborhood in 1961 she wrote a book on

little bit sad little on her hudson

street in greenwich village it's the

most remarkable book on cities the

she talked about what really makes a

city work and and how urban renewal

these big urban renewal projects were

killing cities and you can see their

legacy not only in New York but

everywhere she actually fought the urban

renewal they were gonna put a highway

right through the Greenwich Village to

highway she fought them in one but she

wrote a several other books I got to

know her late in her 80s she became a

mentor and it kind of idled in my knee

she's now become rediscovered by many

interesting people but she wrote a book

called the economy of cities in the book

called the wealth cities in the wealth

of nations she really in those books and

I'm gonna write her debt to the

anniversary of death is in April I'm

going to write a piece of 750 word piece

about this and just put it down on paper

but she solved this puzzle and and now

economists and social scientists are

catching up and and there's a great

economist Robert Lucas he won the Nobel

Prize and and he said he had he asked a

question in any address after he won the

Nobel Prize he said he lives in Chicago

University I said why would people

continue to live in downtown Chicago and

in Chicago and pay so much rent you New

York would even learn more or London a

more obvious example he said well people

could say it's because it's a fun place

to live or because it has good

restaurants or good shopping centers but

that would be a theory of restaurants

and shopping not a theories of cities

and here's what Jane Jacobs discovered

economic growth doesn't come from

capital investment economic growth

doesn't come from ports economic growth

doesn't come from factories well you

know this look we're at Google the real

source of economic growth comes from

people it's such a novel idea and it

makes so much intuitive sense to think

of it economic growth doesn't come from

where the company locates it doesn't

come from big physical investment it

doesn't come from built steel factories

are auto factories it comes from people

who have ideas and she said what's so

interesting about this is when people

come together in a city or a community

and live near one another they don't

just increase their productivity two

times it becomes self reinforcing and

actually she actually leveled this very

implicit critique at Adam Smith because

adam smith in the wealth of nations said

eckin

the crows come specialization and the

division of labor if you can break

things down into more and more specific

tasks whether that's in a shop or in a

factory you can get economy of scale and

a division of labor and you'll be

efficient Jane Jacob said nope that's a

theory of growth but it's not a theory

of innovation because all specialization

really allows you to do is do something

slightly more efficiently if you want to

understand where real economic

development comes from you have to

understand these massive waves of

innovation that comes from people and

people in city she didn't have google to

call upon her Apple she actually studied

the woman who invented the bra it's a

historic don't want to tell you the

story but it's a historical story about

how this lady invented the brassiere in

New York City but basically what she

said is that cities not only make each

one of us more productive because were

diverse and because we have different

perspectives and she said this in a very

matter-of-fact way later at a young man

named Scott page he was a brilliant

economist at the University of Michigan

prove this if you have cognitive

diversity if you have cognitive thinking

styles that differ you get much better

group problem solving and what Scott

proved is that cognitive diversity is

associated with ethnic racial age gender

and sexual orientation diversity so Jane

gives us this basic theory which says

it's not cost that's driving economic

development it's really the productivity

advantages that come from locating in

cities there's one there's two pieces of

that book you guys might be particularly

interested in one as I did with my

collaborator Rob axle who's a brilliant

computer model or adaptive agent modeler

he actually built models and and I could

get you a link we have some video factor

honor we should we should put this up on

our website at creative class common

who's your city calm but we actually

have little videos he built simulations

of how cities form around this Jane

Jacobs principle the talented and

creative people when they come together

they optimize and they magnify each

other's productivity and we did this

over millions and millions of runs

iterations and what you see is these

giant mega regions forming and it's not

like they lock in it's a continual

dynamic process so you see these little

locations starting to build and then one

gets really big and it stays really big

and then two or three get big and then

they crash and you get other ones the

other piece of research I think you guys

would find fascinating is by the folks

at the Santa Fe Institute would actually

use some of our data and some other data

to quantify what they call urban

metabolism and and I this project is

just mind-blowing and we're going to

spend some time together this summer but

basically they said most species have

metabolic rates and those metabolic

rates are constant across species cities

have metabolic rates they're faster and

they said in order for cities to survive

as they grow back they have two super

scale and so that work is talked about

in the book and I think you'd find it

really interesting but the point is

cities are these in cities or what we

call mega regions are these incredible

economic and social organisms that work

not because they're fun and they're

great places to hang out but because

they make people more innovative and

productive so that's the first part of

the book the second part of the book

says well how does this affect kind of

your economic life two things really

struck me in doing three things really

struck me and doing this research the

first 1i called initially the difference

between the mobile and the stuck I now

call it the difference between the

mobile the rooted and the stock

increasingly in our society economic

advantage comes from two people who are

geographically mobile and and that's

something I want just everybody to be

aware i know most of us in this room are

aware of it but most people in society

are not aware of it it used to be that

you can live in your home town and find

a job in a factory in an office building

and be around your family and friends

and do just fine increasingly what we

found and drawing on a lot of other

researches economic mobility is strongly

associated with geographic mobility so

not everybody moves lots of people

choose to stay rooted they want to be

around family and friends they don't

want to disrupt their community they

find that they get a lot of joy from

that and then tragically there are the

people who are stuck who don't have the

resources to move who own homes and

older cities and in places that those

homes are underwater as they say they

can't sell them and and one of the

things that the book points out is that

mobility is is very highly agree is

increasing

associated with socio-economic mobility

the second thing it finds in related to

that and in technology fields you see it

is that job markets are becoming

incredibly specialized sunny sense to

you guys that job markets most cities

used to have a wide array of the mega

reaches a wide array of employment

opportunities now increasingly if you

want to do a certain kind of thing you

have to be in a certain number of cities

well think about the valley and high

technology that's self-evident think

about la in entertainment in filmmaking

the one example I talked about in the

book and especially since my wife Iran

is from Detroit we spend a lot of time

there and we I kind of like Detroit and

I live in Pittsburgh I like Pittsburgh

the example I use in this book is why

would Jack White move from Detroit to

sink Jack White of the white stripes

this incredibly rich and thriving rock

and roll route scene where he kind of

invents the white stripes why would he

move from there to Nashville and he did

he sold his house in Detroit any move to

Nashville and the question I asked

myself I said okay I understand why

technology people would locate around a

Stanford or wherever MIT you know I

understand all of that that makes all

good sense in the university's a hub of

activity we're good friends with the rim

guys ball silly and why they be around

Waterloo musicians could live anywhere

right I mean musicians don't have to

concentrate and collect themselves

together if anything you would think

musicians would be around big markets

where they could get gigs in fact we

looked at the numbers over 40 years

musicians are more highly locationally

concentrated than techies and M

Nashville is extraordinary in that

almost all of the game in the

concentration of musicians comes from

Nashville and we see this since the end

there's a cute little map in there that

we drop of the different kinds of

regions in the United States where

different kinds of professions

concentrate for all the reasons change

Jacobs mentioned that I talked about

before but the point of fact is if

you're thinking about a career you you

have to be really really

really thoughtful about this and as a

young guy will Wilkinson he writes a

fantastic blog on happiness really smart

guy he reviewed and an early copy of

this and I quoted him he said you know

so you want a nap be an actor and you

don't want to live in New York or LA

suck it up and resign yourself to dinner

theater in Biloxi and realize that your

whole career prospects are going to

change so in the final thing on the

economic dimension that I think it's

worth mentioning especially now when we

talk about expensive housing in New York

City and kind of the housing crisis in

America housing is a single biggest

investment most of us make most people

make and there's a great professor at

Wharton a good friend Joe Gorga he

actually looked at rates of housing

appreciation for American cities over

the past 40 years and he showed quite

clearly he called them the superstars

that there are 10 places over those 40

years that have consistently appreciated

at a level that leaves the rest you know

if you bought a house in Cincinnati this

is this example in 1960 you probably

paid about as much as the one in San

Francisco the one in Cincinnati would

have doubled in value the one in San

Francisco would have went up 10 or 20 or

30 times so the point that the book

makes and it's kind of and again a very

simple point that people don't think

about it when you're thinking about

buying a house affordability is only one

side of the equation so you can afford

to buy a house in one of the non

superstar markets it seems like a good

choice but in fact the investment in

housing isn't about what's the cheapest

it's about what offers the largest rate

of return and then think about that for

the choice of location as a whole it's

not just about the trade-off between

what's the most afford think about your

own location choice it's not just the

choice of the place that seems most

affordable it's the choice of the place

that affords the greatest appreciation

well in your in your housing but also in

your career and and people need to think

a lot harder about that when making this

choice of where to live well

the next part of the book veers from

economics into new territory for me and

I think new territory for my field I

want to qualify that because one

reviewer the book said Florida overlooks

he thinks he knows something new about

psychology but he does and environmental

psychologists have always known the

effect of place and hit they said as a

professor he should know better what

will I do know better I actually and i

wrote my psychological colleagues at

common note the literature on

environmental psychology is is wonderful

and if you know it it's about you know

dude how did the tree canopy and I'm

trying to how does the tree canopy in a

neighborhood make you feel if they're

park benches is that good if the space

is isolated and doesn't have a lot of

people do you feel less disconnected it

doesn't talk about the relationship

between psychology and place and

actually personality that literature is

very slim so we did two projects the

first project was by happenstance I had

been interested in how place effect

psychology for a while I had learned in

my earlier research when I done

interviewing and people have said to me

why did you choose the place you choose

to live well they said because I wanted

to be in a place that has excitement

that has stimulation that has energy was

the cons and I actually give a talk to

the positive psychology conference and I

asked about this constructive I've

talked about this construct of energy

and afterwards it a group of positive

psychologist said no no that's not silly

that's actually really important let's

talk about it well they had begun to

collect some data and I got include into

this one day I saw online on a fellas

blog that there had been a study done by

Sam Gosling at the University of Texas

and Jason renfro at Cambridge University

of how they could tell your personality

by the music you listen to they don't

need to give you a personality

assessment they just go look at your CD

collection or your iPod your iTunes they

can tell exactly what your personality

type is and then they started studying

dorm rooms right exactly by how your

dorm room look they could like read with

almost perfect accuracy your personality

type and then of course they started to

mope around office

and I mean it makes perfect sense so I

wrote these guys a note jason writes me

a nut right back he's a young guy just

graduated the University of Texas now a

professor at Cambridge University he's

like I read your book rise of the

creative class it was really great

that's why I moved to New York City

after I graduated it was like Donna he

said you know I started to collect this

data he had date on 650,000

personalities so he said let's map it so

that's all in the book and and we mapped

it and I had to go through this

incredible learning experience there's

five personality types psychological

personality types there's conscientious

people they work really hard they're

very dutiful there's agreeable people

they like to get along with other people

they don't fight a lot they're not very

aggressive there's extroverts right

people who like other people want to be

around other people get stimulation from

other people they tend to do really well

in like sales jobs there's neurotic

people New York is filled with them by

the way it really is that's not just the

fun it really is and and and also places

even like like pittsburgh in tulsa

oklahoma just really interesting and

then there's this group they called open

to experience many people who would work

in your kind of business and certainly

be innovative and entrepreneurial would

fit this open to experience category the

research on creativity suggests the open

to experience personality is highly

creative the people who are

entrepreneurial tend to be highly

creative they also tend to be more

introverted most highly open to

experience people because okkadu

experience people tend to get

stimulation from their work rather than

from other they're kind of different

from an extrovert an extrovert get

stimulated by other people and open to

experience person gets stimulated by

experiences they tend to be somewhat

disagreeable they tend to be somewhat

aloof no I taught a Carnegie Mellon that

was a visiting professor at MIT I

understand so no but but it's just an

amazing thing and then we mapped them

and I think we actually use some of your

mapping stuff some of your heat map

stuff we and we'd love to do more of

this and we got to do more because

there's a first path we mapped them and

and I feel so bad what when I say this

because everybody the conscientious

people were like a blob the agreeable

people were like a blob the extroverts

were like a blob in and then the open to

experience people were like pinpoints

they were in New York they were in

Boston they weren't watching

a few in southern Florida Austin Texas

Bing and then San Francisco in LA and up

in Seattle and Jason I look at this and

we're now probing it an even more the

talent I speculate on this in the book

most economists and social scientists

have have looked at what's happening in

our country and said what's driving

economic growth are people with high

levels of education and they're becoming

a divergent their locations are

diverging it used to be every city had

twelve or fifteen percent of people with

a college degree Detroit Pittsburgh New

York Sanford that might be a little

higher in New York and Boston San

Francisco now san francisco and

washington DC have over fifty percent in

a place like detroit has fourteen

percent so human capital they say our

education is becoming divergent and all

i said in this is what if education is

only one part of skill and then I

thought about all the people who started

interesting high-tech companies and how

many of them were college dropouts right

I mean you know the list better than I

how many of these people were college

dropouts and then I thought about the

fact that according to other research

thirty to fifty percent of all startups

in the United States today are founded

by someone who came from a foreign

country so I said to myself and no one

had ever look at it what if this open to

experience type of person is not only

the innovative creative entrepreneurial

what if they're the migraine and so what

the book suggests is that there's

another way of looking at this

propulsive dynamic of innovation that is

not just skill based and I want to say

this very gently because my experience

at Carnegie Mellon was probably the best

of my life but I posing the question the

difference between Pittsburgh and high

technology in the valley and I and I

suggest gently that it's not the fact

that Carnegie Mellon in fact in terms of

per faculty productivity it is equally

as productive as Stanford or MIT I

suggest that what might be different is

not just the sunshot that actually there

may be more of these open to experience

types of personalities who've clustered

themselves around the San Francisco Bay

Area historically for a lot of reasons

it was open to new ideas it was open to

new people it may be it had Sun and fun

it had great writers there and I'm not

saying these people all of us went

open to people found you know kind of

sorts oh I want to find another open to

experience person I've got to find what

they kind of just ended up and you know

where else they ended up I mean we're

sitting in the middle of one of the

largest concentrations of open to

experience people and one of the things

my work has been controversial about is

is and I'm doing I hope to write my next

book on music but but one of the things

my work has suggested for a long time is

if you want to think about incubation of

technology and innovation one of the

things you could do is track the

location patterns of artists and

musicians and we called it the bohemian

factor it got a lot of controversy but

one of the things that this work points

out is that these bohemian clusters

these artistic clusters are not just

artists you know strumming guitars and

being in the folk bars in the village

and before Bob Dylan and playing jazz

and you know experimental beatnik

lifestyles but these were places that

somehow found it possible that open to

experience people found it possible to

congregate and then all of a sudden they

just became magnets over time

unwittingly for these kinds of

populations and we did one other thing

which psychological data we partner with

the Gallup Organization we did a survey

of 28,000 Americans we asked people two

kinds of questions what in your life

makes you happy and and and you know is

it the what you do is it who you marry

it's the where you live we're the first

people who systematically asked about

where and then we said with regard to

the place you live what are the factors

that really affect your subjective

well-being in your psychology the first

thing we found in a nutshell and then I

want to wrap up the first thing we found

in a nutshell is that the three factors

really determine your overall life

happiness it's not money you know

although there's a threshold there's a

threshold effect it's not money you need

a satisfactory income below that

satisfactory income in developing an

emerging nation you can be terribly

terribly unhappy and dissatisfied but

there's a threshold and it's not a whole

lot of money twenty thirty thousand

forty thousand bucks over it you get to

miss diminishing returns what makes you

really happy is having a job that you

love and you're challenged by it allows

you to manage your time I mean you

guys all know about that secondly what

makes you really happy in your life is

your social connections your

relationships and one of the very very

devastating things we found looking at

some sociological research is that few

we have fewer and fewer real social

connections in our life in fact the

modal number of people we are closed for

close with close confidants in America

is one I mean that is really object ly

terrifying so so so so but people have a

richer social life they feel more

socially connected I think it's

something many people are striving for

young men decent waters were a great

book on this he called it the urban

tribe and he talked about how in in in

it's peculiar among younger groups

people are actually forging new kinds of

communities very different than

communities in the past alternatives to

coupling into marriage and it gets a

wonderful book but anyway found those

two things are really important what you

do and and how excited you are by it and

then and then kind of your social life

we also have an interesting map in the

book we call it the singles map which

shows kind of the places with the best

ratios for men and women which is

hysterical trust me that's what gets the

most hits on the website but gets the

most dialogue going New York is much

better for guys than girls by the way

just let us let you know that the west

coast is just the opposite which is so

interesting to me but then then we

looked at the effect the place place

really has a huge effect on people's

well-being and it's interesting it's not

only about equal to the other two and

the board talks about the statistics

they're not they're close to one another

what's really interesting when we ask

people where stress comes from in their

lives um their job could be a source of

great stress and even their family could

be a source of great stress around three

percent of people reported that the

place they live was ever a real source

of stress now that is very different in

places where commuting patterns are

horrific if people who have long

commutes are terribly unhappy about that

but on unbalanced unbalanced where we

live tends to act on the positive side

of our well-being ledger but the

question we asked about why was really

fascinating and I had gotten embroiled

in a debate with other urbanist

including some in New York at the

Manhattan Institute and what they had

argued is that all of my work on the

bohemian factor we actually had a gay

index with chill

places that have hired gay and lesbian

concentrations have higher rates of

innovation and entrepreneurship and and

they kind of said this is fluffy this is

frivolous you know does Florida really

believe that places that have street

guitarist and people wear ripped

t-shirts and want to live in the urban

core that somehow you know that's going

to out-compete the great suburb so I

said fine fine fine you guys are and you

know I took that seriously I didn't

dismiss it they also said I had a gay

agenda these are just hysterical things

they accuse me of trying to undermine

Judeo Christian civilization I mean this

is just wild but like okay let's look

into it I'm an empiricist I don't have a

values agenda and so we did the survey

with Gallup and we asked about hundred

questions about what people want from

their community we surveyed every ethnic

group every racial group sexual

orientation income groups age groups and

what we found is that there are five

factors that really are important the

first one is is most people given their

druthers would like to live in a place

that's safe and have good schools very

important second thing we found is most

people would like to live in a place

that has economic and social opportunity

the third thing we found is if you have

a good mayor and good business

leadership people are happier but those

were just three fundamentals at the

margin there were two things that really

elevated people's happiness with their

community we asked a question we said

how open good as your community as a

place for racial minorities ethnic

minorities religious minorities artists

techies entrepreneurs family with

children's poor people elderly people

disabled people gays and lesbians young

college graduates looking for work

singles what was interesting is the

places where people reported that their

town was a good place across the board

everybody's happiness factor and

well-being one up guess which group

people said on balance was the group

that Americans were least likely to be

open to we didn't ask atheists dang

young recent college graduates searching

for a job and and we talked about that

in the question second that the second

that factor we found that is the single

most important factor the second most

important factor we found the first most

important the most important factor we

found was we called it quality of place

the physical characteristics of the

place itself we asked you know do you

have do you have parks that you can use

do you have open space are there trails

is their architecture that you and Maura

are do you like the rivers all of this

stuff about the aesthetic character we

call it quality of place you know the

kind of strength of the place itself

places where people report that they

found the quality of the place to be

high the happiness and well-being factor

was much higher anyway I could go on and

on and on I'm pretty good at keeping to

the time you know we all in the academic

world is you know come from the Fidel

Castro school of public speaking so I

could go on and on but I'll just stop

there and and I very much welcome I

welcome your questions and thank you for

your patience and sitting and listening

thank you how much of this is culturally

generalized we have two sets of data the

economic data is worldwide the cultural

data is highly American and Western

centric we now have a research team that

spans most of Europe Northern Europe

with sprinklings in Asia very few in

Latin American none in Africa my goal in

the institute is to make it more

culturally generalizable but to this

point our work has in the cultural and

psychological piece a Western bias I

could and if we follow up I said my

email is Florida at creative class calm

I could ask my research team to think

about whether we have any data on people

who came from other cultures and happen

to be located in North America my fear

just to be honest with you is that those

are not adequate representations of the

phenomena you want we have to go out and

collect deeper samples in those cultures

and constructs

talking about are you know completely

orthogonal to my experience in India

they just don't apply yeah yeah I hear

you and I think and I think where were

you in India was in bangalore and that's

very interesting to me because bangalore

is a spike and if we find cultural

differences or cultural conflict there

then we found something interesting but

but that's one of the things that goal

of our new Institute is to make these

more culturally generalizable and

actually to be quite candid the other

reason we wanted to move outside not

that Toronto's all that far but by

moving to Toronto I felt I really felt

what you you see that much of this work

is American centric and the need to

bring a greater greater global

perspective and hopefully in the future

we'll be able to do more of that this

work to be quite candid hat shares that

bias oh god I don't I'll try to do you

have an idea maybe tracking or

qualifying something that is a

domain-specific network effect where you

kind of just have to be in a certain

guys or like Silicon Valley is known for

the tech startups you can really not do

a deal if you too far away from Wall

Street yes this is not just because

people want to live here you kind of

have to that yeah and i think that's

that's the point of the work we're going

to dig deeper into that but this domain

specific network and the domain specific

networks are not that much overlapping

they are geographically specific to

Silicon Valley tech network the New York

City or London investment banking

network the Nashville is the same thing

for for music deals and Jack White I

didn't get this interview but it came

out after the book he said the reason I

moved to Nashville I don't have this in

the book is he had Detroit had a

debilitating scene and people were kind

of mean but he said I want to write hits

it's what he said he said I want to

write hits and in Nashville all the

people who know how to write hits and

make its live in Nashville I think this

domain specific network is becoming much

more geographically distinct across many

fields and you had your hand up yeah i

mean my question is related to yours and

i was just wondering if that is the case

of people willing to play with our own

yes then how does one create you hugs

like we did would you do anything like

would you do any research into like how

these let me tell you when I asked Jane

Jacobs this question and she's such a

wonderfully brilliant woman here's what

she said to me when a place gets boring

even the rich people leave think about

that I mean it was the most incredible

remark that there are these Gladwell ian

tipping points you don't know when

they're going to occur but all of a

sudden a place that was exciting and

filled with energy and filled with you

know all of a sudden it just gets boring

and they'll and she said to me she said

Richard look at some of the greatest

neighborhoods in the world that are now

slums that there were the greatest

amateur nestlings at some point they

were one of these networks and then it

was all laws so I think at certain

points these networks either become

rigid they become sclerotic or maybe an

entrepreneurial act occurs in a new area

you know maybe Waterloo is one now I'm

just brainstorming with you maybe we're

seeing the birth of one in Waterloo the

one we track historically is Nashville

nasha was a backwater at night now they

had some country players but it was not

a music hub in 1950 and you can watch it

grow so the question is what ignites it

and and what we believe is that they're

kind of random acts it's not Stanford

that ignited the valley there were lots

of possible Stanford's there was some

ignited act igniting act that allowed

that to take off and then they developed

some advantage for some period of time

if they're nurtured but the other one is

look we just came back from Dayton

Dayton was a tremendous center of

domain-specific knowledge and bicycling

and then car and then planes Ron is from

Detroit I mean you're talking about one

of the greatest agglomerations of

Pittsburgh I mean Pittsburgh was kind of

a silicon valley of its day so we kind

of have a sense of why the decline when

they get rigid we believe they're kind

of random acts and and I talked about

this in the book I say I talk about the

joke they asked Lin venture capitalist

in the valley how do you create another

Silicon Valley they said he said take

one great University add venture capital

you know and add a little sunshine

it's not that simple yeah and and they

really are III would i would hunch that

it's places that start to collect these

kind of highly open highly innovative

people and at some point they reach an

ignition point but that's a question for

that needs a lot more study i'll go to

this side of the room and then we'll

i'll try to get as many i'll keep my

answer short so you mentioned that you

surveyed people without their happiness

and factors that would make them more or

less happy and what factors affect their

happiness and when i hear about these

service i was wondering how it is that

you can rely on people to know these

that's a great question did you take

economics of princeton now for instant

has the greatest group of people and

happiness studies in the world Danny

Kahneman won a Nobel Prize for his his

dear and he actually was a consult not

to me the consultant to gallop on these

surveys you try to ask the best and most

precise questions you can but people

will tell you if you want to want the

most precise answers and they're very

hard to do in Kahneman has done them you

have to track diaries that people keep

every day and regularly during the day

and often times if you do that if you do

that you will see that reported

happiness you know what I'm saying if

that on a survey may differ we we hope

and we believe that the data are is

accurate and we ask the toughest and

best questions we could have but there

are all kinds of problems of subjective

bias but the patterns are empirically

robust so they're suggesting there

suggestive I don't want to say this is

the last word they're suggestive of an

effect and I think the most important

thing in this survey I'm a smart enough

social scientist to know how these

things would be so calibrated most

important thing in this survey says is

that place is important I mean if you

calibrate it that way it says it places

this thing we've not talked about it's

important it's a third leg and then I

think to dig into that we're going to do

more calibrated surveys please so the

first is like I think most of us in this

room could probably probably agree with

like the fact that New York is awesome

and like you take Jacobs you understand

like why is awesome is be no see you

geckos in a lot of detail I'd like other

places hard to find other cities in the

New York that has other than New York

could have that kind of quality yep and

yet New York isn't

at least I think we intuitively feel the

New York is very good for the credit

class except demographically New York

isn't really girl fact it in according

to some services are actually well

there's two things I mean this is a very

in North London or or Nora's the valley

north san francisco and so some of my

critics who are very smart people say

well florida has it wrong because if you

look at big globs of employment growth

or big globs of population growth

they're not in New York there in sunny

sprawling suburban areas and and and

what's really happening and I talked

about this in the book I call the

chapter i think it's where the brains

are if you're having a very different

kind of migration you're having a

migration of highly skilled highly

educated people with high incomes to the

new york's then San Francisco's of the

world and in a sense because our

household sizes are smaller most of us

in his room are in one or two-person

households when we move to a city we

might just be displacing it four five

six seven eight person household and

we're consuming even though our

apartments are small we're consuming

more space so what's happening is

wealthier people are moving into these

areas but the population is a sort it's

not a shift and they're displacing much

larger numbers of lower-income lower

skilled people and and that's the way

you have to look at and we looked at

actually the IRS data the tax data it is

it is terrifying this kind of sorting

process the other thing that's really

terrifying is how unequal these places

are becoming I mean you have the

relatively affluent and the super

affluent and you have people who are

just completely at the other end of the

spectrum so in a sense it's not only

that cross regionally were spiky we're

very spiky uneven within these places

please I see your hand up yes yes yes

that's why she said she saw it I mean

she said to me you already got it she

said when a place gets boring I see her

I'm sorry go ahead want any jumping

yes let's do it oh man let's do it

somebody's got to do it oh my god this

is such an interesting because you know

we think I even wrote about in this book

I wrote on my blog about in the valley

the bus and how a lot of my critics said

oh no no no all the gay and artsy people

live in San Francisco all the techies

you know you guys are disproof that

techie people don't like this kind of

neighborhood but it's it's like okay

rich you got it completely wrong all

that one are these conservative Nets

there wasn't more conservative engineers

who want to live in a ranch house and

then all the crazy people your people

the crazy people live in San Francisco

well the bus to me was just the disproof

I think you've identified a great

research project and I don't know if we

could do it together I don't know if the

data is available but simply to plot the

neighborhood locations in in this

location and on the west coast of the

Google people would be I think a quite

remarkable project we really want to get

to these neighborhood effects you almost

need company data or you need somebody

who really knows how to distill census

data but but we believe that it's not

just people moving to New York or just

people moving to Sam they're living in

specific neighborhoods the book tries to

name some of these and we came up with

these funny names like the hipster Haven

or the urban mosaic or like this new

york like parts of New York turning into

the stroller ville you know we tried to

create a typology no data for that but

but but we believe that the data if we

could absolutely app absolutely and in

Crete and if they're not accept is that

they may be our similar income group but

they don't necessarily are similar

ethnic a racial makeup or or or a

similar career pattern but similar

income group did you a question

oh man another another financial firm I

asked them this question I was asked to

address their partners I used this quote

in the book they said Oh Richard we're

not the effect of the real estate bubble

where the cause I mean that's what the

guy no another financial from were the

cause I mean it's our people bidding up

the price of real estate I think there's

two answers to that question one New

York is mistakenly seen as a financial

center it's not we look at the 50

location quotients that are the top

location quotient in New York for three

to four of them were in the financial

markets the rest of them were things in

entertainment design all of the

quote-unquote core creative fields and

then there were three other ones and I

call them kind of the support

occupations of the creative age it was

like entertainment lawyer podiatrist and

personal coach I'm not kidding you and

so there was six out of 50 that were

either financial six or seven out of 50

/ financial or other 43 or 44 that were

kind of creative so I think New York

isn't it is has been a combo

collaboration in the financial industry

the thing is I'm not sure prices will

come down here and the reason is this

market is global it's not a local market

so you're competing for property in New

York City with a bunch of rich people

from the app around the world that said

I think if it comes down at all it'll be

one of the best investments you can ever

make no you know of any of the search

that's being done and creativity is

because I feel like coping mechanisms

promote innovation in a very different

way than the way we perceive the

creative class yeah okay this will be

the last question I can take questions

offline rip Florida at creative class

calm what about creativity and

low-income slum neighborhoods I didn't

talk about rise of the creative class

but there's some misinterpretation to

that book here's the core of my theory

every single human being is creative and

actually one of the companies i use as

my examples of creative companies not

just google it's toyota and and when i

use toyota is an example it's because

it's all the factory workers as the key

source of technological and

continuous innovation not just the

engineers and the folks in the product

development lab what that book really

argues and my subsequent work has argued

and this book talks about a little but

this books about finding your place is

that really the key to building a more

prosperous society has to be unleashing

that creativity and using it in

economically the most productive ends so

no longer having this divide between

those of us who have the fortune and

good luck and perseverance to use our

skills but to make and I'll tell you

guys growing up working class in New

Jersey this all in the smartest people I

ever met were there they were in the

working class tough neighborhoods and

all 99 percent of those kids were left

behind so I resonate with that there's a

growing literature we hope are instant

it's been great to be with you guys

thanks for questions and i'll be happy

to hang around and take a few more

offline thank you