The Kotkin article points out that the hip, professional, artist class hasn't "trickled-down" its wealth to lower socio-economic class in terms of jobs creation. In many cities, the urban creative class is not enough to revive the city's economy.
Florida comes up short each time because he doesn't know how to address the inequality issue. So, wait ONLY professional creative types want public transit, bike lanes, grocery stores, pharmacies and restaurants within walking distance? I bet many poor people want those things too but they cannot participate in the New Urban lifestyle because they have been priced out of the real estate prices by these same creative class types.
As a member of The Left, I appreciate the shout-out from Florida here. Here are Florida's words below:
"This is something that lots of people (not Kotkin, mainly my critics on the left) like to make assertions about, but on which there was little if any detailed empirical research. Here is what we found:
• First, a high share of skills, creativity, and knowledge do lift the wages of every class or group of workers—creative, service, and blue collar alike.
• Second, every group does better in bigger, denser cities—wages are higher overall and for each of the classes.
• But third (and here’s the rub), the picture is different when housing costs are taken into account. Housing costs are much higher in bigger, denser, more affluent cities—as
Ryan Avent and
Matt Yglesias have also noticed—because they lack sufficient supply to meet demand. Creative-class wages are high enough to make up for the higher housing costs, but not working- and service-class wages. Though their wage gains are real, they are not enough to cover their higher housing costs."
First point, the higher density of creative class types you have in a city, the GREATER the income inequality. If a working or service class makes an additional 10 cents from a recent job hire, the creative class manager will make at least 90 cents more in terms of wage rate growth. Creative class types reward each other far generously than the non-college degree, blue-color person below him.
Also, because the creative class earn much higher incomes, the price of EVERYTHING goes up in the city: Housing, dining, parking, buying food at the grocery store. The price inflation does far more damage to lower-class wages.
You know, I laugh at the limited housing supply argument. There are so many apartment complexes in some of the trendiest, hippest neighborhoods in DC and Arlington that have plenty of steady vacancies. Some of the newer "luxury" apartments in my neighborhood of Silver Spring have had trouble attracting tenants for one reason or another. The dirty secret is that landlords and property developers will NEVER, EVER come down on rent to fill empty units. An empty unit is not a big profit killer for real estate companies. They will sit on an empty apartment unit for a year or two before some creative class ******* pays the full freight.
It's not in the real estate developer's interest to build more housing. If you have X number of creative class professionals making over $100,000 per year, you make sure the Y supply number slightly trails that market demographic. Why? Because developers can keep increasing the apartment rents for desperate yuppies looking for trendy neighborhoods. Prices keep getting bid upward and the benefits only fall to the developer or property management company.
Middle-class people. Working class people. They are not on the real estate developer's radar screen. It has been this way for the past couple of decades in the DC region. People scuffling at making $50,000 or $60,000 have budget limits with the rental markets and the landlords don't care for people with meager housing spending limits. They want tenants with far deeper pockets.
The only solution is for massive federal, state and local government intervention in the housing markets where either developers are fully subsidized to build housing OR the government must purchase, build and rent out space to middle class income earners (i.e. school teachers, librarians, cops, Fire/EMS personnel, public transit employees, lower pay grade government employees, shopowners etc.)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bluefly
Your premise is misinformed because you use the low-hanging fruit of hipster and equate it to "creative class", which is wrong. Jokestars fell for it, too.
Creative class isn't necessarily artists. It just means professionals, from engineers to analysts. If you have an office job and a college degree, more than likely you're creative class. You probably don't need a haircut, either.
DC and all the suburbs rebuilding themselves into cities are prime examples of professionals revitalizing and creating cities due to their demand for walkable centers over subdivisions, even as they mature into families. Obviously there are both good and bad that come with it, but this article is quite mistaken in its premise.
The rebuttal discredits the article thoroughly enough:
Did I Abandon My Creative Class Theory? Not So Fast, Joel Kotkin - The Daily Beast |
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