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Old 09-08-2015, 07:07 PM
 
Location: Midwest
1,283 posts, read 2,213,136 times
Reputation: 983

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Leps12 View Post
It's not a "Whose dick is bigger" thing. What I'm just clarifying is that I think what the poster had meant was simply, "If you are looking for a well-paying professional job, you might have better prospects in NYC, Boston, or DC than in Philly."

Let me put it this way. I graduated and was looking for jobs. I really tried to find something in the Philly area, and I would say even harder than I did for the NYC area, but ultimately, the first good offer that came along was in the NYC area, so I took it.

He's not talking out of his behind. Again, it's not a matter of who has what and who does not, it's where MORE of it is located. To use an example before from another thread touching on similar matter, Omaha, NE has Berkshire Hathaway headquarters. But is someone graduating from business school going to be looking at Omaha for a job? Unless they are local, most likely not. You play your odds.
Forget just high-paying jobs. It's not like everyone in other NE cities is a millionaire. But in the half a year or so I was seriously looking for work in NYC, I had more job interviews there (by a lot) for middle of the road administrative jobs for private companies paying middle class wages than total jobs interviews I've had in Philadelphia. None of them wound up working out, perhaps for the better, as I'm not entirely sure what to make of my native NYC much of the time. But it was certainly a very moralizing experience.

Paul Levy often writes about the jobs problem in the city, especially the jobs problem outside of Center City. For those who think you have to have something against Philadelphia to notice this problem.
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Old 09-08-2015, 09:48 PM
 
Location: The place where the road & the sky collide
23,809 posts, read 34,443,504 times
Reputation: 10256
Quote:
Originally Posted by Leps12 View Post
It's a bit of semantics here, but what should really be said is that Philly does not have AS MANY of these kinds of jobs. Of course, there are high paying jobs, but let's take a look at the list your provided above.

Lots of what you said are "Meds and Eds", and the fact of the matter is practically EVERY major city except for a few is strong in these areas. And when referring to the Northeast, Boston, NYC, and D.C. are equally stacked as Philly, if not moreso. Do we really need to talk about NYC and Columbia, Cornell Medical, NYU, Fordham, St. John's, etc...and don't even get me started on Boston and BC, BU, Northeastern, Harvard, MIT, UMass, and a ton others. DC- American, Georgetown, George Washington, you get the point. Meds and Eds is not anything that Philly has and other place's don't.

Law firms, same deal. They are everywhere. Nothing that Philly does more of or better at.

Let's get down to the point of what we really mean. Philly does not compete well in FINANCE with NYC and even Boston. And it does not have the governmental positions that DC has. These are high paying jobs that exist in the other Northeastern cities that are not found to a comparable degree in Philly. And before you post a couple of examples of financial firms located in Philly, know that, again, we are talking about the sheer magnitude of jobs, not whether some companies exist or not. Philly simply gets overshadowed in finance.

Is it "right" or "fair" that NYC and Boston "hog" the majority of the high-paying finance and banking jobs? That's debatable, but what's not debatable is that it's just the way it is.
Boston is an also ran for finance. The number two for finance is Charlotte.

Philadelphia comes out better if you expand to the metro level because of Delaware's laws concerning credit cards.
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Old 09-08-2015, 11:10 PM
 
1,379 posts, read 1,720,641 times
Reputation: 1840
This paints a good picture. Here is a map showing the top Fortune 500 cities.

Visualizing the Fortune 500 | Visual.ly

Some interesting things to point out that help this become even more understandable. Philly has the same number of Fortune 500 companies as Pittsburgh on the other side of the state, despite being about, what, three times as large? Charlotte, also smaller than Philly, has the same number as well. Dallas, Atlanta, Minneapolis, San Francisco, and St. Louis, all of which are smaller than Philly, have more Fortune 500 companies.

These are looking at cities proper. If you expand to look at the MSA's, Philly now pulls ahead of many of the above cities (excluding Minny, Dallas, and Houston) but now gets beat by DC-Baltimore and Detroit.

Philly does beat Boston, both in city proper and metro, but Boston comes out ahead if you look at it per capita.
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Old 09-08-2015, 11:11 PM
 
66 posts, read 73,806 times
Reputation: 74
Philadelphia could get a huge boost soon if the tax structure is changed to allow a more business-friendly tax climate.

This is the biggest thing "holding back" any significant growth.

Report: Philly could gain jobs with tax restructuring
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Old 09-08-2015, 11:13 PM
 
66 posts, read 73,806 times
Reputation: 74
Quote:
Originally Posted by Leps12 View Post
It's a bit of semantics here, but what should really be said is that Philly does not have AS MANY of these kinds of jobs. Of course, there are high paying jobs, but let's take a look at the list your provided above.

Lots of what you said are "Meds and Eds", and the fact of the matter is practically EVERY major city except for a few is strong in these areas. And when referring to the Northeast, Boston, NYC, and D.C. are equally stacked as Philly, if not moreso. Do we really need to talk about NYC and Columbia, Cornell Medical, NYU, Fordham, St. John's, etc...and don't even get me started on Boston and BC, BU, Northeastern, Harvard, MIT, UMass, and a ton others. DC- American, Georgetown, George Washington, you get the point. Meds and Eds is not anything that Philly has and other place's don't.

Law firms, same deal. They are everywhere. Nothing that Philly does more of or better at.

Let's get down to the point of what we really mean. Philly does not compete well in FINANCE with NYC and even Boston. And it does not have the governmental positions that DC has. These are high paying jobs that exist in the other Northeastern cities that are not found to a comparable degree in Philly. And before you post a couple of examples of financial firms located in Philly, know that, again, we are talking about the sheer magnitude of jobs, not whether some companies exist or not. Philly simply gets overshadowed in finance.

Is it "right" or "fair" that NYC and Boston "hog" the majority of the high-paying finance and banking jobs? That's debatable, but what's not debatable is that it's just the way it is.

If im looking for "meds and eds", Philadelphia would come right after Boston and ahead of DC and NYC.
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Old 09-08-2015, 11:18 PM
 
Location: New York City
1,943 posts, read 1,469,966 times
Reputation: 3316
Like the other poster pointed out, Philly does have high-paying, high-skilled jobs, but just not to the extent that the other Big 3 do. Philly has world class hospitals and universities, but so do the other three as well. Boston has top Eds/Meds, New York has top of just about everything, and DC has tops for government/law.

So I'll ask the question, what large, high-paying jobs base does Philadelphia have that the other 3 don't have to the extent we do here? I can't think of any.

Again, people on this board get so into the mindset of "bigger is always better". I remember two people arguing over who's city traffic was worse, and they were literally arguing over who had it worse as if it was a badge of honor. Bigger (or in this case, richer) is not always better.

A poster pointed out that they did not want Philadelphia gentrifying to the extent of Boston, New York, and DC. I simply pointed out that Philadelphia does not have the high-end job base to the extent of those other 3 cities, so it was unlikely to gentrify to the extent of those other three. The guy took offense because he somehow saw this as a putdown to Philadelphia, when it wasn't at all. Have you been to gentrified Boston and DC? IMO they are lacking in being interesting places outside a few tourist attractions. New York has been the only one to retain it's "interestingness" IMO.

The fact that Philadelphia doesn't and probably won't have the wealth to gentrify as quickly and extensively as the other places did/are is probably a strength for the city in the end. But you know, bigger is always better...
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Old 09-09-2015, 12:19 AM
 
10,787 posts, read 8,672,443 times
Reputation: 3983
Quote:
Originally Posted by InternetUser2015 View Post
Philadelphia could get a huge boost soon if the tax structure is changed to allow a more business-friendly tax climate.

This is the biggest thing "holding back" any significant growth.

Report: Philly could gain jobs with tax restructuring
Yes, many of us know that. It's old news. VERY old news.
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Old 09-09-2015, 11:54 AM
 
Location: Chicago, IL
8,851 posts, read 5,776,538 times
Reputation: 11467
Quote:
Originally Posted by Duderino View Post
You're not kidding. I can't think of a more soulless large city that has basically sold itself to big developers to completely let itself get taken over by boring, suburban-bred yuppies (not trying to create tension--I'm a boring, suburban-bred yuppie, too, but economic and racial diversity is key for vitality). DC is actually a good case study for Philly in terms of seeing what can happen when development/gentrification goes too far.

While change in Philly can seem frustratingly slow at times (although even that seems to be changing), at least the benefit is the city is much more cautious and balanced in its approach to new development and its affect on people.
One of the things I've always loved about Philly is the way that it seems to balance gentrification, but at the same time retain the core-historic identity of the city (Boston is pretty similar too). Even though Philly has been booming lately, it still doesn't seem like people completely displaced, and many of its core neighborhoods still seem to retain their identities. At the same time, the new development brings growth to the city and it's a win-win for longtime residents, newcomers, and the city in general. The development seems very strategic.

In Chicago, at the neighborhood-level we do a good job of keeping the neighborhoods very authentic, and balancing gentrification. Although, there is a lot of development downtown (Loop/River North) that seems unnecessary at times and seems it could be strategically better in other parts of the city. There are other parts of the city that could benefit greatly from gentrification.

Although it might seem slow, I think Philly has done a great job in gentrification.
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