The number of eating places per capita is a key measure of a city’s livability Cities are great places for consumers. They provide an abundance and variety of choices, especially in the form of experiences. While our conventional economic indicators don’t fully capture the nature and depth of choices in cities, there are some measures […]
Consuming the city: Ranking restaurants per capita Read More »
The Big Idea: Many metro areas vie for the title of “best food city.” But what cities have the most options for grabbing a bite to eat — and what does that say about where you live? There are plenty of competing rankings for best food cities floating around the internet. You can find lists
You are where you eat. Read More »
The essence of cities is bringing people—from all walks of life—together in one place. Social interaction and a robust mixing of people from different backgrounds, of different ages, with different incomes and interests is part of the secret sauce that enables progress and creates opportunity. This ease of exchange underpins important aspects of our personal
Great public spaces make great cities. But so do great private spaces. They provide opportunities for people to socialize, and provide the character that make a city more livable and unique. We have already talked about how restaurants add value to a city– but thought we’d look at bars in the same way. Now, what
We recently featured a post regarding how venture capital is associated with economic mobility. We know that these are strongly correlated—and that, if we are concerned with the ability of children today to obtain ‘The American Dream,’ we should be concerned with how to increase economic mobility. To understand more about how cities can increase
How is economic mobility related to entrepreneurship? (Part 2: Small Business) Read More »
The work of Raj Chetty and his colleagues at the Equality of Opportunity project has spurred intense interest in the extent of economic mobility, measured by the likelihood that children born to low-income parents achieve higher economic status when they are adults. Their work shows a remarkable degree of geographic variation in intergenerational economic mobility.
How is economic mobility related to entrepreneurship? (Part 1: Venture Capital) Read More »
Note: This article appeared originally in the February 13, 2010, edition of The Oregonian. Forgive any anachronistic references. These are tough economic times. Although economists tell us the recession is officially over, a double-digit unemployment rate tells us something different. The bruising battle over the economic consequences of tax Measures 66 and 67 underscored deep disagreement
Keeping it Weird: The Secret to Portland’s Economic Success Read More »
Which metropolitan economies are the most productive? Our broadest measure of economic output is gross domestic product — the total value of goods and services produced by our economy. Economists usually compare the productivity of national economies by looking at GDP per worker or per employee. At the sub-national level, the Bureau of Economic Analysis
How productive is your city? Read More »
Local media over the course of the last several months have asked us variations on one question repeatedly: if our city wants to do better – be more productive, retain more young people, reduce poverty—how can it do that? That’s a very complicated question of course, and each metro area and urban core has its
One tip for a prosperous city economy Read More »
The Big Idea: Many metro areas vie for the title of “best food city.” But what cities have the most options for grabbing a bite to eat — and what does that say about where you live? There are plenty of competing rankings for best food cities floating around the internet. You can find lists
You are where you eat. Read More »
