Seeding the Vision: Creative Baltimore
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Seeding the Vision: Creative Baltimore Authors: Dr. Zoltan Acs, McCurdy Distinguished Professor of Entrepreneurship at the Merrick School of Business, University of Baltimore Monika Megyesi, graduate student at the University of Baltimore Research Assistant: Annabel Acs, undergraduate student at Boston University Graphic Design: Brandy Zhang, graduate student at the University of Baltimore Inquiries regarding this publication can be directed to: Richard Clinch Program Director Jacob France Institute University of Baltimore 1420 N. Charles St. Baltimore, MD 21201 410-837-4988 [email protected] This report was made possible through partial support from the Office of the Provost, University of Baltimore. The authors are extending their special thanks to the Merrick School of Business and many other individuals who actively contributed to the creation and promotion of Seeding the Vision: Creative Baltimore. Introduction The concept of creative class, as a plausible paradigm unique aspects of traditionally industrial regions. Industrial for contemporary economic growth, awakened significant regions have had a difficult time emerging as creative hubs. interest among academics and the civic leadership community. Nevertheless, among metropolitan areas with populations of In his book, The Rise of the Creative Class1, Richard Florida one million or more, Baltimore ranks 17th in percentage of correlates a region’s economic development with its share of Creative Class population and is the first industrial city to creative talent, tolerance towards diversity, capacity to invent begin a turnaround. or improve technology, and richness of public amenities. While Baltimore does well when compared to its In a nutshell, amenity-rich communities with a high peer cities, it does exceptionally well when combined as degree of diversity attract young, educated, and creative part of the Washington—Baltimore megalopolis. In a sense, people who contribute directly to economic growth. Members then, part of Baltimore’s true strength and potential lays in of the creative class—including scientists, engineers, archi- its proximity to Washington, DC. This unique positioning tects, designers, educators, artists, musicians, entertainers, provides Baltimore with a competitive advantage, since etc.—stimulate a region’s economy by introducing new ideas, Washington, DC is a truly modern, creative and high-tech new technology, and new creative content. Knowledge and epicenter. professional workers who engage in complex problem solving As an integrated part of the greater Washington that involves a great deal of independent judgment also belong metro, in the overall Creativity Index, Baltimore helps to this category. outrank the three largest consolidated metropolitan areas In total, the creative sector of the American economy (CMSAs): New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island, employs more than 30% of the workforce and accounts for Los Angeles-Riverside-Orange County, and Chicago-Gary- nearly 50% of all wages and salaries earned in the U.S. This Kenosha (Table 1). The Washington-Baltimore Megalopolis ratio becomes increasingly important considering that lack of is also nationally ranked No. 1 on its percentage of creative diversity, tolerance, and a knowledge-based economy leads to talent in the region. The tremendous importance of this an out-migration of creative people, or brain-drain, to other ranking is understood as Baltimore’s immediate access to regions. the most significant economic force of our age: creativity. Creativity, as a major economic force, changes An analysis similar to this report2 but focusing on the way companies, cities and countries compete. Across Arlington County, VA, was published by Arlington Economic the U.S., creative metropolises have begun basing their Development (AED) in January of 2005. It claims that economic development strategies, at least partly, on building Arlington, despite its commonly perceived suburban profile, communities attractive to the creative class worker. fares well on several creativity measures, and is already There are countless examples of such transformations a “diverse and inclusive world-class urban community,” among high-tech regions from Silicon Valley to Seattle to attracting top talent from the Washington, DC region. Boston’s Route 128 area, and so on. Baltimore has an even greater potential to attract creative What has received less attention is how traditional talent, thanks to its greater openness to diversity3, a more industrial cities in the old industrial parallelogram – bordered established technology base, and more appealing territorial by Green Bay, WI; St. Louis, MO; Baltimore, MD; and amenities. Portland, ME – have fared as creative centers. Baltimore, as This research seeds a daring vision for Creative a southeast anchor of this parallelogram, incorporates many Baltimore: to be the first industrial metropolis establishing 1 Table 1 Creativity Index Ranking Within Size for Benchmarked CMSAs (Rank Ordered List by the Creativity Measure) Within Size Within Size Within Size Within Size Target Statistical Area Creativity Technology Tolerance Talent Rank Rank Rank Rank Washington--Baltimore, DC--MD--VA--WV CMSA 8 15 1 16 New York--Northern New Jersey--Long Island, NY--NJ--CT--PA CMSA 13 23 10 14 Los Angeles--Riverside--Orange County, CA CMSA 18 19 31 10 Chicago--Gary--Kenosha, IL--IN--WI CMSA 23 29 18 30 Source: Kevin Stolarick, PhD - Carnegie Mellon University Attracting Creative Talent itself as an inclusive, diverse, and creative economy. This Human creativity, the driving force in modern report also intends to educate community and civic authorities urban development and economic growth, is a consequence on the viability of this vision, and to mobilize them towards its of nurturing and stimulating environments. Talented implementation. Baltimore, more than any other city in the people are highly mobile and attracted to regions that region, has the opportunity to capitalize on the regional and offer not only economic opportunities, but also amenities global creative economy. for a variety of lifestyles. Key to understanding the new The feasibility of this claim is demonstrated in economic geography of creativity and its effects on the following pages, starting with a short description of the economic outcomes are the 3Ts of economic development: theory on creativity. An analysis of Baltimore’s performance Talent: or creative share of the workforce, based largely on dimensions of Talent, Tolerance, Technology, and on demographic, educational, and occupational Territory follows. This report analyses Baltimore both as characteristics. a metropolitan area generally and as a counterpart to other Tolerance: or diversity, based on indexes related to traditional industrial cities. It concludes with a short summary immigration, integration, sexual orientation and of findings. bohemian culture. Technology: or innovation, measured by patent activity and the high technology share of the economic base. Each T is a necessary—but by itself insufficient—condition to attract creative people, develop the creativity of the in- NOTE: digenous population base, generate innovation, and stimu- 1. Florida, Richard, The Rise of the Creative Class. Basis Books, New York, NY. 2002. All references to the “Creative Class” are derived from late economic growth. Richard Florida combines the 3 T’s this text unless otherwise noted. into a Creativity Index, in order to rank the creative poten- 2. The report titled “Benchmarking the Creative Class in Arlington, VA” (by Terry Holzheimer and Lauren Hodgin) is available on the Arling- tial of metropolitan regions. Additionally, this report ex- ton Economic Development website at http:// www.arlingtonvirginiausa.com/docs/creativeclass.pdf. pands on a fourth T—Territory—to account for Baltimore’s 3. The Arlington report measures diversity purely based on the region’s rich territorial and communal amenities. Based on rele- share of foreign-born population. It does not consider measures like the Gay Index and Bohemian Index. vance and availability of data, the 3 T’s (Talent, Tolerance, Technology) and the 4 T’s (Talent, Tolerance, Technology, Territory) are used interchangeably, as context dictates. 2 CreativityTable 2 Index Ranking for All Statistical Areas Creativity Index Ranking for All Statistical Areas (Rank Ordered List by Creativity Index) Target Statistical Area Creativity Index Talent Index Tolerance Index Technology Index Austin TX 0.991 0.956 0.790 0.848 San Francisco CA 0.988 0.957 0.939 0.844 San Jose CA 0.985 0.990 0.863 0.896 Raleigh-Durham NC 0.982 0.976 0.646 0.809 Seattle WA 0.979 0.956 0.789 0.808 Oakland CA 0.976 0.920 0.900 0.795 Boston MA-NH 0.970 0.967 0.671 0.677 Sacramento CA 0.967 0.802 0.778 0.703 Washington DC-MD-VA-WV 0.964 0.986 0.824 0.694 Atlanta GA 0.961 0.824 0.720 0.743 Portland OR-WA 0.955 0.838 0.714 0.829 Dallas TX 0.946 0.849 0.793 0.765 San Diego CA 0.940 0.820 0.839 0.778 New York NY 0.927 0.886 0.866 0.545 Phoenix AZ 0.909 0.659 0.739 0.779 Minneapolis MN-WI 0.906 0.890 0.613 0.676 Baltimore MD 0.903 0.874 0.671 0.497 Los Angeles CA 0.888 0.727 0.902 0.484 San Antonio TX 0.870 0.621 0.634 0.708 Philadelphia NJ-PA 0.867 0.812 0.595 0.619 Denver CO 0.861 0.887 0.763 0.557 Chicago IL 0.855 0.811 0.724 0.616 Source: Kevin Stolarick, PhD - Carnegie Mellon University Kevin Stolarick, PhD Information Systems Program Porter Hall 100A Carnegie Mellon Software Center Table 3 Creativity Index Ranking for Benchmarked Statistical Areas (Rank Ordered