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Local Chambers of Commerce: Not Born for Ourselves Alone
Most people are more interested in organized crime than in organized business. Chambers of commerce do not often attract headlines except for the occasional, inevitable dustup with a public authority. For that reason, this April’s 100 year anniversary of the founding of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce may pass without much public attention. This would be a shame, as groups of companies have left their fingerprints all over the American civic landscape, and were busy even at the birth of Tom Donohue’s organization in 1912. read more »
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President Obama Courts Silicon Valley’s New Digital Aristocracy
President Obama’s San Francisco fundraiser with the tech elites today, along with the upcoming IPO for Facebook, marks the emergence of a new, potentially dominant political force well on its way to surpassing Hollywood and even Wall Street as the business bulwark of the Obama Democratic Party. read more »
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- Middle Class
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- Silicon Valley
Arlington and Shenzhen: A Tale of Two Cities
Seven thousand miles separate Arlington, Virginia and Shenzhen, China. Two continents apart, these two cities could not be more different. Yet they are similar, geopolitically and globally. The characteristics of today’s globalization have united and connected cities like Arlington and Shenzhen. read more »
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- Urban Issues
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Why Downtowns Fail and How They Can Come Back
To many Florida developers in the last decade, downtown condo towers seemed to make a lot of sense. They were sold as the logical locale for active seniors and millennials, great affordable starter homes, and best of all, investments. Reinvigorating downtowns became fashionable currency in many of Florida’s second and third tier cities. read more »
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Special Report: Census 2011: Urban Dispersion in Canada
Canada now has fastest-growing population in the G-8 (Note 1), according to the results of the 2011 census, released last week. Canada's growth rate from 2006 to 2011 exceeded that of the United States by nearly one-third and is nearly one half greater than just a decade ago. The population rose from 31.6 million in 2006 to 33.5 million in 2011. read more »
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- Evolving Urban Form
The Geography of Investment Grade Wines
The world produces more than eight billion gallons of wine each year (including those Algerian reds that taste like lighter fluid). All fifty American states, including Alaska, have thriving local wine industries. The eastern end of Long Island now looks like the Médoc, and one reason that the European Union is suffering its debt hangover is because of the huge subsidies that are paid each year to growers who produce wines that no one wants to drink. But perhaps the biggest success of the industry has been to ferment demand for an oversupply of these barrels. read more »
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- Economics
Sex, Singles And The Presidency
By all accounts both President Barack Obama and his likely challenger, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, are ideal family men, devoted to their spouses and their children. But support for the two men could not be more different in terms of the electorate’s marriage and family status. read more »
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- Urban Issues
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Time to Rethink This Experiment? Delusion Down Under
The famous physicist, Albert Einstein, was noted for his powers of observation and rigorous observance of the scientific method. It was insanity, he once wrote, to repeat the same experiment over and over again, and to expect a different outcome. With that in mind, I wonder what Einstein would make of the last decade and a bit of experimentation in Queensland’s urban planning and development assessment? read more »
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Debating Higher Ed: STEMs, Skills, Humanities, and Hiring
Forget about all the perceived problems with the American higher education system, and ponder these two numbers: 12.8 million and 3.4 million.
The first is the estimate of Americans actively looking for work and unemployed. The second is the number of job openings in the U.S. as of the end of December, according to the Labor Department.
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- Demographics
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