The folks at EMSI, a labor market analytics firm, have issued their latest Talent Attraction Scorecard. They look at, among other things, the places that are gaining the most skilled workers. Obviously their ranking heavily correlate with population growth. What I found most interesting is their specific look at smaller counties and even “micro-counties” with a population of less than 5,000. Plenty of names you might not know but are worth checking out.
Also, I couldn’t resist posting the “This City Is Making a Comeback” bingo game that was circulating on the internet recently. Pretty hilarious. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with having most of these things. In fact, they are great to have. But still a fun meme.
That Talent Attraction Scorecard is interesting. To see Macomb County as the “star” county of Metro Detroit is a bit of a surprise. Certainly, it does well for itself within the metro by pandering to industry, having good enough schools, and focusing on immediate affordability over providing urban amenities. When the economy isn’t doing so hot, it excels by acting as a capture basin for all the people that start finding hipper, more desirable locales a tad too expensive. But it’s rarely viewed locally as a major talent draw. However, I suppose it plays the margins of the metro area so well that it has wound up performing impressively well from a statistical perspective.
I’d imagine a lot of larger metro areas have a Macomb County or two – a place that manages to attract a lot of locals by being affordable and merely tolerable. Few love it, but they’re OK with it, and sometimes that’s all it takes.
The presumption being that surely every city in America has all of this by now. I can name one city that still doesn’t have more than a few of these things. It’s America’s most affordable city and has among the lowest household incomes and house prices on average of any metro in America above a million in population. Any guesses? There is still a ‘hipster frontier’ in the city in question, if they can find it.
Whatever city you are referring to, I believe that the Research Triangle in NC lacks quite a few of those things, but does have a booming economy. Which I think is sympatico with the gist of the meme. It does have a number of IT and biotech companies, and one that was just bought out by IBM, creating hundreds of local multi-millionaires. State Flagship universities, the state government, and a southern Ivy university all help with the economy, of course.
Memphis?
He’s talking about Houston, the most affordable large city in America, even compared to other Sunbelt cities.
Dude. What’s with the tall buildings and parking lots in the background photo?
-DC