Richard Florida on the issue of rising economic inequality

In 2002, Professor Richard Florida literally wrote the book on how and why high tech businesses clustered in certain areas, and completely ignored others.  The old, Industrial Age businesses went to cities that bribed them with tax incentives and infrastructure improvements.  When one of those companies built a factory in a city, the workers followed.  Richard Florida found that the high tech industry did just the opposite.  Those businesses moved to where the talented workers were.  Those workers were the Yuppie hordes that moved to cities with good art and music scenes, tolerant cultures, and lots of fun stuff going on. 

That 2002 book by Florida, The Rise of the Creative Class, got towns and cities all over the world trying to create a better environment to attract those high tech and similar workers, what he called "The Creative Class."

 It happened right here in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where I'm living now.  The old Reynold's tobacco complex that built the economy of this city has been turned into a biotech research and business incubator.  The old warehouses that once held tobacco and textile mills are now Yuppie apartments.  The downtown area  that was largely empty 20 years ago is now bustling and being rebuilt.  Winston-Salem is one of many cities that have amped up their downtowns in the 15 years since Florida's seminal book. 

But the high tech success comes at a cost, and the cost is turning out to be much higher than Richard Florida originally anticipated.  When the high tech Yuppies deem a place cool and start moving in to work in new, high paying jobs, several things happen.  They drive up real estate prices, which make it much harder for the lower paid service workers to survive.  They wind up gentrifying old neighborhoods, often driving out some of the quirky and artsy businesses that made the place cool in the first place.  As a city focuses on rebuilding their downtown to attract these Creative Class workers and hopefully attract high tech start-ups, money is diverted from other parts of the city, and rural areas.  This is the New Urban Crisis, the title of Florida's new book. 

Decades ago, the "white flight" to the suburbs left many downtown areas poor and decaying.  Urban decay became a huge problem, and ultimately led to all kinds of crime, rampant drug problems, and riots.  In today's world, the downtown areas have been reclaimed by the Creative Class and other high paid workers, while suburbs, small towns, and rural areas now have major drug epidemics, more violent crime, poverty, and millions of poor people who are sick of their lowering standard of living. This rising unease of the suburban and rural poor fuels the populist movements on both the Left and the Right, and much of the polarization in our country.  Now Florida is setting his sights on how to combat this and raise the standard of living for everyone.