Even if your region could retain all of its graduates, that would still put your hometown at an economic disadvantage. Consultants travelling around the country telling towns, cities and even states how to keep natives closer to home are offering bad advice. Renaissance Chicago is a good example of the talent attraction imperative:
Chicago’s turnaround following the 1980s was remarkable in that a fundamental restructuring supported it. Specifically, though the metropolitan area shed much of its manufacturing base, its work force shifted increasingly into professional and business services. In response, many Chicagoans crafted a new image of their metropolitan region: Instead of being a “hog butcher for the world” and the regional locus for manufacturing and transportation, Chicago (at least in the mind of its citizens) was moving into a new role as a global city, one whose economic connections were being forged with other world business capitals. Chicago was seen as a city casting off its roots for something better.
To read the full, original article click on this link: Burgh Diaspora - Economic Development From Geographic Mobility
Author: Jim Russel
