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Little Rock's Creative Class


turboturtle

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Has anyone read Richard Florida's, "The Rise of the Creative Class?" I haven't read it yet, but I have the book. It is on my list to read next.

I keep coming across him and recently got a RSS subscription to his site.

A fair amount of his blog posts intrigue me and are topics that we don't discuss much here. Because economic development is a major component of what the Creative Class theory is about, I believe this topic is relevant to the forum.

Any Creative Classers out there? Share your thoughts and ideas, particularly as they relate to The Rock. Even if you think it is a bunch of hooey, share.

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Here's a link to the Washington Monthly Article:

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/...05.florida.html

Little Rock's 8th out of 32 in the medium sized city ranking.

Fayetteville, on the other hand, is 57th out of 62.....

57th! hmm... I'm finding this hard to believe.... I'll read it when I have more time.

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Here is a link to Richard Florida's The Creative Class Exchange blog about Today's young workers.

Little Rock is not included in the post. However, there has been discussion about Dallas in the "Little Rock versus Larger Cities" sub-forum. Drilling down into the stats from the link above, it shows Dallas with an rank of #5 in percentage (18.44%) of young workers (ages 25-34) of entire population. Dallas ranked #9 in the list of total population and #6 in the list of population size of 25-34 year olds (young workers). What is more interesting is between 2000 and 2006, Dallas lost a percentage (-6.76%) of this young worker population. Conversely, Austin gained +5.27% during the same time period. Austin is #1 in percentage (20.35%) of young workers of entire population.

For more comparison, Memphis is at 13.67% percentage of young workers of entire population. Between 2000 and 2006, Memphis lost -14.17% of there population of young workers.

So what does this mean for Little Rock, who knows? My gut tells me Little Rock has probably decreased over the 2000 to 2006 time period. But, I bet the percentage drop is more similar to Dallas than Memphis. I am also guessing the Rogers(NWA) has seen an increase.

I'd like to see an age distribution across 25 to 34 for Little Rock. From 2000 to 2006, I'd expect to see I larger decrease in the 25 to 29 segment and some stability (maybe even a slight increase) in the 30 to 34 segment.

Anyone want to speculate on what Little Rock has that would attract young workers?

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The greated threat to future growth and success in Little Rock, AR and the entire state is "Arkansas Drops To No. 50 Of Residents With 4-Year Degrees." The bottom five were Louisiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Arkansas and West Virginia.

The opportunity costs incurred when start-ups and established companies chose not to locate in the State are tremendous. Based on my observations, that the majority of my academic and socio-economic peers left Little Rock after high school and have not returned, I'm convinced Little Rock suffers from this today.

Bill Halter's Lottery amendment seems like a chance to begin to turn this around.

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The greated threat to future growth and success in Little Rock, AR and the entire state is "Arkansas Drops To No. 50 Of Residents With 4-Year Degrees." The bottom five were Louisiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Arkansas and West Virginia.

The opportunity costs incurred when start-ups and established companies chose not to locate in the State are tremendous. Based on my observations, that the majority of my academic and socio-economic peers left Little Rock after high school and have not returned, I'm convinced Little Rock suffers from this today.

Bill Halter's Lottery amendment seems like a chance to begin to turn this around.

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The greated threat to future growth and success in Little Rock, AR and the entire state is "Arkansas Drops To No. 50 Of Residents With 4-Year Degrees." The bottom five were Louisiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Arkansas and West Virginia.

The opportunity costs incurred when start-ups and established companies chose not to locate in the State are tremendous. Based on my observations, that the majority of my academic and socio-economic peers left Little Rock after high school and have not returned, I'm convinced Little Rock suffers from this today.

Bill Halter's Lottery amendment seems like a chance to begin to turn this around.

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The greated threat to future growth and success in Little Rock, AR and the entire state is "Arkansas Drops To No. 50 Of Residents With 4-Year Degrees." The bottom five were Louisiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Arkansas and West Virginia.

The opportunity costs incurred when start-ups and established companies chose not to locate in the State are tremendous. Based on my observations, that the majority of my academic and socio-economic peers left Little Rock after high school and have not returned, I'm convinced Little Rock suffers from this today.

Bill Halter's Lottery amendment seems like a chance to begin to turn this around.

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No I'm really not kidding. I plan to vote for the lottery.

It is unlikely that I'll ever participate in it. That, however, is not a moral judgment. The low likelihood of my playing the lottery is my choice based on my adversity to some risks. I never went to Oaklawn until I was 35. Also, the one time I went to Las Vegas, I played the nickel slots with a roll of nickels. When I was done, I called it quits.

If someone wants to play the lottery, and there is a legislated allocation of funds for Arkansans to attend college, whose principle obstacle to attending a 2 or 4 year Arkansas college or university is the cost of tuition and books, then I'm behind it. Many states have already exercised this vehicle. Lotteries are a last resort. And Arkansas is dead last in percentage of population with 4 year degrees.

An alternative would be to increase state taxes for the purpose of funding more scholarships. Is this preferred? Who is advocating this alternative? OR, maybe some Arkansas are content with the status quo. That's not me.

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Out of my graduating class of 89 students, only 2 people finished their degree, myself included. I am not sure why most people don't finish their degree. I knew some who partied away their college education, some who had kids and dropped out, some who transferred out of state, but many people I knew in college just left and I never saw them again.
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We do a lot of higher education work, a good portion at 2-year institutions. I've had more than one administrator state that a common problem is that people of modest means qualify for student loans or financial aid, but when push comes to shove, decide to use their stipend on a truck payment (etc.) instead of books, tuition, etc. Really short-sighted stuff - a sad state of mind for more and more Americans, who place instant gratification above a long term investment in themselves.
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We do a lot of higher education work, a good portion at 2-year institutions. I've had more than one administrator state that a common problem is that people of modest means qualify for student loans or financial aid, but when push comes to shove, decide to use their stipend on a truck payment (etc.) instead of books, tuition, etc. Really short-sighted stuff - a sad state of mind for more and more Americans, who place instant gratification above a long term investment in themselves.
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Maybe one of problems with education in the state has to do with its perception by the public. You go to most high schools in the state and sports are more important than a quality education. I doubt if any high school in the state spends more money each year on their library than their sports. The results of this view point is there are more important things in life than an education. Just think if the money spent on athletics in the public schools was redirected into a robotics program. The schools could compete against each other and a final tournament could be held each year. What do you think the perception from the outside would would be if Arkansas spent $100 million dollars on something like this instead of athletics? This is just one example of what could be done.
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