Now is the time to make fundamental change in the state’s economic development playbook. What we have been doing has not worked. Michigan's per capita income has fallen from around the national average at the turn of the century to…
Conventional wisdom has it that big cities are dead. This time the cause of their predicted demise is the pandemic. It is widely believed that since you can now work from home combined with a long-lasting fear of crowded places…
For years we ended our presentations with a slide that said Michigan must get younger and better educated or we will get poorer. Where younger meant a place where Michigan was retaining those who grew up here and attracting mobile…
The 2010s were a great decade for America's big cities. The 2020 Census found that each of the top 25 cities in the country gained population. 14 of them had population growth of more than 100,000. New York City led…
More than a decade ago we asked if the state's economic development strategy worked, what state would you want Michigan to look like? Our answer was Minnesota. At the time the most prosperous state in the Great Lakes. And cold…
The Atlanta BeltLine is explicitly deigned to both improve the quality of life of current city residents and to attract new residents to the city, particularly mobile young professionals. This dual purpose is how placemaking should be done everywhere. The…
This post is about what good-paying jobs focused economic development should look like. About what it takes to grow, retain and attract high-wage jobs. It draws lessons Michigan can learn about winning in the 21st Century from our posts on…
One can make a strong argument that Denver is the American region that has understood best the new reality that talent attracts capital. And because it has Denver is one of the regions best positioned to win economically in the…
Today we're pleased to feature a guest post from Ned Staebler, the Vice President for Economic Development at Wayne State University and the President and CEO of TechTown, Detroit’s most established business incubator and accelerator. I’ve been an economic developer…
Today we are delighted to feature a guest post from Global Detroit's Executive Director, Steve Tobocman. He's reflecting on the progress Michigan has made over the last decade in welcoming and integrating immigrants into our economy--for the benefit of all…