The hand-wringing continues here in Boston. On the one hand, business leaders lament a brain drain as high skilled college graduates leave the area because they cannot afford to live here. More disturbingly, low skilled workers give up looking for jobs because the jobs just don’t exist anymore. If it is all true, it is a recipe for disaster; exactly the danger Richard Florida describes in the Flight of the Creative Class and considers in this analysis of the recent elections. A widening opportunity gap is creating a fundamental economic polarization in this country…the so-called “wedge issues” that appear to divide people along social lines are mere indicia of a larger discontent that is, at its heart, driven by economic forces.
The anger is palpable. I am lucky to be in this beneficiary class and it must be infuriating when people learn that I can move from one high-paying job to another…and that my skill set is basically the ability to learn fast and do anything. Meanwhile, people who are not in that class are trying to figure out how they can possibly afford to buy a $500K starter home.
The MassINC study, downloadable after registering on their site, paints a picture of a shrinking labor force that mean Massachusetts might simply lack the workforce to participate in the next recovery. But I think that fear, in terms of “creative class” or “knowledge” workers is overstated. As tech starts booming again, people will stay here after graduating college or they will relocate. It will take a much longer cycle of cultural depression to completely tarnish the “hub of the solar system,” “Athens of America” mystique.
The growth of an underskilled, frustrated class of unemployed, low skill workers, coupled with the ongoing “domestic outmigration” does create a community and social problem that is a greater threat. As Robert Putnam described in Bowling Alone, the national decline in many measures of civic participation is most directly driven by generational differences…e.g. the generation born during WWII has been carrying the load for far too long, and as the baby boomers and Xers age and occupy a greater percentage of the civic population, their aggregate lower participation levels reduce the overall participation levels. If you now add to this phenomenon a localized effect of creative class people leaving and service class people either leaving or becoming unemployable, you can see a compounding effect–an unhealthy storm of conflict and a lack of social and community resources to deal with that conflict.
But what, exactly, are we to do about it? That’s where things break down. The motivated, educated, driven people will consume the helpful career advice of writers like Penelope Trunk on things like time management, but what does that stuff say to people who are angry and frustrated and tired of trying to fit in or just get a break? I cannot visualize how any form of “worker retraining” is going to help people learn to adapt. My job is because of a different way of looking at things and a lifetime of choices, experiences, and opportunities. I am not saying that people are not smart enough, but we are asking a lot when we say that people just need to adapt. But we are creating false hope if we believe we can train people into a mindset that, frankly, is sometimes hard even for us “knowledge workers” to sustain.
We need a mix. It’s not just that we need service people to serve the creative people, but we need a healthy community of people who contribute in many ways. That requires balance in many areas–like home affordability–and a committment to an inclusive value system. The danger, the reason people are getting worried, is that we can feel the lack of balance in the status quo and we should know that the system will correct itself one way or another. If we ignore the plight of those who are being displaced and simply look after our own interests…we do so at our own moral and economic peril.
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