Blog Release: Pittsburgh to Launch Entertainment Technology Project

From Pittsburgh Art + Technology:

With six internationally released made-in-Pittsburgh films premiering, a new project will connect Pittsburgh entertainment technology with Hollywood.

PITTSBURGH, Nov. 29, 2010

As three big-budget feature films shot in Pittsburgh premiered this past month, the Pittsburgh Technology Council, Idea Foundry, the Pittsburgh Film Office and Carnegie Mellon University’s Entertainment Technology Center plan to detail the consortium’s Pittsburgh Entertainment Technology (PET) Project.

Now showing or coming soon are “Unstoppable” starring Denzel Washington, “The Next Three Days” starring Russell Crowe and “Love and Other Drugs” starring Jake Gyllenhaal, all of which had major portions shot at various locations in the greater Pittsburgh area. More titles, including “I Am Number Four,” “One for the Money” and “Abduction,” starring Taylor Lautner, are slated to be released in 2011.

With these recent movies as evidence of the region’s growing stature among film producers, the PET consortium will showcase new innovations, products and companies in Pittsburgh’s entertainment technology cluster with the objective of introducing those capabilities to Hollywood and attracting additional film and entertainment projects to the region. Those capabilities include 3-D computer graphics and visual effects, music composition, non-traditional viral marketing, branded gaming, online fan community building and a wide variety of other applications.

In addition, the PET will spotlight the region’s talent, especially as it relates to the southwestern Pennsylvania’s top-tier universities.

To that end, plans include a comprehensive inventory of regional assets, a coordinated marketing initiative aimed at Hollywood decision-makers and a trade mission contest, in which companies with the most attractive market-ready products will be awarded a trip to Los Angeles to pitch their work to industry executives.

Previously, the Pittsburgh Technology Council, in partnership with the PET partners, hosted a one-of-a-kind talk with Mk Haley, entitled “Incenting Innovation with New Media.” Haley currently serves as the associate executive producer at Carnegie Mellon University’s Entertainment Technology Center and a leader at The Walt Disney Company’s new research lab at CMU’s Collaborative Innovation Center.

For more information on the Pittsburgh Entertainment Technology Project, visit:

www.pghentertainmenttech.org

For more information on:

The Pittsburgh Technology Council, visit www.pghtech.org

The Idea Foundry, visit www.ideafoundry.org

Pittsburgh Film Office, visit www.pghfilm.org

The Entertainment Technology Center, visit www.etc.cmu.edu

Pittsburgh Filmography

From “The Perils of Pauline” made in 1914 through the soon-to-be-released “Abduction” starring Taylor Lautner, Pittsburgh has been the location for more than 127 motion pictures and television productions. See the complete list at:

www.pghfilm.org/about/about_filmography.jsp

SOURCE Pittsburgh Technology Council http://www.pghtech.org

Rust Belt Built Boomtowns: Portland

At the center of any US urban boom are Rust Belt refugees. On the heels of college graduates from the Industrial Heartland follows regional prosperity. Portland (Oregon) is a good example. The native talent is less than thrilled with the city's transformation:

In August, 23-year-old Kate Williams, whose jobs have included barista, bartender and coffee roaster, ditched Portland for the third time. "I'm going to California -- going, not moving," she emphasizes. "I want an opportunity to miss my home instead of resent it, and I'm starting to resent it."

The story is similar for outsiders. Many are struggling to make a go of it in such a popular destination. Portland's economy cannot absorb all the talent clamoring to live there. Others don't find success so elusive:

I found getting work ridiculously easy; I had a job within a week. But a lot of people here really struggle. I work with 28-year-old people who make $8.50 an hour and smoke pot all the time and come to work and they're lazy. You could not go to Wooster, Ohio, and do what people do here, or Columbus or Cleveland. I don't understand the structure of it, or why people would want to do it. In five years, what are you going to have, if you're not building real relationships, if you're just doing what you feel like doing? I hired (a guy) at Grand Central. He's one of the nicest people, but he's 42 without any roots. He has no savings; he's living on his sister's couch. He's the quintessential Portland person. If Portland is Neverland, he's Peter Pan.

That Rust Belt work ethic is a competitive edge in hip Portland. The best and brightest leaving states such as Ohio are rock stars wherever they go. They compete. They thrive. They propel the city forward. Not all members of the Creative Class are like this. If you want a dynamo, then recruit graduates from Big 10 universities.

There's a caveat to the magical demographic. It's the talent that leaves that is most desirable. Those who move the furtherest from home are the entrepreneurs that Portland needs. Ideally, they come from Pittsburgh or Cleveland. Shrinking cities don't produce many Peter Pans. That's particularly true in the hearth of Rust Belt Chic.

War For Talent: China

I think I've exhausted the demographic time bomb going off in Germany. There's considerable pressure to attract more immigrants at a time when voters are at the pinnacle of an intolerant mood swing. In China, a looming talent shortage looks more dire by the day:

We've noted this trend a couple of times before (here, for example). The interesting question is how firms in Shanghai, Guangzhou and other cities close to the coasts will respond. Factories can raise their wages and improve conditions to appease picky workers. Or if workers won't come to them, they can go to the workers—moving inland or overseas, where labour is cheaper. (That amounts to paying higher logistical costs in order to escape higher wage costs.) But firms in service industries, like Sichuan restaurants, have to remain close to their customers. So South Beauty is trying a third option: migrating up the age-scale. It has removed the age-limit for applicants, and is now happy to hire older staff.

We talk about peak oil. Is there such a thing as peak talent?

Since human capital is renewable, the metaphor is strained. However, people can't move around the world like oil does. As the above passage indicates, firms are more mobile than talent. Also, necessity is the mother of invention. As the supply of cheap labor tightens, businesses get creative.

US regions could learn a lot from China's demographic challenges. They would also benefit from a better understanding of best talent management practices:

If talent is the leading indicator of whether a business is up or down, a success or a failure (and it is) . . . do you know how to accurately judge raw human talent? Understand a person's unique combination of traits? Develop that talent? Convert what supposedly are "soft" subjective judgments about people into objective criteria that are as specific, verifiable, and concrete as the contents of a financial statement?

The talent masters do. They put people before numbers for the simple reason that it is talent that delivers the numbers. Success comes from those who are able to extract meaning from events and the forces affecting a business, and are able to look at the world and assess the risks to take and the risks to avoid.

What regions do wrong is put the numbers before people. Instead of developing talent, we develop places. Why else would we educate foreign born people at our finest universities and then push them back from whence they came?

Talent retention strategies are cut from the same cloth. There is no concern about developing people. The focus is on a place, such as Memphis. We should be trying to better align the interests of talent and place, not undermining growth and prosperity (which what plugging the brain drain does). The failure to acknowledge the linkage between geographic mobility and economic wellbeing is appalling.

Spinning Migration Data

Politicians are notorious for torturing numbers. Think tanks and consultants also belong on the podium of infamy. I won't absolve journalists, who more often than not eat up the spin. All are in cahoots promoting one brain drain boondoggle after another. Some Texas-sized tall tales:

Texas Gov. Rick Perry peppered his book tour this month with boasts that the Lone Star State had ripped off 153 businesses from the Golden State in the first eight months of the year.

But he was only half right, if that, concluded an exhaustive review of the claim by the Texas branch of Politi-Fact – journalist/fact checkers who call out politicos for their misguided bluster.

The outfit found that Perry's office obtained the figure from business consultants Dun & Bradstreet. What Perry doesn't say is that 92 companies moved from Texas to California during the same period, reducing the net gain to 61. Perry also fails to explain that the D&B figures include companies that stay put but move branches to another state.

The migration unit of analysis is businesses, but the deception is the same. Brain drain Chicken Littles often point to outmigration with no mention of inmigration. This isn't an oversight. It's active deception. You won't get what you want if you present the entire picture.

Exodus Arizona

Concerning the war for talent, Arizona is clueless:

Of course the law has had the biggest effect on immigrants, both legal and illegal, and Latinos generally. Researchers at BBVA Bancomer, a Mexican bank, this month estimated that 100,000 Hispanics, mostly of Mexican descent, have already left Arizona, for Mexico or for other states, because of SB1070. This means a lot of upheaval for families and individuals, and for Arizona’s economy. Ethnic Mexicans, whether native or immigrant, are younger on average than Anglos, reducing the average age of greying Arizona’s population. And immigrants pay more in taxes than they send to Mexico in remittances. Above all, they tend to have jobs—on construction sites, in hotels and homes—that do not replace but complement American jobs, according to BBVA Bancomer. A permanent decline in the immigrant population could thus destroy many more jobs than just those of the immigrants.

As I look at how the economy is resetting during the recovery, Arizona is an obvious loser. Georgia is a less obvious one. Can the Rust Belt step up its game?

Giving Thanks For Steeler Nation

The story is dated, but the recognition is timely:

The People's World took Second Prize in the feature story category for John Wojcik's article Steeler Nation Fights its Way Back.

According to the judges, "Wojcik spoke with out-of-town fans who had made the trek from California to Pittsburgh for the game; it turns out, like many Steelers fans across the country, the family's patriarch had worked at the Homestead Mill until it was shuttered in 1989. Wojcik captures the pride these former steel workers felt in the work they did, the devastation of the mass layoffs, and their struggles since, working fast-food jobs for minimum wage. Wojcik's essay makes an eloquent argument for an industrial policy in America."

"I wondered why there were all these Steeler fan clubs across the country, more than most teams," Wojcik said. "When I was in Pittsburgh, I asked the question of these guys at the bar. It turned out that, because of the shutting of the mills, people scattered and there's this diaspora of people from that area who still love their hometown team."

The Burgh Diaspora sometimes seems as segregated as its hometown. For a few years, I've been aware of the different outmigration patterns for African-Americans. I still obsess gender distinctions. I've thought less about class divisions and how that might impact the expatriate experience.

I would expect white collar, college educated workers to travel far from home. I would predict that blue collar, high school educated workers to bounce around the Rust Belt in search of relatively better economic conditions. I wouldn't guess California as a destination. Is that migration an outlier? If normal, is it unique to Pittsburgh? I find myself always disaggregating the numbers to reveal the more interesting findings.

Crime And Migration

Imagine politicians touting the crime problem in their cities. Rallying a constituency to address the issue is one thing. But when image and civic pride are at stake:

The National Conference of Mayors called the report a “premeditated statistical mugging of America’s cities,” saying the rankings are “bogus.”

St. Louis mayor Francis Slay said on Twitter yesterday “Crime stats reflect crimes. Crime stats rankings reflect how we draw our boundaries.”

Cities defending themselves against negative lists and rankings is an old story. It makes sense. Geographic stereotyping affects the regional bottom line. Neither talent nor business wants to move to a bad place. Which is why I find the public airing of brain drain perplexing.

Neither talent nor business wants to move to a place everyone is leaving. Statistically speaking, the complaints about brain drain are bogus. Yet no one is interested in debunking this myth. Instead, politicians and other civic leaders act to amplify the hysteria. Why?

Policies designed to retain graduates are a waste of money. When brain drain is used to justify public expenditure, then the voters can be sure that the project isn't worth the money. Tax cuts? Once outmigration is invoked, the lobbyists are the ones doing the talking. Special interests love to talk about brain drain.

Stories about more crime are a public relations disaster. The spin doctors come out in force, employing damage control. Let's put aside the discussion about urban crime. Better to focus on the brain drain, a problem that doesn't exist.

More Talent Is The New Oil

The metaphor takes an unexpected and explicit turn:

The labour sending countries of South Asia and South East Asia should form a union like OPEC to ensure that the labour receiving countries implement minimum wages, zero cost of migration, decent working conditions, labour laws to protect the workers and special laws for female workers. The labour sending countries should collectively take a decision not to allow workers to go to those countries which are not prepared to fix a minimum wage and offer them decent working conditions.

You either do what we say or we will withhold the talent.

The more striking conclusion of the policy paper is the admonishment of sending country governments for failing to manage the export of labor. I've been tracking the ineptness of the Ireland regarding the handling of its latest exodus of economic refugees. It is squandering a tremendous opportunity. The same could be said for many regions throughout the United States.

Nevada Exodus

As the situation improves, more people are leaving Nevada:

While DETR's Chief Economist Bill Anderson said the report is a sign that the recession's grip on Nevada may finally be loosening, he added that one contributing factor to the state's unemployment rate drop is the decline in the number of individuals looking for employment in Nevada.

"Most likely, a number of workers have moved out of the state, while some have become discouraged and stopped looking for work," he said.

Parker also said the state's unemployment rate is heavily impacted by a decline in Nevada's workforce as people leave the state and to look for work elsewhere.

Estimates show Nevada will lose 70,000 residents this year, Parker said.

The migration has been occurring for some time, Parker said, but this is the first month people have been leaving the state's labor force faster than it has been losing jobs.

Will the last person to leave Las Vegas please turn out the lights?

Paying Lip Service To Talent Attraction

Concerning the war for talent, most states and regions simply don't get it. The game is one of attraction, not retention. But the latter still receives all the resources:

We Live New York is a statewide organization of young leaders that seeks to attract and retain young talent. The group is teaming with the Empire State Development Corp. and the New York State Urban Council to fund a $50,000 grant for young professionals organizations. Each award will be between $500 and $2,000, and will be given to 10 to 15 YP organizations across the state. ...

... We Live New York also seeks to connect young leaders and YP organizations from across the state to share ideas and collaborate on items that help retain young people. ...

... Projects, Cooney said, can be anything from an outdoor concert to enhancing green space in urban areas, so long as it improves the quality of life for young people in New York. "You name it, we can help fund it," he said.

Established leaders realize the value of retaining young talent.

"The energy that's driving revitalization across the country is the young professionals," said Heidi Zimmer-Meyer, president of the Rochester Downtown Development Corp. "We think if we can tether these mobile young leaders to tangible city building projects, we stand a much better chance of keeping them in New York state."

There is no mention of funding for initiatives designed to attract young talent, which is the real issue that New York State faces. The taxpayers are throwing money down the brain drain and cities such as Rochester will continue to suffer.

Engineering inmigration is difficult. New York would be better off giving money to experiments that hope to attract out-of-staters to live in urban neighborhoods in need of revitalization. Keeping graduates from moving to NYC doesn't solve anything. It will, however, do considerable harm to the prosperity of those who stay. It also helps to entrench the chronic economic problems plaguing Upstate cities.

The return on investment for We Live New York is negative.

Brain Drain Boondoggles: CEOs For Cities

CEOs for Cities Carol Coletta is offering bad advice to Memphis. Increasing the regional educational attainment rate is a good idea. The suggestions about how to achieve that goal are, at best, misguided:

We talked to a woman who knows how to keep talented people in town. Carol Coletta is head of CEO's for Cities, a company that consults big cities on competing for the best talent. Something she said Memphis must do a better job of if it wants to reverse the brain drain.

... "You've got to be able to educate and develop your talent but you also need to be able to retain that talent," said Coletta.

Coletta goes on to say that better place making in the urban core is critical. Once again, fear of brain drain (i.e. outmigration) is used to justify public expenditure. Once again, a civic booster does considerable damage to a region's image.

Coletta is wrong to advocate for better talent retention strategies. Her approach will undermine economic development and harm Memphis. More distressing to me is Coletta's poor grasp of migration and how those flows might improve our cities. Serving up destructive practices is no way to promote urban living.

Mesofacts Migration: Rural Counties

Population decline is not necessarily a bad thing. But that's the common perception. Here is the typical sob story for rural America:

"Rural communities are experiencing the out-migration of their young people, an aging population, deterioration of their economic base, industry moving away. How do they maintain their vitality?" J. Robert Reeder asked rhetorically at Wednesday's meeting of the City Club of Martinsburg, where he was the guest speaker.

Net outmigration eats away at community vitality. That's the assumption. The premise is flawed:

The other set of outmigration counties, however, tends to show fewer signs of economic distress than nonmetro counties with little or no outmigration. Their residents have relatively high education, low unemployment, and better housing conditions than counties with little or no outmigration.

I recommend reading the full report. From the abstract:

Most high net outmigration counties, however, are relatively prosperous, with low unemployment rates, low high school dropout rates, and average household incomes.

Emphasis added. High net outmigration positively correlates with prosperity. This research undermines the work of Patrick J. Carr and Maria J. Kefalas detailed in the book, "Hollowing Out the Middle". The culture of encouraging the best and brightest to leave benefits rural communities. Carr and Kefalas get it exactly backwards. Unfortunately, their message is garnering all the attention.

All the interest in stopping brain drain retards economic development. The better policy course is clear:

People often view the loss of young people right after high school as the critical migration issue facing rural America.

For most communities, however, population growth and economic development depend less on retaining high school grads than on attracting newcomers or former residents back later in life.

Return migration—usually defined as an individual moving back to a hometown or other previous place of residence— is a major component of inmigration to most U.S. counties.

You wouldn't know that if you read "Hollowing Out the Middle". Those authors claim that return migration is insignificant. The research is shoddy, but rural boosters readily embrace it. Established narratives of economic development are killing rural America.

Talent Is The New Oil

The current labor market in Germany is a preview of where the United States is headed. Talent shortages are dominating the economic landscape. Via Demography Matters, East German companies are scrambling to fill skilled positions:

For years, demographers have been warning that Germany could face a labor shortage as its population ages. In eastern Germany, such scarcities have already become reality. Competition for talent is fierce -- and businesses are becoming more generous. ...

... These developments show that the lack of skilled workers is no longer an economic problem but a structural one. Well-trained individuals are becoming the most important and scarce commodity in a modern industrial and service society. This doesn't just apply to Germany, but in hardly any other country is the outlook quite as dramatic.

I think this story puts the recent headlines about Google's brain drain into proper perspective. It's akin to China's scramble for energy to support growth. What does this mean? Labor is capital:

If labor is capital, then we have lost the automatic tight connection between spending and employment. Firms can vary their output with little or no variation in employment. This explains how we can have a “jobless recovery,” meaning a large percentage increase in output without a comparable percentage increase in employment. For firms in today's economy, labor represents an investment. Firms hire workers in order to develop capabilities that will eventually produce output more efficiently. The return on an investment in workers may take as long or longer to realize as the return on investment in a machine. The return on investing in workers may be at least as uncertain as the return on investing in equipment.

The dominant model in play today has firms attracting talent (see the above East German example). Various "bottlenecks" restrict these flows and the resulting mismatches could (I predict will) turn the migration on its head. Companies willing and able to move where the talent is will have a competitive advantage. This is a return to the economic geography that birthed cities such as Buffalo. Production needed to be near the scarce commodity. Bad mortgages and protectionist labor markets are eating away at geographic mobility.

Labor is one of the least mobile forms of capital. To the extent that this movement is restricted privileges the regions that produce the most talent. Regions that improved educational attainment rates through inmigration are in a tough spot. They will be competing with each other for the labor that can still move, driving up the price for that talent. Companies will find it increasingly attractive to move to Pittsburgh if they can't outbid Google.

Moving your company from Ann Arbor to Austin for better access to talent is myopic. It looks good now, but is a bad bet longterm. Ann Arbor is struggling to attract the right people. The suggested policy solution is to be more like Austin. That's the migration game, yesterday's economy. Produce more talent and the companies will come knocking.

Demographically Sorting Pittsburgh

Pittsburgh is shrinking. Pittsburgh is grey (old and damned with a lousy climate). Pittsburgh is tolerant:

In the long term, these immigrants or their children may become local economic stars. In the short term, tension is mounting. Mr Frey found that many of the new magnet states attract immigrants unlikely to speak English or to have completed school. Voters in such communities may view immigration rather differently than do those in San Francisco or Pittsburgh, hubs for skilled, foreign-born workers.

Unequivocally, immigration has been very, very good to Pittsburgh. It's also hard to notice and hasn't done much for the regional demography. Like domestic migration, Pittsburgh tends to attract the few and the very well educated. So does San Francisco, but that city is also an established gateway community for the foreign-born. The Bay Area sports quality and quantity immigration.

Yet Frey (or the Economist) lumps Pittsburgh in with San Francisco. Why?

The answer to that question is long and complicated. Regarding the above article, boil it down to improving educational attainment. Smart cities are weathering the recession well and the politics are less contentious. (So says Brookings) For Pittsburgh, immigration and domestic migration serve to improve the overall skill level of the workforce. Like Google, Pittsburgh is hoarding the best and the brightest.

In aggregate, Pittsburgh is a migration loser. In population, Pittsburgh is a loser. The analysis offered complicates (correctly) that picture. Magnet states are experiencing increasing political instability, which can frustrate recovery efforts. Pittsburgh is relatively demographically stable and therefore ironically tolerant.

I won't get into democracy diffusion theory and demographics. Suffice to say that Grey Pittsburgh was an asset during the turmoil of the recent election. Pittsburgh is ahead of the curve. WAY ahead of the curve.

Net inmigration (domestic or foreign born) is not necessarily a good thing. Those ticking off such numbers did a disservice to their community. I fail to see how one could think otherwise. We obsess population like we do the closing of the Dow Jones. People vote with their feet. End of story.

Where people go isn't a referendum on place. That's a bogus analysis of migration. That's Richard Florida. We can and should do better. Just say no to stopping brain drain. Just say no to resisting immigration.

Team NEO Takes Down Senator Sherrod Brown

Update: Cleveland Heights is screwed:

But now Cleveland Heights wants to be “ahead of the curve” for when things in the economy finally turn around, Mayor Ed Kelley said.

“We brought Howard on to start working, not just with people outside of the community to come in, but with people who are already in the community who want to expand and do other things to retain them here,” he said. “We’ve had a lot of successes in the past few years, and we hope Howard can build on that for us.”

Thompson said he hopes to capitalize on the city’s location next to the medical community in University Circle and beyond.

He is also looking to “reverse the brain drain” by attracting big companies that are looking to expand.

------End Update------

US Senator Sherrod Brown is one of the biggest promoters of the brain drain myth. His claims amount to a data slight of hand. He's also badmouthing his state to the rest of the country. Ohio deserves better during such difficult times. Team NEO to the rescue:

"What we find in the state of Ohio is about 75 percent of the graduates from Ohio colleges and universities are still here either working or taking more school about a year later. That is exactly on the national average," says Thomas Waltermire with Team NEO.

Team NEO has looked at data over the past few years and says young people are finding the opportunities they need in the jobs they want.

Time for Brown to get his facts straight and stop misleading the people. His brain drain tour and suggested policies are a waste of time and money. There are more pressing economic development issues to tackle. Highlighting the brain drain skirts the issue. Is he out of ideas?

Brain drain is often the red herring of last resort. If the situation is hopeless, then highlight something that doesn't matter. Instead of providing leadership, politicians duck and cover. It's a sham and a shame.

Mythic Landscapes: Marcellus Shale

The rhetoric surrounding the shale gas rush is, more often than not, ridiculous. But the following bit of hype takes the cake:

There is a buzz or rather a rumble in Western Pennsylvania! For years local citizens became use to being part of the rust belt. Job loss became the new normal before unemployment grew throughout the rest of the US. But the energy gods parted the clouds and provided our region with Marcellus Shale.

Suddenly, everything that is good news out of Southwestern Pennsylvania comes from Marcellus Shale. The over-the-top branding campaign does have benefits. Exaggerated or not, buzz attracts migrants.

That doesn't mean residents should give the Marcellus Shale Coalition whatever it wants. On the contrary, the bulk of the evidence undermines the MSC's position. The boom is here to stay:

The U.S. has been a net importer. Interestingly, even with shale gas development, the Energy Information Administration predicts (or predicted as late as July 2010) that we will continue to consume more gas than we produce.

It also projects Canada will continue to produce more than it consumes. But, as our story suggests, it will be importing gas to its eastern provinces from the Marcellus Shale because it's closer and, potentially, cheaper than piping it from its western wells.

To what extent that this counterintuitive geographic relationship sparks job growth in Southwestern Pennsylvania is anyone's guess. What counts (in terms of inmigration) is the image of the region, not the hard data. The energy gods are beckoning you to Pittsburgh.

Talent Migration Geopolitics: Turkey

Migrants link two regional or national economies. It isn't a matter of working in one place or the other. We view geographic mobility as a zero sum game, ignoring the importance of the transnational experience. The talent flow from Europe is quietly transforming Turkey:

Once a month, about 50 of them meet in a fashionable bar in downtown Istanbul. It is a time for chat and the swapping business cards and job offers, but everyone is talking German. “German is my mother tongue,” insists Emine Sahin, the 37-year-old real-estate project manager, who organises the monthly meet of German-Turks who, like her, have chosen to come and live on the banks of the Bosphorus. ...

... According to a survey by the German Futureorg institute, one third of dual nationality students in Germany are thinking about a career in Turkey. Companies on the other side of the Rhine have understood how to take advantage of this phenomenon. The Turkish subsidiary of Mercedes-Benz now reseves 30% of its management positions for German-Turks. Government institutions, hoping to benefit from their dual culture, are also opening their doors to Euro-Turks. “Turkey is developing very quickly and needs people like us,” remarks Belgian born and educated Ilker Astarci, who was recently appointed as an advisor to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. “There are more opportunities than there are in Europe. I felt it was important to do something for Turkey, which is my country of origin.”

Instead of trying to retain talented Euro-Turks, EU companies are taking advantage of the trend. This approach can work at the regional level. The Sun Belt boomtowns now hemorrhaging people should piggyback on this migration and redevelop the local economy. Exodus is an opportunity, not a harbinger of doom.

The typical reaction to outmigration is to only the see the leaving with no attention paid to where this talent is moving. This is brain drain, the local labor market losing people. That's the end of it. The act of getting out of town is just the beginning. How far and where they go is very important. Hopefully, they go where there is the most growth so the town they left behind can benefit the most. Inevitably, expatriates are caught between two places. But their hometowns don't seem to notice or care.

Pittsburgh Regional Advantage

When I see or hear "Pittsburgh", regional cooperation doesn't come to mind. A "Balkanized" political geography dominates my thoughts. That perspective is a bit of a myth. While we wait for the day of reckoning concerning the City's pension crisis, a lot is being accomplished at the regional scale:

My downfall was that I like to peer out the window while the plane is landing. I also like the aisle seat, so this gives the person next to me the window of opportunity (brilliant pun, I know) he or she has been waiting for the whole time to get into the plane conversation. “So, are you from Pittsburgh?” my fellow passenger eagerly asked. This led to a brief conservation about where I’m from and learning about where he is from. “So, why are you going to Pittsburgh?” As I explain my research project about sustainable and technology-savvy regions, he looked puzzled. “Really? I don’t know why you’d pick Pittsburgh.”

Those types of responses are exactly why I’m here. People always think of Pittsburgh as the Steel City, but they need to pull back that steel curtain and look a little closer. There’s so much more behind it. As I traversed the red-foliaged hillsides and crossed the shimmering rivers during the two amazingly sunny autumn days I spent in the city, I found folks all over the place who are creating a region where sustainable and digital innovation thrives. Pittsburgh is a great example of how thinking regionally can help turn a steel city into a green city, which in turn is drawing people back to the town.

This isn't the first time I've encountered someone holding up Pittsburgh as a good example of regional thinking. We tend to focus on the dysfunction and ignore the opportunities.There is plenty that can be done regionally without the benefit of merging jurisdictions. Just so happens that Southwestern Pennsylvania is relatively adept at exploiting the work-around angle.

A transformation of the dominant policy geography would be ideal. But it is also extremely unlikely. You best just set about your business. The story about Pittsburgh's revitalization is proof of concept:

A film from the 1950s described the city this way:

“It was a grim city, a city you could taste in your mouth, a city that smarted in your eyes. Smoke blotted out the sun. It filled the lungs of every man, woman and child within its reach.”

“There was tremendous concern about the future of the city,” Tarr said.

Leaders from politics, business, universities and nonprofits all worried that the future of Pittsburgh was literally clouded by all the junk in the air. And, despite all their different interests and loyalties, these groups came together after the war to form the Allegheny Conference.

It’s unclear who created it, but Professor Tarr says this combination was immensely powerful and started tackling the city’s problems.

“I think that the Pittsburgh Renaissance, as it’s called, is the first major effort by an industrial city really, not just in this country, but in the world, to improve itself significantly,” said Tarr.

The Allegheny Conference was able to leverage the political space available. The federalist structure of government doesn't privilege urban/metro policymaking. Brookings is trying to change that. Ironically, the lack of structure informed Pittsburgh's success. The novelty of the partnership allowed a lot more to be accomplished.

Now the Allegheny Conference is a regional institution and emblematic of establishment thinking. Where are the new political frontiers? Right here in the world of social media.

Don't Move To Pittsburgh

Is your company looking for talent? Don't look at Pittsburgh. The region, as the editor of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette once told the world, is suffering from acute brain drain:

If there's a road map to Rust Belt renaissance, a model of postindustrial success, it may be in Buffalo's one-time steelmaking soul mate, a city once described as hell with the lid off.

The leaders of the world's economic powers convened there Thursday for the two-day Group of 20 summit, prompting the question, "Why Pittsburgh?"

"It's a wonderful story of redemption, renewal and renaissance," said David M. Shribman, executive editor of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

It's also a story of pitfalls and stereotypes and of a city still facing serious economic challenges.

"There's still litter on the streets, you can't fly anywhere from our airport, and it's still hard to keep our young people here," Shribman added. "Having said that, there may not be a better place to live in the United States."

Pittsburgh's big moment in the sun and Mr. Shribman mistakenly laments the outmigration problem. This is Pittsburgh's Cleveland Moment, the inexplicable tendency to torpedo your own city about a shortcoming that isn't even true. It's a baffling approach to economic development and improving a region.

There is rhyme and reason to my Monday rant. Michigan Future relays a piece of news that should concern any Rust Belt city:

Important Nathan Bomey article on AnnArbor.com. It’s entitled “University of Michigan microcontroller startup leaving Michigan for Texas”. The reason: not enough talent here. That’s right, not enough talent in our supposedly high tech mecca Ann Arbor. As Bomey writes: The firm, Ambiq Micro, determined that the Austin region offered the best chance of landing the talent to advance its integrated circuitry technology, which improves energy efficiency in wireless electronic applications. ...

... The lesson we need to learn is if you care about the Michigan economy you had better care about the location decisions of mobile talent. And that mobile talent increasingly is concentrating in big metros with vibrant/high density central cities. No vibrant/high density central cities, no prosperous Michigan. It is the straight forward!

Perceptions matter. Mesofacts drive migration and company relocation decisions. Not only is Ann Arbor in Detroit's shadow, many people think the area suffers from brain drain. That includes local people who run or fund start ups. The hysteria over outmigration has a serious negative impact on the bottom line.

CEOs are just as susceptible to geographic stereotypes as anyone else. Would you move your business to the brain drain belt of the United States? Yet this is how shrinking cities choose to present themselves to the world. Never mind that the migration data suggest the exact opposite to be the case.

You best wire me money or your youngins are gonna leave! It reads like extortion given the ignorance. Regions are paying to chase away companies. They are also scaring away talent. Who wants to move to a place that everyone is leaving?

Brain Gain Cleveland

There isn't an exodus from Rust Belt cities. That's a myth. Aaron Renn (The Urbanophile) takes a hard look at the outmigration rates across the nation and comes to a startling conclusion:

Not what you expected, is it? That’s right, Pittsburgh is dead last among all 366 US metro areas I’m tracking in terms of its out-migration rate. People aren’t leaving, just like they aren’t leaving a lot of other places famous for large absolute net domestic out-migration. Not even Cleveland (#13 from the bottom) or Detroit (#17). (In fairness, net migration did turn positive for Pittsburgh this year).

The flight of the Creative Class? Hardly. The numbers tell us that all the money spent on retention amounts to a boondoggle. What strikes me as stupid (i.e. regional suicide) is that shrinking cities are keen to advertise their brain drain problem. You don't attract business by caterwauling about all the talent leaving your area.

Looks like Team NEO has finally figured that out:

"There's just this whole idea that somehow everyone is leaving and its entirely wrong," says Thomas Waltermire with Team NEO.

The stigma of "Brain Drain" is all perspective. Waltermire has crunched the numbers and says the statistics show, Cleveland is gaining and gaining where it matters.

That is quite a turnaround from the absurd Cleveland Plus campaign to keep graduates from leaving. Perhaps you need a refresher:

His 10-year-old company [Collegia] has been connecting colleges and communities to improve the economic well-being and vibrancy of both in places like Boston, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Baltimore.

But PlusCollege is ''the most advanced site we've done,'' he said. For instance, the calendar uses an algorithm that takes a database of 100 activities and spotlights the ones most likely to appeal to the targeted age group.

Hoffman said the desire to keep young professionals at home is not unique to Northeast Ohio. ''Every region feels they could do better,'' he said.

But aggressive region wide efforts to do something about it is a new trend, and Northeast Ohio is ''in the front end of the wave coming across the country,'' he said.

And because college students are ''very influenced by what they read, by what they think is a cool city,'' Hoffman said, then a Web site that helps them find a comfy coffee shop, an electric night life or valuable internships will help them see the grass is green on this side.

The George GundFoundation provided $40,000 for the project.

That's $40,000 paid to blast to the world that Cleveland has a brain drain problem that doesn't exist. Brilliant strategy. That's why Renn's analysis is so surprising. Rust Belt cities expend a lot of time, energy and resources to negatively brand their regions. Now Team NEO is trying to undo this damage. In the past, Team NEO has been one of the culprits of keeping Cleveland down. I'll be interested to see if the organization has really changed its tune.