Map from the Toronto Star.
Indianapolis takes first place and Boston second (so much for the curse of the Bambino). New York is 12th, D.C. 35th, L.A. 14th, Chicago 23rd. The ranking, by the Toronto Star, calculates the winning percentages since 2000 for the 37 U.S. and Canadian cities with at least two professional sports teams.
The H-1B’s spousal complement, the dreaded H-4 or “dependent” visa, means if he wants to stay and work in America, his brilliant, cheerful and pregnant wife Samvita Padukone, 27, would be chained at home by work restrictions. “The H-4 is out,” he says, sitting next to Padukone in their Toronto home. “Because there’s no way that I would be comfortable – I mean, I don’t have the right, to tell my wife `You have to sit at home and be barefoot and pregnant.’ No one has the right to tell anyone that, let alone someone who studied in Singapore on scholarship.” …
The couple’s situation isn’t unique. Mavinkurve, who works on digital mapping and was recently promoted to head a team at Google’s California headquarters, says he is one of several Google employees stationed in Canada because of American visa restrictions. Noting that Alberta has targeted H-1B holders, he says “Canada is already showing signs of capitalizing on America’s misguided `walls.’” …
“It’s hard for me to know what `from’ means. I was born in Bombay and I have a lot of family there. But I grew up in Saudi Arabia, because that’s where my dad was working for a long time. And then at the age of 14 I went to America,” he says. “The baby will just, kind of, be born whenever, wherever we are.” Living here and working for a company in California presents its own, uniquely modern challenges” …
This past Saturday we went to a party in Miami hosted by a young gay couple who are planning on having a family – one’s a Canadian with long experience in financing sustainable investments in emerging economies, the other an American with strong ties to Miami. They’re looking at houses in Toronto – because it’s a great place to raise a family and because of the economic crisis.
Crises are times when the relative positions of nations and cities can, and frequently do, change quickly. The closing of European economies during the late 20s and 30s causes a massive movement of top scientific, entrepreneurial, and creative talent to the United States. I’m not saying anything like that will happen to the U.S. But when it comes to top talent, the margin can really matter. If talented people or their spouses face obstacles to working and living in the U.S., they will go elsewhere: some will return home, some may go to Canada. Enterprising companies will open up facilities where needed to attract this talent. Over time, these sorts of places can develop a self-reinforcing cycle of growth, developing greater abilities to attract talent.
Spikiness is not just something that creates winners and losers across global cities and regions, it also occurs inside cities as well, with the globe’s tallest spikes seeing some of the highest levels of inequality. This Toronto Star report looks inside the growing economic separation of the “Three Torontos.”
A new study written by Richard Florida and Roger Martin, released by the Martin Prosperity Institute today, makes recommendations for how Ontario can become a world leader in the creative age.
Roger Martin and Richard Florida call on Ontarians to embrace the promise of the global economic transformation underway and to harness its potential for building shared prosperity for Ontarians. Despite the current economic environment, Ontario is well positioned to compete and prosper in the ongoing global economic transformation. While the economic environment has worsened in the past year, the current upheaval only accelerates the longer-term trends – especially the shift from more routine-oriented to creativity-oriented jobs. Yet Ontario can do more to ensure it is a globally competitive jurisdiction. That is the key conclusion from the report released today, Ontario in the Creative Age.
The full report and press release can be found here and, to read more, see the related articles in The Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star.
Your thoughts?
The Toronto Star’s Sandro Contenta provides a sneak peak of our study of future of the Ontario economy, led by Rotman School Dean Roger Martin and myself.
The $2.2-million report is expected in February. Florida and Martin say it’s too early to discuss specific recommendations. But in separate interviews, they make clear they will focus on strengthening the Toronto “mega-region,” investing massively in infrastructure, greatly expanding post-secondary education, and managing a seismic transformation that will eliminate most manufacturing jobs, but may also threaten social peace. “If we don’t do this adjustment right, if we lose social cohesion, we’ll never get it back,” says Florida, director of the Martin Prosperity Institute, affiliated with the University of Toronto.
The full story is here.
