Twin Cities - Competitive Position
I am fascinated by the competitive position of cities and regions within the global and American economies. When I was being recruited by the University of Minnesota to attend business school, they sent me the publication, You Are Here: Minneapolis – Saint Paul a sales piece published by Mpls.St.Paul Magazine. I was immediately struck by this graph.
I am not interested in the information it compares, but instead who it is comparing. It shows what other regions the Twin Cities feel is their competition for people and employers. It is interesting that none of the cities listed are located in the South, Texas or California. Is the winter weather such a major impediment to attracting people that warmer regions of the country are not even mentioned for the purpose of comparison?
New York and Washington, DC are excluded due to the unrivaled assets they possess, Wall Street and the Nation’s Capitol. Other regions in America simply cannot complete with these economic assets and both will always draw people and investment.
The graph also shows the Twin Cities strengths. Chicago and Boston are truly global cities. Chicago is of a very large size and Boston has some of the best educational institutions in the world feeding their local economy, and has the shortest flight to Europe in North America. The Twin Cities believe they can compete with these places, and poach their residents and entrepreneurs. That is not a small order.
Seattle and Denver are probably the closest comparables to the Twin Cities region. They are of roughly the same population size, Seattle is a little bigger and Denver is a little smaller, and both are located far from other major world and American cities. They both are growing and have relatively healthy regional economies. But the Twin Cities does lack some of their cache. Do people feel that Minnesota is as sexy as Colorado and Puget Sound? I think not.
I will continue to revisit these two comparisons in the future, as I attempt to best understand the Twin Cities true market position for residents in the American economy.
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