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Courting the Creative Class To Achieve Economic Development

By Theresa Camoriano

Greater Louisville Inc. recently sponsored a presentation by Richard Florida, author of The Rise of the Creative Class, who presented an interesting theory about how to promote economic development in an area.  His theory is that the places that have the greatest economic success are those that are able to attract creative people.  He also says that a city’s lifestyle is what is important in attracting and keeping the creative people, and that lifestyle can be promoted in low cost ways, such as by word of mouth.  He does not promote the usual huge projects that drain tax money, such as arenas and convention centers.  Bravo!

Now, this is a man who seems to be on the right track!  He is absolutely right that the greatest contribution to economic development is made by the creative people among us – those who have new solutions to problems, new ways of conducting business, new products, and so forth.  We all owe a great deal of gratitude to those people. 

Since I have been a patent attorney for over twenty years, I have had the privilege of working with many of these creative people, and I would like to share with you what I have learned from that experience in the hope that we can use that information not only to attract creative people from other places but also to encourage and foster the creativity of our own home grown people. 

1.         First, if we want creative people to live and thrive in our community, we need to treat all people with respect.  We cannot take the adolescent approach of ridiculing and ostracizing anyone who does not follow the average, normal path.  Instead, we need to respect and appreciate people who think for themselves and are willing to forge their own path, because those are the creative people.  If we ridicule and ostracize those who might be considered to be “offbeat”, we probably are chasing away the very people who could foster growth and development in our community.  From the perspective of government, that means that the law should respect people’s freedom of contract and freedom of association and should not single out any particular groups of people for special benefits or punishments but rather should treat every person the same.

2.         Second, we need to appreciate successful business enterprises, recognizing that they benefit their communities while they are benefiting themselves.  Many people have an almost visceral dislike for, jealousy of, or even hatred of successful businesses, believing that the only way to achieve success in business is to plunder other people.  That is a very mistaken notion, and, as long as a large portion of a community holds that view, the community will be hostile to the creative people it needs in order to thrive.  The reality is that businesses thrive when they serve their customers well.  Businesses also thrive when they treat their employees fairly and encourage their employees to be successful.  So, a successful business enterprise means prosperity and success all the way around – for customers and employees, as well as for the business owners.  A community that appreciates this truth is much more likely to establish an environment in which creative people can thrive.

3.         Third, if a community wants to encourage the creative class, it should reduce taxes and regulations to a minimum.  Excessive regulations hamper a creative person from being able to exercise his creativity, and a heavy tax burden punishes the creative person’s success, both of which establish a very hostile environment for creative people.  For example, a creative person may have a great idea for converting an old building to a new, productive use, but he may quickly give up on his idea when he encounters the mammoth zoning regulations and building codes with which he would have to comply.  The result may be that the old building stands idle or is used for a much lower-valued use than would have been possible if creativity had not been hampered.  Also, using tax money to subsidize creative businesses is a big mistake, because it means that taxes will be higher than they would otherwise be, thereby punishing success, and because subsidizing a business distorts the realities of the marketplace. 

Reducing regulations also means that the community is free to develop the way consumers and creative entrepreneurs want it to develop, frequently in ways the bureaucratic regulators could never even have imagined.  Heavy regulations, on the other hand, will lock a community into a fixed mode, which frequently prevents the diversity in which creative people thrive. 

4.         Fourth, a community that is really interested in promoting the creative class should take a serious look at its education system.  Today, the largest portion of the education system is under bureaucratic government control – not exactly a hotbed of creativity!  In government schools, students generally go through their years as if on a conveyor belt, traveling at the speed of the “average” student, with the most creative students falling off the belt and frequently being mistreated because they don’t fit the “average” profile. 

After over twenty years of working with inventors, I would have to say that most of the inventors I know were probably the hyperactive kids in the classroom, who were frequently being reprimanded by their teachers and ridiculed by their classmates.  Many got so tired of the abuse or so bored by the lack of creative outlets in school that they dropped out.  One of my most successful inventor clients told me that his high school counselor advised him not to go to college, because he was too dumb to succeed.  Another described how he dropped out of high school, went into the Navy, and only later went on to study engineering.  Another very successful inventor said he was probably dyslexic, had a very tough time in school, and was still working to overcome his lack of confidence caused by the rebukes and reprimands he received from his teachers and parents. 

Fortunately, those who became successful inventors had enough self-confidence to continue driving forward to achieve their goals despite the reprimands and tormenting from their teachers and fellow students.  But I can only imagine how many potentially creative children were so beaten down by the system that they gave up on themselves.  A community that wants to foster creativity will stop locking children onto the bureaucratic education conveyor belts and will stop beating down those children who are “different”. 

One of our daughters attended the Academy for Individual Excellence, a school that encourages children to learn in their own way.  However, it is a private school, not available to children who are in the “education welfare system”.   If we want to encourage creativity, we should allow families to use their education dollars freely in any way they think best serves their children.  This would enable a wide array of educational opportunities to spring up, which would greatly benefit all children, especially those who do not fit the mold and who may become the future "creative class" if given the opportunity.

5.         Finally, a community that wants to encourage the creative class should focus on success, not failure.  It should recognize that many people fail on their first attempt but may succeed on their second, or fifth, or tenth attempt, if they just learn from their mistakes and don’t give up.  Too often, when a person fails, he is labeled a "loser".  This doesn't encourage people to take the risks that are necessary in order to make great progress.  Too often,  there is an assumption that many people in society just can’t make it on their own.  While there will always be a few who, because of physical or mental limitations, cannot succeed without some help, the focus should be on encouraging success, not failure.  If we encourage people to be productive and stop helping them to death, many of the people who were thought to be helpless may turn out to be the very creative entrepreneurs who make a big difference in their community! 

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