A book that made me realize I am not as unusual as I thought. The "creative class" is a social grouping that has emerged as a significant minority in the past few decades. The authors estimate that 38 million Americans (about 20% of the adult population) are members, but ironically, the nature of these type of people is that they tend to think of themselves as isolated individuals, misfits for any particular social category.

Creative class members tend to be young, hip and bohemian. They are almost always knoweldge workers (e.g. computer programmers, graphic designers, writers) and tend to command high salaries. They work odd hours (creativity strikes haphazardly, not 9 to 5) and dress or wear their hair in unconventional patterns that express their individual natures. Traditionally people care about things like salary, benefits, and stability in a job. Creative classers are less motivated by these factors, and more by challenge, peer recognition, location, job flexibilty, and a type of work they enjoy.

Cities often put lots of money into building expensive office parks and leveling "blighted" areas to attract high-tech companies. This doesn't work as well as you might think, becuase companies care about going to cities that allow them to attract members of the creative class. Creative classers are drawn to areas with vibrant culture and nightlife, availability of late-night coffeehouses and restaurants, and tolerance for (or even appreciation of) diversity. College towns are a favorite with creative classers, because these same traits appeal to students. The authors also find a positive corelation between "gay-friendly" cities and level of attractiveness to the creative class. Not because members of the creative class are any more likely to be gay than anyone else, but because this demonstrates that the area tolerates or even celebrates diversity. The trait factor of creative class members is that they are all weirdos in their own way; they want someplace they can go where they will not be stared out or treated disdainfully because of their unusual dress, maners, or habits. They also like being surrounded by people different than themselves. Cities with a large imigrant population (especially from many different places) thus also appeal.

The book breaks down the traits that make a city attractive to creative classers, and then scores and ranks major cities in the US. The list they produce has San Francisco at the top, with Austin, San Diego, Boston, Seattle, and New York in the top ten. (My current home, Los Angeles, is number 12.) The list matches up pretty closely with my own internal sense of where I'd like to live; and the cities at the bottom of the list (Buffalo, Grand Rapids, Memphis) also match with places that strike me as someplace I would not feel at home.

This isn't in the book, but an observation of my own is that me and people like me (i.e. my friends) tend to move around between the cities ranked high on the creative index, rarely living anyplace in-between. This produces a sort of meta-geography whereby I know far more people living in New York than I do in any of the much closer cities in the states in the center of the US. New York, San Francisco, and Boston all feel much closer to me than than Des Moines or Salt Lake City, even though they are physically more distant.