Photographs by Flint Born TRACEY AND SEAN FRANCIS used to look forward to Fridays, but not for the usual reasons. That’s the day The Patriot Ledger newspaper carries its big weekly real estate listings covering the South Shore area where they both grew up, and where they hope to raise their two young daughters. […]
Economy
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New Economy Potential
The good news is that Massachusetts has retained its number-one ranking in the California-based Milken Institute’s annual New Economy Index, which measures states by their potential for high-tech growth. The Bay State finished in the top 10 in all but two of the index’s 12 criteria, benefiting from a highly educated population; venture capital investment […]
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Economists give their prognoses for recovery
Left to right: Adrienne Ortyl, Paul Harrington, and Alan Clayton-Matthews. Back in March, when economists and other observers were trying to figure out what kept consumers spending even as indicators of an impending downturn piled up, The Boston Globe‘s Adam Pertman trotted out this theory: “Many Americans [are] feeling certain that any downturn probably will […]
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Small cities face big economic challenges
In the shadow of Mount Greylock, high in the rolling Berkshires, Pittsfield opens the commercial gateway to western Massachusetts. . . . Today the city has a prosperous, tranquil look of general comfort and cultivation. . . . The homes of the well-to-do line its elm-shaded streets with substantial dignified residences and smooth lawns. . […]
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The death and life of American cities
The Boston Renaissance: Race, Space and Economic Change in an American Metropolis By Barry Bluestone and Mary Huff Stevenson Russell Sage Foundation, New York, 2000, 461 pages Comeback Cities: A Blueprint for Urban Neighborhood Revival By Paul S. Grogan and Tony Proscio Westview Press, Boulder, 2000, 285 pages OVER THE PAST half-century, America grew into […]
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New Economy New Philanthropy
Not long ago, at an estate-planning seminar, a Boston money manager told this story: He paid a call on an older couple who lived on Cape Cod. They had a modest home and kept the heat too low for his taste. But in their bank account, the money manager discovered, they were sitting on several […]
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Recycling Economics
When it comes to recycling, it sure seems easy to be green these days: After all, everyone knows that the more a community recycles, the more it saves on trash disposal costs, right? So why are the state’s biggest cities lagging behind? Boston recycles only 10 percent of its residential garbage, according to the most […]
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Economist Juliet B Schor on the Maxedout Middle Class
With the publication of The Overworked American in 1992, Harvard economist Juliet B. Schor became part of the tiny company of left-wing economists who have found a wide national audience. Her stated aim was to “help revive the public discussion on hours of work which died out 50 years ago.” She succeeded. The argument that […]