Seattle, Portland, Hot Cities of '90s, See Growth Slow With Age

[BrushStart]

Is the unemployment rate out there still incredibly high? For a while it was in striking distance of Michigan for the number 1 spot. I know someone who moved to Portland without a job, and from what I hear that's what a lot of people who move there do.

My buddy recently moved from downtown Detroit to Portland for quality of life reasons. I did my best to convince him to stick around, but the allure of Portland was just too much to overcome.

When he came back to town recently, I asked about the job situation in Portland, and he said it is totally different than here. Basically, there are many people who move to Portland [[quasi-hippies) who have no intention on working, so they never really look for employment. He said that any reasonable person who wants a job in Portland can find one, especially if they are not overly selective. If you want to work, someone will hire you. That's the difference. In Metro Detroit, there is very little work available for most people, no matter how qualified they are.

[FlyingJ]

i'm out of Seattle on my mom's side who blew outta Detroit during the
Grant Administration. If Boeing, like all aerospace companies, weren't so sketchy on long-term employment I never would've been born in Detroit. That said, I don't think anyone here should dance on the grave of Microsoft-it's like watching Jeff Gordon's victory yesterday you realize they're now underdogs. It took Bill Gates a lot of guts to relocate to his hometown from Albuquerque after MITS went down. He absolutely changed Seattle from a shabby Navy town with a couple big industrial outfits, like Weyerhauser. And because of the isolated market a lot of local outfits followed his lead. And so a town less than half Detroit's size spawned household name companies like Nordstrom's, REI, Safeco Insurance, Costco, Amazon, T-Mobile, Sonicare, Nintendo... What is Jones Soda but Towne Club, except it's for sale in every Target cross the country? Whenever you guys post about "brain drains" or "Why doesn't somebody do something cool HERE?" you gotta ask yourself "Why is Detroit so hostile to industry & innovation?" You almost forget we stole the auto industry from INDIANA. Or that William Boeing was FROM Detroit, Nobody remembers that Sam Raimi wanted to bring his first studio picture HERE until Detroit City Hall slapped Universal Pictures with a $25,000 bill supposedly for DPD overtime on CRIMEWAVE/XYZ Murders to which Universal wisely said "What the hell is this?" and pulled out at a cost of millions of dollars to the local economy. If the D didn't waste so much energy snatching defeat from the jaws of victory it would be a lot better off.

there are many people who move to Portland [[quasi-hippies) who have no intention on working, so they never really look for employment. He said that any reasonable person who wants a job in Portland can find one, especially if they are not overly selective. If you want to work, someone will hire you..

ah, great album;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirtee..._Urban_Bohemia