"Richard Florida" is an United States/American urban studies theorist. Florida's focus is on social and economic theory. He is currently a professor and head of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto.

Prof. Florida received a PhD from Columbia University in 1986. Prior to joining George Mason University's School of Public Policy, where he spent two years, he taught at Carnegie Mellon University's Heinz College in Pittsburgh from 1987 to 2005. He was named a Senior Editor at The Atlantic in March 2011 after serving as a correspondent for TheAtlantic.com for a year.

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If the foreign talent cannot get into the United States or faces considerable delays in doing so, companies are in effect forced to go overseas to get it.

Cities have realized that they can attract educated people and they don't need good schools to do it.

You've got these housing markets that are completely out of whack. There's no point of entry for young people anymore.

You know what they say, they say we want our kids back. We want them to stop leaving. What they don't say is that they want other people's kids to move there.

L.A. draws highly skilled Asians and San Francisco draws highly skilled gays, but D.C. draws highly skilled everybody -- gays, Latins, Asians, Africans, scientists and so on, ... The trick will be to avoid pricing ourselves out of that creativity.

People are really smart and engaged. There's no better place in the country to write serious nonfiction. There's no better place to be public intellectuals.

If an employer is serious about attracting and retaining talent, about making Wisconsin the kind of place they can do business over the long haul, they've got to understand that the ability for all people to feel welcome is absolutely critical.

I think we do need more time off, but it's not a government issue. It needs to be a social thing. People need to realize that working all the time and ignoring families is not healthy.

Minneapolis-St. Paul is competing for a very mobile group of people who have the world for their choices.