The presence of college graduates in a region is responsible for 58 percent of a region’s economic success. Here’s where the Memphis MSA stands:
· Atlanta – 1,929,599
· St. Louis – 862,687
· Charlotte – 790,010
· Austin – 762,636
· Kansas City – 688,349
· Columbus, OH – 668,724
· Cincinnati – 632,672
· Indianapolis – 627,221
· Nashville – 571,321
· Raleigh – 510,097
· Richmond – 406,119
· Jacksonville – 390,495
· Oklahoma City – 374,788
· MEMPHIS – 350,196
· Louisville – 334,499
· New Orleans – 331,341
· Birmingham – 318,195
· Chattanooga – 124,059
Memphis has always suffered from the lack of a large, world class university. University of Memphis can never meet that criteria. Rhodes is excellent, but it’s a small liberal arts college. Memphis severely lagging economic development, along with our poverty, are quite evident through these statistics.
The numbers above tell a true story but they are slightly deceptive. Atlanta is about 4 times larger than Memphis (at the MSA level). So Atlanta would have more college graduates no matter what. Look at the numbers of college graduates relative to the population:
— Atlanta 36.6%
— St. Louis 30.7%
— Nashville 35.9%
— New Orleans 28.9%
— Memphis 26.6%
We don’t look too great on that list. It is important to remember that with the existence of Interstates and cars, the actual nature of local educational institutions may not be that important. If the Memphis job market required people with college educations, they would drive here to get the jobs. Memphis business offers jobs that our current population is probably properly educated for.
I was thinking how much Nashville benefits from Vanderbilt. It’s a world class university and medical center and one of the largest private employers too.
Quote from david ciscel: ” Memphis business offers jobs that our current population is probably properly educated for.”
Very true, like low paying service industry jobs and equally low paying distribution warehouse/cargo jobs. Memphis barely has a high tech community and the corresponding well paid job market in that sector is dismal.
Memphis needs to find a way to benefit more from Ole Miss and Arkansas State. Ole Miss should be spoken of as part of the Memphis area.
I doubt the folks at Ole Miss and Arkansas State have much inclination to be more closely tied to Memohis.
Here’s the thing: the reason to increase workers with college degrees is that in cities with higher numbers/percentages, people with just high school degrees earn more. In other words, the additional opportunity that comes with more workers with college degrees greatly benefits everyone in the city, not just the college-educated workers themselves.
If we only want to offer jobs that our current population is educated for, we are telling college graduates that economic development strategies here are really not about them and we are selling our future at a discount.
Interesting footnote is that Atlanta is not succeeding right now in attracting more college graduates – it’s attracting high school graduates. As we blogged a few months ago, in the most recent time frame, Memphis attracted more college-educated workers than Atlanta did. The trick is building on that progress.
The reason I think that Ole Miss and ASU should be seen as part of the Memphis area (and I know that both cases are stretching it) is that more Memphis children should see those two schools as options for going to college and the graduates from those schools should see Memphis as their first option for work (if that is not already the case)