In his new book, The Rise of the Creative Class, economist Richard Florida argues that the economic future of cities will depend significantly on how well they cater to the ever-growing population of young creative professionals—what he calls the new "creative class". Comprising 30% of the working population, these young scientists, artists, and technology specialists gravitate to energising urban centres with a strong arts and music scene, cafés, clubs, extreme sporting, and other hedonistic pleasures. Like the once-flourishing industrial centres of Detroit and Buffalo, cities that don't cater to this powerful economic class will find themselves floundering. According to Florida, such cities as San Francisco, Austin, Boston, San Diego, and Seattle are hotspots for the creatives. (When I asked him about Vancouver, he said he can certainly see it making the mark).

But there's one big glitch—a glitch that Florida certainly acknowledges, but that I think needs much more attention. Members of the creative class are not the only people who are "creative". The cities that the creatives are migrating to all have poor neighbourhoods and ghettos. The disadvantaged residents of these areas use creativity every day as they struggle to survive. Yet as the well-heeled creative class inhabits more and more regions in these cities, the other creatives are driven out because they can no longer afford to live there. These displaced residents represent the artistic and cultural capital that makes these cities creative in the first place. When they leave, these cities lose their creative energy and become the next Detroits.

Florida hopes that the new creative class will start taking more responsibility and ensuring that everyone living in cities has a chance to contribute to and reap the benefits of a strong creative culture. Yet the new creative class is a selfish one; many young, up-and-coming creatives could care less about social responsibility. Florida's views on this are very strong. I think mine might be even stronger. What on earth is going to motivate these people to look outside themselves? If the cities they inhabit today flounder, they'll just move somewhere else. Because they have the economic clout we need, we are putting a lot of faith in this new class. But beneath their creativity, I don't see very much of a redeeming social value. Throughout history, we've seen that people are motivated to change primarily when something horrible shakes them. What will shake the creative class? Has the creative class ever even known anything horrible? I'll have an article on this topic in a couple weeks.