In this week’s issue of the Economist there is a fascinating article on the development of the health care industry and the cities that are reliant on those jobs. Rochester with the Mayo being an obvious example,
VISIT Rochester, Minnesota on an average winter morning and the frozen streets are virtually empty. But inside the Mayo Clinic’s lovely Gonda building, designed by Cesar Pelli, the city throbs with life. The hospital’s lobby is filled with patients and visitors. At noon, underground walkways teem with nurses and doctors buying lunch. In the evening fleets of buses take them home. Visitors retreat to nearby hotels and restaurants, built around Mayo especially for its guests.
All this is an extreme example of a growing phenomenon. After the 20th-century factory town, such as Flint, Michigan, comes the 21st-century hospital town. Rural hospitals are often the main employers in their communities. Even Flint is trying to re-position itself as a medical hub. But a select few cities have entered the era of the mega-hospital. The most dramatic are Rochester, a medium-sized city where Mayo has long been a star business, and Cleveland, Ohio, a rustbelt city that has seen its hospitals boom and one, the Cleveland Clinic, become a new economic force. Each hospital is a behemoth: Mayo’s revenues in 2006 totalled $6.3 billion, Cleveland’s $4.4 billion.
I’d also like to thank my mother in law for the subscription to the Economist for Christmas — greatest. mother. in. law. ever.
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The Economist is a great read.
My husband and I have lived in Rochester coming on 32 years this March. It was IBM that brought us here. The developement of the infrastructure and increased businesses overall has been amazing.
I have lived on both coasts, traveled to just about every state in the country, but Minnesota will remain my home. Rochester has been fortunate to grow as it has even during the worst of economic downturns that have affected much of the rest of the US.
Rochester is also fortunate to host both the GOP and DFL State Conventions in 2008.
The area is a great example of what public funds can do when directed toward development of private industry.
I hope the bioscience partnership between Mayo and the U that the Guv implemented a couple years ago really enables this to take off even more.
Rchester is not my cup of tea.
I like Kathy, though. ;)
The area is a great example of what public funds can do when directed toward development of private industry.
Now apply that same formula to renewable energy. Solar, wind, geo-thermal, hydrogen fuel cells.
Uh oh, Richard. We might agree on something.
Yes! Government should help spur development of those technologies.
And consistent with my point above, the investment should be about 5% public, and 95% private sector.