Kotkin. Don’t underestimate the fellow

I do not want you to think Joel Kotkin is not a smart guy. But I think the guys behind him are even more smart. Here is one example, of how the PR backed him up as shown in an official site: “US writer slams city for pushing out middle class. Note that this is English, of course it has been much more widespread in Danish. I’m sure the organizers of the visit of Florida in Vejle, the business development part of the Kommune (Municipality), are quite amazed at the moves of the Danish Industry.

There it is the battle against the kommunes and the industry. In my last post I was kind of hard on Kotkin, but I will give him credit.

I have the term “experience economy” in Google Alerts, so anytime someone with some type of authority is talking about it, I know. The other day I came across a Bent Rook’s post on Greenville Online, the blog says: “Evidence-based economic development shows a direct parallel between successful and vibrant communities and strong support of the arts.” That made me think about Kotkin who argued that economy comes always first and then arts, and made me wonder if there would also be a “direct parallel” between Starbucks coffee and successful communities.

Therefore, we should be careful when we talk about the experience economy. We need to keep in focus, that the experience economy it’s not something that takes or will take the economy. Although, of course is worth to study. I would have to say, though, that sometimes I’m quite uncomfortable with the term “experience economy” and I’d rather use a term like “experiences level”, where the “goods and services levels” coexist. Let’s see what happens.