Economic diversification

Reimagining the future

Two articles on attempts to move into high-tech; first, New York City

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Readers' comments


Yankee Doodle

Once a state becomes a Blue State it is a one way road down. Blue States cannot have economic prosperity.

New York has an income tax and lots of states do not. Who would pick a state with an income tax? New York has the 3rd highest taxes!


I am shocked that no one else has commented on this little nugget:

"The Big Apple even overtook Massachusetts in venture-capital funding for internet and tech start-ups, making it second only to Silicon Valley."

The population of all of Massachusetts is substantially less than than of New York CITY proper (roughly 6.5 million against 8.2 million). If you consider the population of the respective metropolitan areas, the gap grows even larger (significantly so) in favor of New York. This is combined with all of the other resources that New York has within its orbit - HUGE amounts of capital, service providers, etc.

Given all of that, people are still celebrating New York overtaking Massachusetts in this particular measure?! It seems to me the commentary should be more about the amazing ecosystem for innovation up here in our little outpost on the North Alantic (that would be the Greater Boston Area) rather than what is happening in what is indisputably one of the world's great cities, which should be blowing us away (and isn't by a longshot!).

The Division Bell

These are excellent news. While NYC in the last decades was been slowly conquered by suits and ties it's now the the perfect time to reshuffle the cards. I agree with Erie Canal comparison but with one exception it could turn to be a new era not just for NYC but for the entire US and even more to the western world. We all know the vast global impact NYC has, that can allure many entrepreneurs to come and make the necessary change in America.

Audi Man

New York does have a good set up for an entrepreneurial-tech-capital ecosystem. Really, far better than silicon valley from a "natural" standpoint. New York can pull more international talent and has sort of that natural neighborhood innovation that has always made it great. I hope sincerely that their goals come to pass.

Michael Dunne

I hope this initiative yields expected dividends.

While it is great that New York is a financial capital of the world, it probably isn't healthy for the city to rely so much on just the banking/insurance/trading/diversified financials sectors (and to a lesser degree media and tourism).

One question, how much of a headquarter location is New York now for non-financial firms? There is still Verizon, L 3 Communications, Hess Oil, News Corporation, Time Warner,McGraw Hill, Bristol Myers, Colgate Palmolive, Estee Lauder, etc. I believe....


New York City, when portrayed in countless films, especially British and American, represents the Glory that is Mankind and the top achievement in the history of humanity: It represents Freedom, Love, and All That Is Good. In romantic comedies, the Handsome Man and The Beautiful Woman work in fashion magazines, drive their fast cars through pristine and smooth streets, always find parking in front of their workplace or home, and are able to afford spacious and clean apartments that would make Donald Trump flush with envy. It is no wonder that billions of the yearning masses long to live there and make it their #1 destination and purpose of their lives - especially young people in their late teens and 20's. With the extermination of unclean theaters of orgasmic quests of Times Square of old (Google: "The Smut Wars of New York" - 1986-2000), and by granting the NY Police Department starting salaries and benefits (such as immunity) that would rival any Wall Street banker, the City has finally taken its place on top of all cities on this planet and any other in this galaxy. But if only the City could bulldoze the other 4 counties to the ground and erect 100 story buildings, everywhere, there would be spacious and affordable rents for everyone who's ever seen a romantic comedy and wanted to move to New York to Find True Love and a big fat salary. I only wish Mayor Bloomberg could try again and get the next Summer & Winter Olympics as well as the World Cup, Woodstock, Dakkar Rally, and Spain's Tomatera to be held in The Big Apple. Clean streets, low taxes, friendly & caring people, Texas sized dwellings, immaculate and affordable transportation, parking everywhere, negligible crime rates, and overall a Family Atmosphere that beats Disney at their own game, autobahns and bullet subways, public buses with leather seats and Pan Am service from the 1960's... why else would anyone want to live anywhere else?


Why not? The money for startups is right there, on Wall Street. California deserves to go down for its uber liberal politics. Competition is good for all.

Connect The Dots

Will it become a Silicon Utopia or a Silicon Ghetto?

The greatest innovation center in the past generation was Steven Jobs sitting at his work desk.

Einstein worked at a creaky wooden Government patent desk, but outclassed all of Europe's research labs.

After the the Bubonic Plague closed Cambridge university, Issac Newton moved back into his father's small farm. There he invented Physics and Calculus.

Thomas Edison was the single greatest mind of his generation. His home became his work bench. And that became his lab and it resulted in our electrical world and power grid.

There are maybe a handful of major innovative thinkers in the world. And they are international distributed thorough out the world populations. The next Steve Jobs may be Chinese.

I think a program like the MacArthur Genius Grants are a better source of identifying the talent. Or Nobel Laureates. Or Westinghouse/ Siemens Science Competitions. Or the Million Dollar winners from Jeopardy.

Alternatively, identify the top 1% most ambitious and innovative entrepreneurs. Sponsor them to live in NYC.

An alternative stimulus program is pay these geniuses to move to NYC, give them free rent, special free parking license plates, and set up free lab and library space.

You need to become a brain magnet for the Elite 1%...the trick is identifying the 1%. Silicon and Technology as a category are too limited. We need more cross disciplinary pollination spanning EVERYTHING.

There is genius in every endeavor. And a gold mine in every mind.

Instead of bringing 50,000 semiconductor microchip researchers to SOHO, find the nEXT Steve Jobs.

It is more a man hunt than attempting to found a cutting edge university and research institute.

The Solution is Simple, but as easy as winning the lottery.

Did Steve Jobs ever win any of these honors from which he could have been identified? (Nobel, MacArthur Grant, etc... )

50K microchip researchers is very important, it creates a pool of talent from which future "Steve Jobs" can hire people to execute their vision.


It is not at all obvious to me that this is such a wonderful idea. If this is such a slam dunk, then how come no university had even tried to do this before? (My guess is that New York's building regulations kept them away).

Look out Silicon Valley? Hyperbole.


This is indeed great news. Unfortunately, i suspect that the majority of the engineering and science graduates will leave for less alluring pastures than NYC since few if any tech firms can afford to locate there. Don't tell me about facebook, that nonsense fad/timewaster wont endure. i bet many graduates will be lured into the web of deceipt that is "financial services"and private equity "industry".

Mark Markarian

The plan to open an applied sciences university campus in New York City maybe a great idea and it may payoff in tremendous ways in the years to come, but, it will never be an "Erie Canal moment".

It was not the building of the Erie Canal that made New York State the Empire State or New York City, America's premier port.

It was the use of the Erie Canal that catapulted our state and city to these tremendous heights.

And the reason the Erie Canal was used and used and used for 134 years, was because it was a monopoly on the cheap transportation of bulk goods between the Mid-West and the rest of the world.

And unlike the majority of American canals which had short lives and closed under the weight of competition from railroads, the Erie Canal continued to power New York’s economy until the Saint Lawrence Seaway opened in 1959.

The applied sciences university campus will not be a monopoly and will have to compete with similar campus’s across the world and while it may provide New York with a great return on investment, it is not an “Erie Canal moment”, that moment was lost when New York and every other state had the opportunity to build our own 'Large Hadron Collider' and didn’t.

Ithaca402 in reply to Mark Markarian

Excellent point (and even the aforementioned Mr. Pinsky kind of hinted that the "Erie Canal moment" was perhaps a bit of hyperbole).

The main reason for the Erie Canal's success is that it ran along the only flat land between the deep south and the Canadian border that could connect the U.S. midwest with the Atlantic coast. The rest is covered with hills or mountains. As Mark Makarian notes, when it comes to high tech, a similar natural monopoly for New York does not exist.

New York (State and City) could come improve its reach for an "Erie Canal moment" with the construction of high speed trains between New York City and points north and west, running, in one case, through Ithaca (Cornell's home), Binghamton and Rochester. The area has excellent academic facilities: Rochester in particular also has a long tradition of cutting edge technology, in business as well as academe. Converting to high speed rail the two existing train lines linking New York with Montreal, and New York with Buffalo via the cities along the old Erie Canal route, with ongoing connections to Toronto or Chicago, would go a long way toward rebuilding the economy of upstate New York. Ithaca is a lovely place to live and the Finger Lakes area would make a nice silicon valley if people could jump on a train and be in New York or Toronto in an hour, without having to go through the ordeal of U.S. airports.

Mark Markarian in reply to Ithaca402

I hate to disagree with someone who agrees with me, but

Building high speed rails in the 21st Century would be like building an

Interstate Canal System in the 1950’s.

The future of transportation is Virtual, Personal and VTOL.

The internet, video chat, teleconferencing and the ever increasing processing power of computers are reducing the number of miles and the number of people who have to travel to work, school and even court.

Personal transportation has never been more exciting and we are just at the starting gate for an entire new world of vehicles.

The most cutting edged ones being the three wheeled Persue which combines the excitement and fuel efficiency of a motorcycle with the protection and all weather use of a car.

The Transition is the first truly functional flying car designed by MIT trained engineers to cruise at 115 mph while delivering 23 mpg. That means its passengers can travel from exactly where they are to exactly where they want to go, covering up to 500 miles in about 4 hours in what ever direction they care to travel. First deliveries are scheduled for late this year.

And then there’s the HondaJet. Yes, the people who gave us the CB750, the Gold Wing, the Civic, the Accord, Acura, the NSX and oval pistons, are bringing us a personal 4 passenger jet plane, being built in the USA, just as the Persue and Transition are.

Finally there’s VTOL. Born in the disastrous rescue attempt of the 52 American’s held for 444 days by the Iranian regime, the V-22 Osprey has seen its problems, but it continues to fly and maybe the game changer and starting point for a whole new flying infrastructure.

If there is any place where government, be it Federal or a State should invest, it should be here. This technology is created and owned by America and American’s and is the perfect alternative to high speed rail.

V-22’s travel faster than trains, they’re routes are more flexible than trains and they can be operated by private industry instead of a quasi state / federal government sponsored enterprise.

Now that could be an “Erie Canal moment”!


This is simply the Greatest News for New York City, after 9/11...First was in 2011, New York City had the highest number of tourists with a record of 50.2 million, and this is the second best thing Happening to New York City, the city I love...



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