Job Creation on a Budget: How Regional Industry Clusters Can Add Jobs, Bolster Entrepreneurship, & Spark Innovation
Brookings Institution, January 2011
This report is part of the Metropolitan Policy Program’s Project on State and Metropolitan Innovation, which, as a series, analyzes state policy challenges and offers practical, low-cost strategies for state policymakers to help states and metros recover from the Recession.
Mark Muro, Senior Fellow and Policy Director at the Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program and co-author of the report, said states should bring in a new generation of cluster programs designed to catalyze more entrepreneurship and job creation. Such efforts should not only represent something entirely different from traditional business relocation-oriented programs, but improve upon and sharpen existing cluster and cluster-relevant offerings for metropolitan regions.
Among the recommendations of the report:
- Reorient existing economic development programs, policies, and initiatives to support clusters
- Establish a modest grants program to address discrete gaps in cluster performance
- Develop and use data and rigorous analysis to identify clusters, target policy, and track performance