‘Coolest’ is no model

A piece this week by Joel Kotkin, long a critic of the “hip city” phenomenon and a defender of suburbs and blue collar jobs, on the “Daily Beast” web site assembles some of the evidence, anecdotal and factual.

“Investments in ‘cool’ districts may well appeal to some young professionals, particularly before they get married and have children,” he writes. “But overall … it has done little overall for the urban middle class, much less the working class or the poor.”