Goals
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Indicator Measures
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How are we doing?
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3.1 Maintaining the Region’s Competitive Edge |
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3.1.1 Share of young knowledge workers Metro Boston versus other regions |
Boston in 2000 had about 30% of 20–34 year-olds but lost 8% of this population between 1990 and 2000, while Austin gained them by 30% and Raleigh by 20%. |
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3.1.2 Innovation capacity measured by patents per capita |
In 2001, about 3,972 patents were granted to Massachusetts’ innovators or about 62 patents per 100,000 residents. |
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3.2 Infrastructure to Support the Knowledge Economy |
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3.2.1 Level of Research & Development funding |
In 2000, Massachusetts attracted the highest share of R&D funds among all states — $348 per 1,000 people or over $4 billion in total. |
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3.2.2 Share of the nation’s venture capital investment |
In 2001, only $4.86 billion in VC was invested in Massachusetts, a drop of nearly 50%, after a peak of $10 billion in 2000. |
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3.2.3 Funding for higher education |
In 2000, Massachusetts ranked 39th in state appropriations ($185.4 per capita) for public higher education and 14th for state spending ($16.73 per capita) on student aid. |
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3.3 Economic Strength and Resilience |
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3.3.1 Employment by industry sector |
In 2002, the city lost almost 5,000 jobs to bring it down to a total of 683,584 jobs. |
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3.3.2 Unemployment rate |
Unemployment rate in Boston rose from 2.9% in 2000 to 4.9% by mid 2002. The Metro rate at 4.1% continues to be lower than the citywide average but is also rising. |
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