top of the professional pecking order not what it used to be:
http://tinyurl.com/37bf6p

“The older professions are great, they’re wonderful,” said Richard Florida, the author of “The Rise of the Creative Class: And How It’s Transforming Work, Leisure, Community and Everyday Life” (Basic Books, 2003). “But they’ve lost their allure, their status. And it isn’t about money.”

Or at least, it is not all about money. The pay is still good (sometimes very good), and the in-laws aren’t exactly complaining. Still, something is missing, say many doctors, lawyers and career experts: the old sense of purpose, of respect, of living at the center of American society and embodying its definition of “success.”

In a culture that prizes risk and outsize reward — where professional heroes are college dropouts with billion-dollar Web sites — some doctors and lawyers feel they have slipped a notch in social status, drifting toward the safe-and-staid realm of dentists and accountants. It’s not just because the professions have changed, but also because the standards of what makes a prestigious career have changed.

This decline, Mr. Florida argued, is rooted in a broader shift in definitions of success, essentially, a realignment of the pillars. Especially among young people, professional status is now inextricably linked to ideas of flexibility and creativity, concepts alien to seemingly everyone but art students even a generation ago.

[ 08 January 2008: Message edited by: Geneva ]

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but it’s going to pay off in status. You’re going to be famous, providing something people are going to know and use all over the world.”

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Also, the status of doctors has become more realistic in terms of what other people in health care contribute. My mother, a retired nurse, remembers forty years ago, when the doctor walked into the unit, the nurse sitting nearest him would automatically jump to her feet and offer him her chair. And if you questioned a doctor's judgement, he'd fly into a rage.

Go forward to last Saturday, when I caught two medication errors made by the doctor in the clinic next door. At the end of his shift, he came into the pharmacy and gave me a hug, thanking me for preventing him from getting his "ass sued off."

But by way of explanation, a middle-class conservative insurance adjuster might define quality of life as a two door garage at the end of a cul-de-sac of homes that can only be differentiated by numbers within a sea of homes in a huge subdivision sitting on what once was a forest and within short driving distance (because who walks?) to the Superstore, Winners, and Boston Pizza.

But a creative personality, a bohemian, might prefer a busy downtown with coffee shops serving fair trade organic into the wee hours and being served by a tattooed, pierced from head-to-toe punker who heads off to a gig at the afterhours club when the cafe closes.

One of the important aspects of being a creative city, in my opinion, is being able to offer an environment where creative types can get together in both informal and formal settings and feed off each other's energy and ideas.

That just can't happen in a place that is more suburban blight than city.

There are all these cities all over the place that want the benefits of a gritty, happening downtown but without actually having the downtown. They have poured their resources and planning into creating antiseptic, sterile collections of subdivisions and then can't figure out why it is they can't attract and keep the 20 and 30 somethings who possess creativity, energy, and are seeking like minded individuals to work and play among.

I have been to Ontario cities and towns without a single independent, non-corporate coffee shop. Without independent book stores and without those edgy, on the margins art galleries.

Believe it or not, there are university towns in Ontario cities that do not have student villages where the university meets the city and ideas give way to risk taking and small businesses. They regard the students as a problem to be managed rather than a resource to be embraced. And they want to be "creative cities"!

Give me a break.

[ 08 January 2008: Message edited by: Frustrated Mess ]

I live close enough to the downtown that weaving my way home from the Celtic Festival, is perfectly do'able, having been greatly hosted by my friends who also own the local brewery, yet far enough away that the regualar Friday/Saturday night rabble rousers make no impact.

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Originally posted by Frustrated Mess:

It is not just "quality of life" as that can be defined by different people differently. Rather much of it is what Florida calls the bohemian factor (and I know Halifax has a bohemian factor)...

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us prairie folks have been enjoying the Bohemian factor for some time now, and as of the past few years, thanks to Lakeport starting a budget beer war, now i live in Toronto, i can enjoy that bohemian feeling in the big city too!

kidding aside, i read the linked article and all i can say is "boo fuckin' hoo". i find it hard to be sympathetic towards obviously arrogant and classist people who, despite the references to "higher callings" are clearly whining that thier once percieved as god-like professions are actually just jobs. welcome to capitalism you elitist pricks.

i remember in winnipeg, going up to the umpteeth floor of the Trizac Building in 1992, to a bargaining session for first contract in my pre-press shop (print industry), a trade job i was doing an apprenticeship in, not to mention apprenticing as a shop steward as well, and i was wearing a plaid flannel shirt tucked in and plain workpants (new even!) and winter boots (it was winter!!!) and there were all these junior suits yapping away about how much money they were going to make this year. they were lawyers, about the same age as me (then 22) and were clearly boasting about making.....gasp!....30-35. yup, that meant thousands. which in the Peg in '92 is pretty good for a young single person. the thing that struck me was the obvious disdain they had for me (the whole elevator was mirrored. i could see them checking me out), and the conspicuous way they were talking salaries for our benefit. the joke though was i made the same amount roughly. even more with overtime! i smiled a knowing smile with my journeyman (in a tacky blazer) and union prez (in a nice suit) who knew exactly what i was thinking.

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Originally posted by rural - Francesca:

Yet far enough away that the regualar Friday/Saturday night rabble rousers make no impact.

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Francesca

I have been and currently are one of those rabble rousers.

What is the difference between a doctor and god?