In the July 24, 2006 Issue:

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 Senate Appropriators Finally Concur on ATP Demise
Supporters of NIST's Advanced Technology Program (ATP) have weathered years of attempts by members of the House and the Bush Administration to eliminate the program, but this may be the biggest hurdle yet: The Senate Appropriations Committee approved language calling for the program's termination as part of the Department of Commerce fiscal year 2007 appropriations. The first of only two ATP-related sentences included in the Senate Committee report 109-580 accompanying H.R. 5672 conveys the weariness of the battle as the Committee conveys their defeat: "The Committee will allow for the phase out of activities for ATP. No funds are provided in fiscal year 2007 for ATP, and the Committee believes that sufficient funds were provided as part of fiscal year 2006 under this title to cover all necessary close out costs associated with ATP."

The Bush Administration has repeatedly called for the program's termination and the House of Representatives has often agreed. Program supporters have always counted on some funding in the Senate's version of the bill and strong pressure in conference to continue the program. It would now take an amendment to restore funding in H.R. 5672 if and when the full Senate considers the bill, possibly in September. Far more remotely, funding could be reinserted in conference. The likelihood of anything more than a continuing resolution being passed to keep the government running after Oct. 1 grows stronger with each passing day, which also moves the program into shutdown mode.

Complicating the matter and perhaps offering another avenue of hope for ATP proponents is the possibility of leadership of one or both of the chambers switching political parties with November's election. The lame duck session could be quite lame if the Democrats gain control in January. It is unknown if Democrats would attempt to resurrect the program, however.

ATP was created in 1990 to provide matching funds for industry-led research that accelerates the development of innovative technologies for broad national benefit. ATP has invested in risky, challenging technologies that have the potential for a big payoff for the nation's economy. These technologies create opportunities for new, world-class products, services and industrial processes, benefiting the ATP participants, other companies and industries, and ultimately consumers and taxpayers. By reducing the early-stage R&D risks for individual companies, ATP enables industry to pursue promising technologies which otherwise would be ignored or developed too slowly to compete in rapidly changing world markets.

The Senate Report accompanying H.R. 5672 is available at: http://thomas.loc.gov/home/approp/app07.html

More information on NIST's Advanced Technology Program, including information on the 760-plus projects approved, is available at: http://www.atp.nist.gov

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Toronto Considers Strategies for Building Regional Creative Economies
In a report released last week, a Toronto group says that creative industries may soon overtake ICT and business services as the fastest growing sector in the region's economy. In order to preserve this momentum and ensure that other industries benefit from the presence of a strong creative sector, the authors recommend enlisting regional leaders to create programs that support creative people, creative enterprises, affordable spaces for creative work, and a shared community vision.

The report is the culmination of almost two years of work by Toronto's Creative Cities Leadership Team, with support from the University of Toronto, the Ontario Ministry of Culture, the City of Toronto, and the Ministry of Research and Innovation. Similar case studies by the Strategies for Creative Cities project are now being undertaken in New York, San Francisco, London, Barcelona and Berlin. A report on London was released earlier this year.

According to the project, creative industries are those producing cultural goods, including media and broadcasting, architecture, the performing arts, advertising, design, and publishing. Creative workers, however, can be found in any industry, but rely on creativity in their daily work. This includes writers, graphic designers, musicians, illustrators, artisans and photographers. From 1991 through 2004, the compound annual growth rate of creative occupations in Toronto (6 percent) far surpassed the overall growth of the labor force (2.3 percent). In fact, between 1990 and 2000, creative employment grew faster than in many well known creative cities, such as San Francisco, Montreal and Los Angeles.

The Toronto study focuses on the region's need to build on this growth to advance Toronto as a center of North American creativity and to connect creative firms with partners in other industries. These partnerships give creative firms greater access to the capital available to more traditional industries and provide those industries with access to the region's creative talent.

Highlights from the recommendations include:

Find out more about the Toronto strategy at: http://www.imagineatoronto.ca/

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Recent Research
Is It the Water? Great Lakes Region & Manufacturing Job Loss
"More than one-third of the nation's loss of manufacturing jobs between 2000-2005 occurred in seven Great Lakes states: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin," write Howard Wial and Alec Friedhoff in a new paper from the Metropolitan Policy Program of the Brookings Institution. Bearing the Brunt: Manufacturing Job Loss in the Great Lakes Region: 2000-2005 reveals that, despite these statistics, manufacturing - with its 38 percent increase in productivity during the period - remains a major driver in six of the seven state's economies.

The change was dramatic in most of the studied states, in which more than one in five manufacturing jobs in 2000 did not exist by 2005. For five of the seven states, the percent change in manufacturing employment exceeded the national average of -17.6 percent: Michigan (-24.3 percent); New York (-22.7 percent); Pennsylvania (-20.9 percent); Illinois (-20.8 percent); and Ohio (-20.3 percent).

After discussing the impact of this most recent restructuring of U.S. manufacturing, Wial and Friedhoff look more closely at the impact of the job losses on the 25 largest manufacturing-dependent metropolitan areas of the Great Lakes. All but one, Peoria, Ill., lost manufacturing jobs during the past decade. Canton, Ohio, and Flint, Mich., suffered the loss of the greatest share of manufacturing employment, with decreases of 31.1 percent and 29.5 percent, respectively.

The authors also found that the sustainability of more established jobs was limited: Those Great Lake cities that had their highest manufacturing employment figures before 1998 experienced sharper cutbacks than those whose manufacturing employment peaked in or after 1998.

Growth of high wage advanced service industry jobs is offsetting the loss of manufacturing jobs in a handful of metropolitan areas, with Indianapolis and Cincinnati seeing net growth of more than 30,000 advanced service jobs. Despite growth of advanced service jobs, those large metro areas closer to the Great Lakes, however - Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, Rochester and Flint - all still suffer net losses of manufacturing jobs exceeding 22,000 positions.

Wial and Friedhoff also make policy recommendations for states to consider to either retain/expand manufacturing employment or soften the impact of future losses:

Bearing the Brunt: Manufacturing Job Loss in the Great Lakes Region: 2000-2005 is available at: http://www.brookings.edu/metro/mei/20060727_manufacturing.pdf

Links to this paper and more than 4,000 additional TBED-related research reports, strategic plans and other papers can be found at the Tech-based Economic Development (TBED) Resource Center, jointly developed by the Technology Administration and SSTI, at: http://www.tbedresourcecenter.org/.

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Can Globalization and Outsourcing Be Blamed?
Also released this week, and related to the negative change of U.S. manufacturing employment, is a new working paper by members of the National Bureau of Economic Research. Outsourcing Jobs? Multinationals and US Employment, by Ann Harrison and Margaret McMillan, examines the labor market decisions of U.S. multinationals at home and abroad for the years 1977 to 1999. Using firm level data collected by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, the authors econometric model reveals changes in the employment and operations of U.S. multinationals is correlated to whether the affiliated country is a low-income or high-income nation.

Using a variety of different theoretical approaches to estimating labor demand and a range of econometric techniques, Harrison and McMillan found, as one might expect, that "employment in low income countries substitutes for employment at home. Employment in high income affiliates, however, is generally complementary with U.S. employment. Second, U.S. capital investments in both high and low income affiliates are associated with lower employment in the United States."

In addition, the model's results show that "other factors have made important contributions to falling manufacturing employment in the United States, including technological change and import competition. Taken together, our results suggest that concerns over the impact of globalization on U.S. jobs are grounded in reality," the authors write.

Outsourcing Jobs? Multinationals and US Employment is available for purchase at: http://papers.nber.org/papers/W12372

Links to this paper and more than 4,000 additional TBED-related research reports, strategic plans and other papers can be found at the Tech-based Economic Development (TBED) Resource Center, jointly developed by the Technology Administration and SSTI, at: http://www.tbedresourcecenter.org/.

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SSTI Job Corner
The six position opportunities described below were posted on the SSTI Job Corner over the last week. For more information, including complete details on responsibilities, qualifications and application deadlines (when available), visit http://www.ssti.org/posting.htm.

Georgia Tech's Program in Science, Technology, and Innovation Policy (STIP), a joint program of the Georgia Tech School of Public Policy and the Georgia Tech Enterprise Innovation Institute, seeks applicants for two postdoctoral positions: (1) program manager; and (2) research associate II. Applicants should have a background and interests in one or more of these STIP research thrusts: strategic technologies and regional innovation clusters; research commercialization; universities and technology development; knowledge measurement; scientific and technological human capital; industrial modernization; and diversity and innovation. A doctoral degree in public policy, city and regional planning, economics, management or a related discipline is required. Competitive salary and benefits packages based on experience. These are both one-year positions and may be renewed annually.

The North Dakota State University Research and Technology Park is seeking a business development specialist to assume responsibility for the overall entrepreneurship activity in the Center for Technology Enterprise, which is scheduled to open in December 2006. This position will be responsible for coaching incubator tenants, providing technical assistance with business plan development, and capital formation for entrepreneurs. The position will also coordinate and enlist the assistance of an advisory board of experts from the region to guide the program and assist with the creation of new entrepreneurial ventures. A bachelors degree from an accredited university in business or accounting, or extensive experience in creating new technology ventures, is required.

The University of South Dakota is seeking a director of research development for its Office of Research and Sponsored Programs. This position will work with the vice president for research to develop and implement policies and procedures aimed at increasing research productivity, sponsored research activity, and the commercialization of research. Minimum qualifications include three years of experience in university research development or administration and a master's degree in a relevant field.

The Washington Technology Center (WTC) currently is hiring for three positions:

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People

Trisha Batra was named executive director of Absolutely! Aberdeen, an economic development group serving the Aberdeen, S.D., area.

Dr. Alan Brown was named executive director of the Pennsylvania NanoMaterials Commercialization Center, a newly formed economic development initiative.

Barbara Fleisner is the new vice president of economic development for the Green Bay Area Chamber of Commerce. She succeeds Paul Ehrfurth, who retired in June.

As part of plans to build a biotechnology campus in Kannapolis, N.C., Clyde Higgs has been hired to oversee a $100 million venture capital fund that will serve to attract biotech companies and other corporate tenants.

Paul Hiller has stepped down as CEO of the Riverside, Calif.-based Inland Empire Economic Partnership to be the executive director of the Boise Valley Economic Partnership.

GSP Consulting, a full-service government and consulting firm, has added Dr. Jerry Paytas to its newly established Economic Architecture practice as director of research.

Colorado State University and the Northern Colorado Economic Development Corp. together have hired Martin Shields as a new regional economist.

Marie Wesselhoft was appointed interim director for the Arizona Center for Innovation, replacing Jim Fountain who is retiring this month.

WSA (formerly the Washington Software Alliance) announced that Kathy Wilcox will step down as the organization's president and CEO at the end of 2006. Wilcox intends to work with for-profit and nonprofit businesses as an advisor on operations, business development, board structuring and fundraising.

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