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Richard Florida Must Be Lonely

By David Topping

Because in time for the Canadian edition of his book Who’s Your City, the Toronto-based Florida ranked the best places in the country to live for certain demographics: singles (aged 20–29), mid-career professionals (29–44), “empty-nesters” (45–64), and families with children. The ten cities leading the way for “singles”? Calgary, Iqaluit, Ottawa-Gatineau, Victoria, Yellowknife, Edmonton, Guelph, Canmore, Whitehorse, and Montreal. Toronto finds itself at the top of the list for “empty-nesters” and right by the top for “families with children”; According to Florida’s rankings, you’re seemingly best off living in Calgary after you graduate from university, marrying, moving to Ottawa-Gatineau, having kids there, moving to Toronto when the kids leave for university, and then moving on back to Ottawa-Gatineau once your career ends. Sounds great.

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  • http://null KeithTalent

    Is this maybe an April Fool’s joke? I wanted to give Florida the benefit of the doubt but it’s become clear he is a cringe-inducing gasbag. Iqualit and Ottawa for singles?

  • http://undefined KeithTalent

    Sorry, “Iqaluit”. Quick and dirty internet research leads me to believe there are probably about 600 people between 20-29 in Iqaluit. Making the perhaps controversial assumption that a single person is interested in meeting another single person, and making the further perhaps controversial assumptions that a single person is interested in meeting a single person of similar age and of a certain gender, then our hypothetical single person might have less than 100 “dating possibilities”.

  • http://undefined Ben

    Where the hell are these places he’s talking about?
    The only one which is remotely familiar to me is Ottawa-Gatineau. I used to live in the area. He must mean Gatottawanata-Hullpriorleans.

  • http://null Padraic

    Way to make a straw man out of Florida. Obviously, the purpose of the rankings isn’t that you are supposed to move throughout your life – it’s simply to give different advice based on what stage people are at in their life.
    I think it’s pretty legitimate to quibble with his high ranking of Iqaluit, but you don’t need to completely distort the purpose of the rankings.

  • http://www.torontoist.com David Topping

    “Obviously, the purpose of the rankings isn’t that you are supposed to move throughout your life – it’s simply to give different advice based on what stage people are at in their life.”
    Yeah, I got that. That’s why I said “according to Florida’s rankings, you’re seemingly best off…” rather than “Florida says you must…” The latter half of the entry is what we in the blog biz refer to as a “joke.”

  • http://null panko

    Read Florida’s books: I have never seen so little intellectual capital blown into so much hype and publicity.

  • http://null Vincent Clement

    Or, since Ottawa-Gatineau is on every list and is at or near the top, you could just live in Ottawa-Gatineau from beginning to end.