Reply to What would make DC more appealing for young professionals?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I think DC is pretty attractive to young professionals.  However, one area where it is lacking is in the creative field.  DC has a lot of interesting stuff, but much of it is more middle of the road or even stodgy.  A little more edge culturally would probably be attractive to a lot of younger people--that is something that draws people to NYC and other cities.  [/quote]

Not picking on this poster in particular but for god's sake none of you all seem to know a thing about DC or people under 60.[/quote]

I am under 60 and have lived in several cities that are generally viewed as attractive to young people, including the Bay Area, Austin and Berlin.  I am also very familiar with other cities.  Based on that experience, it is very clear to me that DC is not cutting edge culturally.  Yes, it is better than when I moved here.  No doubt about that.  But there is a lot of room for improvement.  [/quote]

Some people really believe that DC is the be all and end all for everyone - and who wouldn't want to live here?? Gasp!! LOL[/quote]

No, we just don't like bamas and get annoyed by transplants who haven't ventured beyond the Wharf yet feel they know enough about the DMV to opine about what the area needs. [/quote]

I am the one all of you have been responding to so I will weigh in.  I have lived in DC for quite a while now, and if it makes you feel better, I have been to the Wharf exactly once.  Why shouldn't I have an opinion?  I have lived here a long time--longer than any other place I have lived in my life--and yet I also have direct experience with other cities, so I have the ability to make a comparison.  Seems like a valid perspective.

Don't get me wrong.  I actually like DC, and personally, I had enough of the creative types in other cities by the time I came here.  But the question was basically what is lacking in DC that might make it more interesting to young professionals.  I still think the response to that question would be a stronger creative community.  At this point, I have kids so it doesn't really matter to me, but that it is very plain that DC is lacking in that area.  
[/quote]

The problem is that that question: what would make DC more interesting to young professionals is fundamentally flawed.  DC is already, and has been since the 90's, one of the most popular places for young professionals in the country.  It doesn't need to do anything extra to attract them.  For a city the size of DC (700,000) it's art, music and food scene is top notch.  And yes, I too have lived in many global hot spots (London, Mumbai, Cape Town).  Young policy and international focused professionals will always flock to DC.  But they're nerds.  That's ok, we're all nerds as well.  It's that mish mash of being able to talk about Ukraine policy while eating Ethiopian food and watching an Iranian protest in the shadow of the White House that attracts them.  The DC scene from the 90's was one of the prime spawns of hipsters.  The influence of native DC culture (gogo, hardcore, and tagging to name three) has had an outsized influence on what is thought to be "cool" disco dan.

But to be honest, culturally DC has gone downhill over the past decade.  That is true.  But that is just a normal cycle and has more to do with end group millennials being more boring than the three cohorts before them.  The key to DC culture is not the transplants that come in.  It's the children of the ones that stay.[/quote]

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