On a self-reliant, resilient and regenerative local economy : 3 : What makes economic expansion happen?

Jane Jacobs was asked what she thought she’d be remembered for most. “If I were to be remembered as a really important thinker of the century, the most important thing I've contributed is my discussion of what makes economic expansion happen. This is something that has puzzled people always. I think I've figured out what it is.” Interview in Reason, 2001. City Views : Urban studies legend Jane Jacobs on gentrification, the New Urbanism, and her legacy.

She goes on to say "Expansion and development are two different things. Development is differentiation of what already existed... Practically every new thing that happens is a differentiation of a previous thing… Expansion is an actual growth in size or volume of activity.” from interview excerpt on her Wikipedia page.

From her 1969 book The Economy of Cities and later in Cities and the Wealth of Nations and The Nature of Economies, Jacobs referred to a principle she called import replacement, that a city’s economic expansion grows from producing for local markets what is now imported, some of this production later becoming viable for export. A principle I’ve found difficult to apply to Nanaimo, a city whose economy is supported more by public sector payrolls than by the private sector's local creation of goods and services, and where much commerce is in effect privatized to remote corporate owned shopping centres, with many franchised businesses.

The earlier post on craft brewing’s growth examines what can be learned from its success by other local industries. Has the consolidation of industries into fewer and fewer, larger and larger corporations, created niche demands at the local level?

A large trend is right in front of us: food security, farm-to-table restaurants, farmers markets, local wines and spirits as well as craft beer… Its economic potential is considerable. What help does it need (or want) to go to the next level?  

Cities and the Wealth of Nations－Principles of Economic Life, Jane Jacobs
Chapter 7, Transplant Regions pic.twitter.com/Lot1acbdBA

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