Response: Different Purposes,Different Measures

Abstract

This essay commends Chapple, Markusen, Schrock, Yamamoto, and Yu, whose article appears in this issue, for creating an index of metropolitan development potential that captures advantages related to city size and diversification over industries. Their critique of prior ranking studies, however, is unnecessarily harsh. In particular, studies that explore New Economy attributes or the presence of foundational technologies like computers and biotechnology may be valid when judged on their own terms. The authors imply that other analysts’ criteria for selecting high-technology regions are narrower than their own—typically ignoring the human capital dimension—but that is simply not the case. Index and ranking studies of metropolitan areas can provide useful insights provided that their purposes, conceptual frameworks, and methodologies are clearly understood.

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