The Portland job market!
I've been starting this discussion in a couple different forums in an attempt to try and get to some of the causes - irrespective of the current economic funk - of the poor reputation for the Portland's (and I guess, Oregon's in general) job market. It's almost a meme at this point; sky is blue, water is wet, there were no Matrix sequels, Portland's job market sucks.
SSP seems to have a higher percentage of educated "insiders" than the other forums I've had this discussion on, so I'm eager to hear your opinion. So far, these are some of the themes I've come across:
- Not a "college town" but lots of small colleges introduce lots of young workers into the market every year
- Portland is a "trendy" place to live; people who follow trends don't create jobs and are only secondarily concerned with employment
- Few large scale employers; small companies are more insular in hiring practices
- Higher quality of life leads more people to accept less for their abilities
- Hipsters
Obviously, these are pretty generalized. So I was hoping for some more detailed thoughts. Outside of this general idea - which I don't particularly agree with - that liberal governments are "bad for business", I'm unclear on the specifics of the market malaise. Is it as simple as supply and demand?
(For the record: I'm a 30 year old married male who would like to relocate to Portland. However, after one aborted attempt 3 years ago [when the economy was "good"] we've become much more cautious and thoughtful about our strategy. Hoping this information might give me a little more comfort level in future attempts.)
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