by Richard Florida -- Basic Books, New York, NY. 2002.

Author
Richard Florida is a professor in the Heinz School of Public Policy and Management at Carnegie Mellon University. He is also a columnist for Information Week and a popular speaker and lecturer.

Blurb
 “The Rise of the Creative Class gives us a provocative new way to think about why we live as we do today-and where we might be headed. Weaving storytelling with masses of new and updated research, Richard Florida traces the fundamental theme that runs through a host of seemingly unrelated changes in American society: the growing role of creativity in our economy.
Just as William Whyte's 1956 classic The Organization Man showed how the organizational ethos of that age permeated every aspect of life, Florida describes a society in which the creative ethos is increasingly dominant. Millions of us are beginning to work and live much as creative types like artists and scientists always have-with the result that our values and tastes, our personal relationships, our choices of where to live, and even our sense and use of time are changing. Leading the shift are the nearly 38 million Americans in many diverse fields who create for a living--the Creative Class.
The Rise of the Creative Class chronicles the ongoing sea of change in people's choices and attitudes, and shows not only what's happening but also how it stems from a fundamental economic change. The Creative Class now comprises more than thirty percent of the entire workforce. Their choices have already had a huge economic impact. In the future they will determine how the workplace is organized, what companies will prosper or go bankrupt, and even which cities will thrive or wither.” -- From the book jacket (2002 hardcover first edition)

Why Read It
So you won’t find yourself in a conversation in which you are the only person who hasn’t. This is a “must read” for anyone is interested in the larger trends shaping our society. The book is so widely read and quoted that key phrases from it, including of course, “creative class,” have become common terms in our public vernacular.