From a Wall Street Journal article on government austerity and economic development in the United Kingdom, making the point that efforts to rejuvenate regional economies have a mixed track record in the UK and elsewhere:
Stuart S. Rosenthal, an economics professor at Syracuse University, remembers driving through Virginia in 1997 and seeing a sign saying, “You are entering southwest Virginia’s high tech corner” [sic — the sign said “corridor].
“And all I could see was cows and farms,” he said. Recent employment data shows that aside from one pocket, little has changed.
Ouch!
Are those signs still up? If so, someone please take them down.
