Ask people involved in economic development about the importance of ‘quality of life’ in the site selection process and you will get about as many different answers as you have respondents.
In large part this is due to the wide variety of ‘definitions’ as to what is quality of life. “Quality of life” is pretty much an individual assessment of things that are important to a person. Not everyone defines it the same way. However, there do seem to be some common denominators. Those who know me well can already anticipate where I am heading on this one. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs takes a somewhat layered approach to personality development that places certain needs in the order in which they need to be met if one is to climb the ladder of self-fulfillment. These levels are, in order of which they must be met:
- Physiological Needs
- Safety Needs
- Love, Affection and Belongingness Needs
- Esteem Needs
- Self-Actualization Needs
What often gets missed in this process (in my opinion) is the fact that the parameters involved tend to shift when someone moves to a new level resulting in a revisiting of the lower levels to accommodate those changes, a result of a shift from the concept of ‘need’ to the concept of ‘want’. Also, often missed is that the concept can be applied to communities as well as to individuals.
How does all of this apply to site selection when some company is considering locating a facility in a region? Quite simply, the literature that I have reviewed (list available upon request since this is not a major paper) indicates that quality of life seldom plays an important role in the initial phases of site selection. Instead, it can become the crucial element for those location who have survived the process to make the final cuts where the company makes their choice of location.
Quality of Life also seems to be defined in many ways by the income level of workers that will be employed at the facility. The higher the pay scale, the broader the definition of quality of life that is applied. Physiological Needs shift from simply ‘food and shelter’ to one of certain foods, quality of homes, and other amenities such as sidewalks, art, music, etc. That is not to say that those issues are not important to those making minimum wage, just simply because of affordability they become more important with those who have the discretionary income to fully utilize them. When someone is working 2 jobs trying to make ends meet, the availability of sidewalks, parks, recreation opportunities, theater, live music, etc., is not as important simply because it is seldom a viable option. For people who have more time and money, those things take on a greater level of importance.
In summary (since I’m still busy reviewing the literature on this), those things like sidewalks, parks, art, theater (live ), music, small specialty stores with unique items, can make the difference in the final determination of where to locate a business/company. If these amenities are not available in one area, but are in another, it can be the determining factor. Based upon what I have seen thus far, it appears that many areas are bolstering those very amenities as an investment in the future jobs they hope to generate for their areas. This whole process is also dependent upon the type of business that is looking at the locations. If it is a business that does not care about longevity of workers in the work place, rather is simply looking for revolving door employees that keep the pay scales low and are not required to invest a good deal in training and retention, those businesses really do not care about quality of life issues.
I guess it is ultimately up to the location to decide what types of businesses they wish to attract, whether they want to have a transient population or a stable one, what payrolls they wish to attract to their areas. I’ve got a lot more digging to do on this but right now, it looks like it requires planning to make things happen and to prepare to look to the future and activate programs to shape that future now.
