By Richard Florida, Atlantic Cities, October 23, 2012

[....] In March 2009, I wrote a piece for The Atlantic outlining the likely effects of the crisis on America’s economic landscape. Several years into the crisis, I wanted to look at how the crisis might have affected the geography of finance across America.

With the help of my Martin Prosperity Institute (MPI) colleague Charlotta Mellander, I looked at two dimensions of finance. The first covers the geography of the firms and establishments that make up the finance and insurance industry based on 2010 data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. The second covers the geography of finance and related jobs and wages based on 2011 data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The MPI’s Zara Matheson mapped the data [....]

Perhaps the most striking thing in our analysis is this: While finance was the main force in precipitating the crisis, its share of occupations and wages has increased in its wake. The finance share of all U.S. occupations grew from 4.4 percent in 2006 to 4.8 percent in 2011 according to our analysis, while the finance sector’s share of wages grew from 6.8 percent to 7.3 percent over the same period. During this time, nearly three-quarters (73.3 percent) of U.S. metros saw their share of finance jobs grow, while nearly 60 percent of metros saw their share of finance wages increase. The average wages and salary for finance-related jobs increased from $60,000 in 2006 to $68,740 in 2011. [....]