Description

February 19, 2009

"Ontario in the Creative Age" lays out a vision for Ontario that describes the important bases for a vibrant Ontario economy in 2030. First, all Ontarians must harness their full creative potential. We should aim for the Province to become the first in the world with half our workforce in the high-value, high-paying jobs of the creative economy by 2030. At the same time, we must make all our jobs more creativity-oriented. We must reinforce the development of our clustered industries to compete more on the basis of distinctive advantage than on low cost or replication of what is done elsewhere. Second, the Province should aspire to be the world's most talented jurisdiction. We need to raise the percentage of our young people in colleges and universities so that we have the talent base to fill the 70 percent of new jobs in the coming decades requiring post secondary education.
Third, Ontario needs to establish new social safety nets. Currently, we aim to provide material benefits for those in need, but we have to provide greater opportunity for our citizens to engage their full creative talents, in sync with the creative age. For example, let's aim to be the first jurisdiction to implement early childhood development for those in high-risk circumstances. Such investments in life-long skills can help ensure that Ontario has broad participation in creating and sharing prosperity.
Fourth, Ontario must build province-wide geographic advantage. We have a strong economic core, but we need to improve the connection of the cities, towns and regions across the province - linking our older, industrial communities and disconnected rural areas to the mega-region. There are many ways to improve this connectivity from light rail to local transit hubs, but the key is to increase the speed and velocity with which we move goods, people and ideas to compete with the world's other leading mega-regions.