Unemployment is higher here because there's a mismatch between the skills we have and the ones the economy wants. Unless South Florida can staunch its brain drain and reinvent itself as a white-collar employment center, its economy risks being dangerously dependent on sun, sand and surf for the foreseeable future. John Mestepey earns his living getting people to take jobs in South Florida. And Fort Lauderdale offers little comparative advantage. Fort Lauderdale fared better, but at 36th it was essentially at the halfway point of affordability.
Schools are another problem.
Managers in other parts of the nation who have their children in suburban districts are shocked to find out no such thing exists in South Florida, where whole counties are school districts, overcrowding is an ongoing problem and quality is a concern. One recruiter recalls a job candidate in Broward mistakenly thinking an elementary school surrounded by portable classrooms was a military camp. Just last week, the state rated schools for performance. In a devastating report for Miami-Dade, the county had 26 of the 78 Florida schools receiving an F grade, meaning reading and writing and math scores were below the state's minimum standards. Broward had seven such schools.