Mapping the Skill Sets Unique to Cities

Cities have long been considered hubs of economic activity, and closely linked to opportunity. As Sohan Murthy posted earlier this week on the LinkedIn Blog, "Over 175 million LinkedIn members are located in the United States and Europe, and by mining the skills and location data in their profiles, we built two maps that highlight the skills which define almost every major city in each region."

Some findings from the map confirmed trends throughout the United States and Europe, such as the abundance of "skills valued by the petroleum industry are much more likely to found in Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and most recently North Dakota."

Across the Atlantic Ocean, many European cities have technical computer skills, but "Madrid and Sevilla have just enough java development skills to rank as the dominant category, whereas Hamburg and Berlin have user interface design, game development, and mobile development skills – indicative of the region’s booming startup scene."

These maps are a continuation of LinkedIn's Economic Graph, an initiative for digitally representing the globalized economy to ultimately "build a global map of supply and demand for every skill on LinkedIn, and in the process, help members find opportunities by offering a change in scenery."

H/T to Richard Florida for the article.