Founder Michael Porter Discusses ICIC In Harvard Gazette

Our founder and Chairman, Harvard Business School Professor Michael E. Porter, was recently featured in an article in the Harvard Gazette, “The costs of inequality: Faster lives, quicker deaths.” The article, part of a series on Harvard professors’ work as it relates to issues of inequality, details the disparate health and economic outcomes seen by African-American and Hispanic populations across the U.S. According to ICIC research cited in the article, 37 percent of U.S. inner city residents are Hispanic and 31 percent are African-American.

From the article:

After the Los Angeles riots in 1994, Porter founded the ICIC in Boston to increase business activity in urban areas with low income levels and high poverty and unemployment rates.

“A lot of the thinking when we started said that the problem was a social problem,” Porter recalled. “There are many social issues in these communities, and that’s why the performance is what it is. But ultimately this couldn’t be solved by building affordable housing or social programs. We also had to at the same time be creating an economic strategy to help grow businesses and attract new businesses into these locations, which would improve the accessibility of jobs.”

Read the full article here.