Analytics, Education and Science, EU – Baltic States, Investments, Latvia, Markets and Companies, Rating

The results show that Northern Europe is taking the lead. Latvia occupies the 17th place in the country ranking of brain business jobs, with 46.1 such jobs per 1000 working age population. It does well in ICT, but poorly in tech. This is also reflected in the diagram below that maps strengths relative to other countries. Latvia is outstanding in IT-services, and good in advertising, but not very pronounced in the other fields. This reflects the fact that Latvia now has a thriving start-up scene, and low costs of doing business which make it attractive to investors. Communications are also good. For example, Latvia has the busiest airport in the Baltics.

Surprisingly, the geography of brain business jobs in Europe no longer follows a simple division between North and South, West and East. Many countries in Eastern and Central Europe outpace their Southern European fellow EU-members in brain business job intensity. The brain jobs of the former planned economies of Eastern and Central Europe tend to be strongly focused to the capital regions. The Slovakian capital region of Bratislava has the highest share of brain business jobs in all of Europe, despite the fact that Slovakia as a nation has a mediocre concentration of brain business jobs – it ranks 18th amongst 28 European countries.

"The analysis reveals a totally new landscape. Several Eastern European regions have outflanked southern Europe in creating brain business jobs." says Nima Sanandaji.

"There is a clear pattern. Brain business jobs are mobile and will quickly migrate to regions that provide favorable conditions. That is where economic growth will take off," adds Stefan Fölster.

This is the - to date - perhaps most extensive analysis of knowledge-intensive clusters in Europe, which is crucial information for investors and business managers.

The unique methodology adopted for this analysis looks specifically at the main activity of businesses rather than the specialization of professions across industries. Therefore our report perfectly captures clusters of knowledge-intensive industries, what we call "Brain Businesses".

The report can be accessed on www.ecepr.org.