Technology & Information
The nation’s advanced industries are falling behind, but place-based strategies can help them catch up
Economic Development
The Recompete Pilot Program can help rebuild distressed places—if policymakers properly fund it
Workforce Development
We haven’t yet decided that climate and infrastructure jobs are for everyone, or even that we’ll have enough workers
Workforce Development
How the American Rescue Plan Act is preparing workers for the job market of the future through local investments
Focus Areas
Building inclusive regional economies
Brookings Metro is helping fuel a new generation of investments in inclusive innovation and talent development by chronicling and informing the implementation of programs such as the Economic Development Administration’s Build Back Better Regional Challenge, the Commerce Department’s CHIPS for America Fund and Regional Technology and Innovation Hub program, and the National Science Foundation’s Regional Innovation Engines.
Advancing competitiveness and inclusion through infrastructure
Brookings Metro is helping local leaders bend infrastructure spending toward more transformative and inclusive priorities by mapping state infrastructure policies and practices that advance economic inclusion and environmental justice, codifying success principles of locally led state infrastructure campaigns, and detailing how regional and state leaders can use Investment in Infrastructure & Jobs Act dollars to equip a diverse new generation of infrastructure workers.
Accelerating equitable climate action
Brookings Metro is contributing to equitable climate mitigation and adaptation by framing the need for community-led solutions to sustainable local development, creating reliable measures of the “payoff” from resilience-focused investments, demonstrating how the public sector can tap emerging data sources to better partner with investors and consumers, and bolstering local capacity to deploy federal investment toward equitable, climate-smart outcomes.