Had the thought as I drove by the convention center site on the way in this morning that there’s been relatively little discussion of the merits/drawbacks of the convention center from a labor standpoint.

Which is to say that the convention center will generate a significant number of jobs in center city. What everone disagrees upon is whether this is a net positive or negative. I know some folks (and c’mon Charlie, I’m calling you out) who say that this is ultimately a waste; that while the enterprise might indeed create many full-time jobs, they are not jobs that will pay a “livable” wage; that the people who take those jobs might as well go work at McDonalds because frankly, they’re not likely to make any more money at our “first-class” facility.

And that’s likely true, as far as it goes. But there’s a second aspect to this question.

Frankly, there aren’t a few hundred such jobs available at McDonalds or anywhere else in the city. If you live in the city, perhaps in one of the less-affluent neighborhoods where many of the applicants may come from, you have to travel to find even these jobs. You have to drive out to the suburbs, or maybe you need to take the bus or catch a ride in some other way. Employment opportunities, even at this low rung of the ladder, are simply not available in sufficient supply in the City of Lancaster for those who might be interested in them.

The convention center project would indeed change that. And so we can argue that the jobs created would not be sufficient, would not be the kind of jobs we should be creating for these communities - but who else is creating any significant number of jobs at all for unskilled workers in the city, where transportation would not be an issue because people could ostensibly walk to work?

The answer is, no one. Even at best (”best” being a relative term here) if a Wal-Mart were to be built at the Stockyards site, that would provide a fraction of the jobs provided by the convention center/hotel, would probably pay minimum wage where the downtown project is likely to pay at least slightly more than that, and would be physically located too far away from most city neighborhoods, making transportation an issue.

None of this validates the idea of the project in total, but I throw it out as food for thought. In terms of jobs this isn’t economic development in an ideal sense by any means; but some might say that something is better than nothing.